In the autumn-winter apparel landscape of northern China, Xiaoli Town in Rongcheng County is attempting to answer a long-standing question for county-level garment industries: how to transform four decades of manufacturing strength into new momentum for brand globalization when the domestic market is saturated and competition is homogenized. The 2026 Autumn-Winter Xiaoli Apparel Trade Fair, which opened on August 1, offers a combination of cross-border e-commerce, digital design, and green materials as the answer.
Industrial Heritage and Transformation Pressure
Xiaoli's garment industry dates back to the 1980s, evolving from family workshops into a cluster specializing in middle-aged jackets, fleece, autumn-winter cotton-padded clothing, and outdoor functional wear. Public data shows these products have sold well both domestically and internationally, thanks to solid craftsmanship and high cost-performance. However, local government officials admitted at the opening ceremony that the industry currently faces bottlenecks of homogenized competition and an overly single domestic sales channel. This acknowledgment reflects a common dilemma for county-level garment industries: strong manufacturing capability but weak brand premium; heavy reliance on domestic sales but slow overseas channel development.
Fair Highlights: Four Upgrade Directions
The fair is not a simple ordering event but an industrial docking platform integrating keynote forums, fashion shows, supply chain sharing, roundtable discussions, and cross-border e-commerce training. The agenda clearly identifies four key directions for industrial upgrading: cross-border e-commerce channel building, AI+3D digital design application, renewable green fabric promotion, and automated intelligent production line implementation. These directions directly target the pain points of county-level garment enterprises—insufficient design capability, lacking overseas channels, low production efficiency, and tightening environmental standards.
At the fair, the autumn-winter fashion show displayed windbreakers, fleece, and outdoor functional wear, with renewable eco-friendly fabrics as a highlight, signaling a shift toward green and sustainable development. In industry sharing sessions, experts and enterprise leaders discussed cross-border export paths, platform support policies, AI+3D design reshaping R&D processes, rPET fabric applications, and intelligent sewing equipment, providing local enterprises with a complete upgrade roadmap from concept to practice.
Cross-Border E-commerce: From Policy to Practice
Notably, the fair includes a two-day cross-border e-commerce special training covering major platforms such as Amazon, TikTok, Ozon, and Etsy, with courses on store operations, brand going global, AI digital design, automated production line implementation, and one-person company (OPC) store setup and distribution. This arrangement precisely meets the real needs of small and medium-sized garment enterprises to expand overseas markets. The head of the Xiong'an New Area Cross-Border E-commerce Comprehensive Service Center delivered a special policy briefing at the opening ceremony, clarifying the supporting measures and service guarantees available to enterprises. For Xiaoli enterprises long dependent on domestic sales, this means overseas markets are no longer an unattainable goal but a feasible path backed by policy, platform support, and training.
Industrial Impact: Differentiated Breakthrough for County-Level Garment Clusters
From an industry perspective, Xiaoli's attempt provides a reference model for transformation in northern county-level garment industries. Against the backdrop of domestic demand pressure and strong overseas demand, the competitiveness of industrial clusters no longer depends solely on manufacturing costs but increasingly on design, brand, and marketing—the high-value links of the value chain. Leveraging Xiong'an New Area's location and policy advantages, Xiaoli is trying to combine its manufacturing strengths with cross-border e-commerce and digital design, extending the industrial chain in both directions. This 'manufacturing + digitalization + globalization' model, if it can facilitate substantial supply-demand matching during the two-month fair, is expected to open new growth space for Rongcheng's garment industry and provide lessons for other county-level clusters.