The outdoor fabric specialty zone on Dongsheng Road in Keqiao's China Textile City is becoming a window into the transformation of local fabric merchants. Haoli Textile, a premium fabric stall, targets the business menswear and light luxury segment with a price range of 100-600 yuan per meter, sharply contrasting with the surrounding mass market. Behind this is the support of Qiting's decade-long supply chain and a dual-brand strategy that started from school uniform fabrics and gradually moved upmarket.
Background Haoli's growth trajectory began with the launch of the Qiting brand in 2013. At that time, Qiting set up a store in the East Market, focusing on basic school uniform fabrics, accumulating stable customers and supply chain resources through solid quality control. In 2018, as profits on conventional fabrics came under pressure, the brand initiated a strategic transformation: on one hand, it developed functional outdoor fabrics; on the other, it established Haoli Textile to specialize in premium business menswear fabrics, forming a dual-brand independent operation. Qiting was among the first to enter Phase I of the Dongsheng Road outdoor functional fabric zone, while Haoli opened an independent stall in Phase II, each with a clear market focus.
The Dongsheng Road area gathers brand owners, e-commerce merchants, and fashion designers who demand finer fabrics and offer better order conversion, providing an ideal platform for Haoli's high-end positioning. General Manager Li Xiongzhen noted that the area's demand for refined fabrics directly boosted Haoli's business. This location logic reflects the evolution of Keqiao's fabric market from wholesale to precision services.
Industry Impact Haoli's product strategy directly addresses the pain points of premium menswear and light luxury fashion. The line uses natural fibers such as wool, silk, and lyocell, abandoning chemical dyeing in favor of plant-extracted colors, highlighting environmental attributes. This combination of materials and processes determines its 100-600 yuan price band, precisely avoiding low-end price wars and catering to designers and brand purchasers who demand strict quality. For buyers, this means differentiated fabrics are no longer scarce but can be quickly matched through digital tools.
On the supply chain side, Haoli shares Qiting's 15,000-square-meter warehouse, adopting both stock and custom order models. Stock supports small-batch urgent orders, custom cycles are 3-10 days, and fastest delivery is within one hour. This rapid response capability is crucial in the premium fabric segment as it shortens the cycle from sampling to production. More notably, Haoli participates in the AI Cloth mini-program, digitizing core fabrics like waffle, health knit, double-face plain, mesh, air layer, and pique, enabling one-click matching of similar fabrics. This tool significantly reduces manual sample searching and color card comparison time, especially benefiting remote foreign trade communication.
Dual-brand synergy further amplifies scale effects. The outdoor fabric production line is equipped with Italian imported napping machines, continuously expanding capacity and improving supply chain bargaining power. Foreign trade channels target Europe and America, with fabrics meeting EU standards for fluorine-free environmental protection. Domestically, long-term partners include Qiaodun (8-10 years), Xiaobeibei, Yingqi, Macedonia, and Xiaozhubanna. Two-way traffic helps Haoli open premium menswear customer channels. After two years of strategic transformation, overall performance improved significantly last year, and order growth remains strong this year.
Practical Advice ### For Buyers - Focus on plant-dyed natural fiber fabrics, as their environmental attributes meet high-end brand ESG requirements, but verify colorfastness and batch consistency in advance. - Use AI fabric search tools to quickly match similar fabrics and shorten development cycles, but always request physical samples to verify hand feel and drape.
For Foreign Trade Companies - Follow Haoli's model by making digital archiving a standard practice to improve remote sample matching efficiency and reduce cross-border communication costs. - Invest in environmental certifications (e.g., EU fluorine-free standards) to meet increasingly stringent sustainable procurement requirements from European and American clients.
Keqiao fabric merchants' path to high-end is not simply raising prices but a systematic reconstruction of supply chain, digitalization, and brand positioning. Haoli's case shows that within traditional wholesale markets, it is possible to cultivate refined service capabilities for designers and brand owners. In the future, with the rollout of infrastructure like the AI Cloth experience center, this transformation may accelerate, but the core remains extreme control over materials and craftsmanship.