Keqiao Fabric Firm's Dual-Track Experiment: From School Uniforms to Light Luxury

While the mass fabric market is mired in price wars, a brand duo in Keqiao's Dongsheng Road district is carving out new space through strategic differentiation. Qiting and Haoli Textile—one holding the stable base of school uniforms and outdoor fabrics, the other entering the blue ocean of high-end menswear—share a supply chain yet operate independently. This dual-track model reflects a shift from scale orientation to value orientation among Keqiao fabric merchants.

Background

Qiting's origins were humble. Launched in 2013 and registered in 2014, it started with a store in the East Market, focusing on basic school uniform fabrics. Solid quality control built a stable customer base and supply chain, but by 2018 intensifying competition squeezed margins on conventional fabrics, forcing a strategic pivot: developing functional outdoor fabrics on one hand, and founding Haoli Textile to target high-end menswear on the other. This timeline aligns with the broader upgrade of Keqiao's market—when low-end overcapacity makes differentiation a survival necessity.

Haoli's positioning is clear: exclusively using natural fibers like wool, silk, and lyocell, replacing chemical dyeing with plant extraction. Fabric prices range from 100 to 600 RMB per meter, directly targeting high-end menswear brands and designer orders, avoiding low-end price wars. This price point sits in the mid-to-high range for Keqiao, meaning customers demand higher quality, environmental standards, and service, but they are willing to pay for value.

Industry Impact

The dual-brand synergy amplifies supply chain advantages. Haoli shares Qiting's 15,000-square-meter warehouse, operating both stock and custom order models: stock items can handle small urgent orders, custom orders take 3-10 days, with fastest shipping in 1 hour. This responsiveness is rare in high-end fabrics, relying on mature inventory management and production scheduling. For buyers, it means small-batch quick response is feasible without worrying about minimum order quantities.

Digital tools further enhance service capability. Haoli participates in the AI Fabric mini-program, digitizing core fabrics like waffle knit, health jersey, and air layer. Previously, designers brought sample swatches to find similar fabrics, requiring inefficient manual searching and color card comparison; now the system offers one-click matching, saving time even for overseas clients. For high-end customers, precision matters more than low price, and digitalization becomes a support point for service premium.

More notably, the AI Fabric Experience Hall in Dongsheng Road is about to trial operation, equipped with smart body scanning, 3D virtual fitting, fabric visual creation, and garment simulation. This extends fabric display from physical swatches to virtual space, allowing designers and brand clients to preview online and experience offline. For Keqiao merchants, this is not just a tech upgrade but an expansion of customer acquisition channels—especially for those relying on designer resources, virtual samples can reduce communication costs and speed up sampling decisions.

Practical Advice

For Buyers - Prioritize suppliers offering both stock and custom modes to handle small urgent orders and shorten procurement cycles. - Utilize digital fabric libraries with matching functions to significantly reduce sampling time, especially for high-frequency, multi-variety procurement. - For high-end fabrics, request environmental certifications (e.g., EU-standard fluorine-free) to ensure compliance with export or brand standards.

For Foreign Trade Enterprises - Adopt a dual-brand strategy to separate conventional and high-end products, avoiding price system confusion and precisely targeting different markets. - Leverage digital tools (like AI fabric matching) to improve remote service capabilities and reduce communication costs with overseas clients. - Share warehouse and production resources to enhance delivery flexibility, but ensure brand independence and customer data isolation.