Recently, on major e-commerce platforms and live streaming platforms in mainland China, low-priced cashmere has been showing a trend of high sales. However, these “good quality and low price” cashmere products actually contain only a small amount or even no cashmere at all.
According to a report by “Financial Investigation,” despite live stream hosts repeatedly emphasizing that their cashmere products have “100% cashmere” written on the washing labels, and providing “test reports” for the products to prove they are all 100% cashmere, with cashmere sweaters labeled with golden washing labels being promoted as “top-notch products.”
However, the reporter from the media learned from Puyuan Town, Tongxiang City, one of the shipping locations for these cashmere sweaters, that the cost of 100% cashmere yarn is close to 1 yuan per gram. When considering production losses, labor, and machinery costs, the cost is even higher than the selling price of cashmere sweaters on online live streams.
Local industry insiders revealed that when 100% cashmere products leave the factory, they already have washing labels attached. However, factories also produce some low-cashmere content or blends of cashmere and wool “blanks” for distributors to label themselves. The so-called “blanks” have no washing labels or any trademarks. Unscrupulous distributors would overstate the cashmere content when attaching the washing label to the “blanks.”
An insider frankly stated that the cashmere content on the washing label can be whatever the distributors want depending on their pricing strategy, “if they want to sell it at a higher price, they would mark it as higher.” Additionally, the so-called “golden label” in live streams is just a marketing gimmick with different colors, as per the hosts’ promotional tactics.
Upon visiting Yuanming Cashmere Clothing Factory Store in Puyuan Town, the reporter confirmed the statements of the insider, as the clothes displayed in the store are made of wool but marked as 100% cashmere. One of the sweaters labeled as fake cashmere but actually made of wool was a product customized for a live streaming company, purchased at 160 yuan, but was sold for 299 yuan on the live stream as “100% cashmere.”
Furthermore, based on information from live streams, the reporter visited another shipping location in Ordos City. Managers Qin and Hao from Hongfu Cashmere Round Clothing Store on Dalat Nanlu Road revealed that the so-called “cashmere cardigan” sold in their live streams actually had no cashmere content at all, basically deceiving customers.
Another live stream host from Yulian Cashmere Boutique admitted that many businesses would deceive customers by selling inferior products, and one cannot possibly buy real pure cashmere products at live stream prices. Manager Xu from a factory store candidly admitted that only wool products sold as cashmere products would sell well.
The manager Liu from Dingrong Clothing Store frankly admitted that although the “cashmere sweaters” she sells are labeled as “100% cashmere,” most of them are a blend of cashmere and wool. Despite being recently fined, she expressed complete indifference to the consequences.
According to reports, many businesses at the wholesale city of Ordos Cashmere have the issue of mislabeling the cashmere content in their products.