Bikes made in Hebei county find global popularity

SHIJIAZHUANG — Ahead of Christmas, tandem bikes, powered cars for kids and baby strollers produced in a small Chinese county were on the shelves in overseas supermarkets and online sales platforms, ready to be taken home as gifts.

"Our baby strollers and car seats can be found in Walmart and on Amazon. All our products are for export, most of which enter the European and North American markets," said Qiao Xiaoguang, deputy general manager of Goodbaby's branch company in Pingxiang county, Hebei province.

Goodbaby is among 4,800 manufacturers of children's bicycles, strollers and electronic car toys in Pingxiang.

Over the years, they have formed an industrial cluster in the county, generating over 30 billion yuan ($4.17 billion) last year.

Last year, Pingxiang manufactured 145 million kids' bicycles, strollers and electronic toy cars. Its products were exported to over 80 countries and regions, including the United States, Russia, Germany and Kazakhstan.

With a booming children's vehicle industry, Pingxiang, once poverty-stricken, has morphed into a global production and research center for children's vehicles.

Saffir Chuniyan Kunnummal, a 47-year-old Indian businessman, said his multinational trading company had reached a cooperation deal with enterprises in Pingxiang. Under the deal, about 20 containers of bicycles are sent to the Dubai market every month.

Another foreign trader, Meldan Anabedyev, has become a regular visitor to the county since his first purchase of kids' bikes over a decade ago.

"The products here are of good quality and not expensive," said the Turkmen trader, who comes to Pingxiang every year for new products.

Pingxiang's history of bicycle-making started in the 1970s when a villager assembled a bike with accessories at home. Today, small and random family businesses and workshops have given way to modern industrial parks.

Some pioneering enterprises pursued industrial upgrading in their forays into high-end children's vehicle markets.

Montresor, a local brand, is one of these enterprises that has made tremendous headway in recent years.

"When our Breeze series was first introduced to the market in 2019, only 1,500 bicycles were sold. Yet in 2023, the figure went up to more than 100,000 units," said Zhou Wang, deputy general manager of the company that owns the brand.

Having manufactured other brands for decades, the company decided to create its own brand in 2018 and invited international designers to help.

The works of Italian painter Giorgio Morandi inspired this series of beginners' bikes.

With yellow tires, light-colored frames, rattan baskets and animal-shaped bells, it has a naturally soft tone and is now particularly popular in China, Japan and South Korea, said Zhou.

Although priced at about 1,000 yuan and slightly expensive, Breeze has still won the hearts of countless young mothers due to its artistic design, antibacterial saddles and handlebars, and the availability of a button that enables the quick removal of training wheels.

"To cater to the aesthetics and demands of European and American markets, we also introduced new designs, such as using ultralight aircraft-grade aluminum as the frame and replacing the heavy chains with car engine belts, and so on," Zhou added.

Over the years, the industrial cluster of children's bikes, strollers and electronic toy cars has financially benefited more than 200 nearby villages and provided jobs to 120,000 people.

At a local factory, Liu Huagai, a 49-year-old female worker living in Wanghongkang village, Pingxiang, is assembling a baby stroller. Local employees such as Liu make up 90 percent of the company's workforce.

As of the end of 2024, 10,000 strollers produced at her factory had been shipped by rail to Russia.

Xinhua