What happened when Wenzhou burned fake and inferior leather shoes?

Replay of the incident

In 1987, the daughter of former Minister of Commerce Hu Ping bought a pair of new leather shoes in a shopping mall in Wuhan. After wearing them for a day, the soles came off and became a veritable "one-day shoe." ". As Minister of Commerce, Hu Ping lost all face in front of his daughter.

It was also in this year that the mayor of Wenzhou received a pair of worn-out shoes from a couple of newcomers from the Northeast: Wenzhou people used such low-quality leather shoes to deceive others. Will the mayor be blushing? It turned out that the groom’s newly purchased Wenzhou leather shoes were opened at the wedding banquet and were filled with horse manure paper.

A reporter from Xinhua News Agency wrote a report based on this, which triggered the national commercial system to start cracking down on counterfeiting. Wenzhou’s fake and shoddy shoes became a street rat.

A typical example is the Wenzhou shoe burning incident in Wulin Square that shocked the country: On August 8, 1987, the Hangzhou Xiacheng District Industrial and Commercial Bureau seized more than 5,000 pairs of Wenzhou shoes from various places at Wulinmen Square. of inferior shoes burned to the ground. The "Burning of Wenzhou Shoes" incident dealt a heavy blow to the nascent Wenzhou shoe industry. Many shoe companies closed down one after another. Those that barely survived switched to Shanghai and Guangdong brands and switched to OEM sales. Stores in some domestic cities have posted notices saying "We do not sell products from Wenzhou."

Follow-up report

The Wenzhou Municipal Government promulgated the "Implementation Measures for Wenzhou Quality City". This is my country's first local regulation on quality, and it is also the earliest personal social credit file in Wenzhou. The fire of Wulin Gate has ignited Wenzhou's quality consciousness. In May 1994, the Wenzhou Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government held a mobilization meeting involving 10,000 people to “build the city on quality”. In 1999, some Wenzhou residents publicly burned more than 2,000 pairs of fake Wenzhou brand-name leather shoes in Hangzhou. Today, Wenzhou has become a veritable capital of famous brands, and August 8 has become Wenzhou’s “Integrity Day”.

Some shoe factory directors were deeply impressed by this: one of the "Implementation Measures" at that time was very powerful, that is, those who engage in counterfeiting and shoddy products and refuse to mend their ways will not only have their business licenses revoked, but will also not be allowed to work in the factory again. Become a boss in Wenzhou; if your business license is revoked due to quality problems, the ID number of the person in charge of the company and the photo must be reported to the relevant departments in the city, and you will not be allowed to apply for a business in Wenzhou within 5 years.

Wenzhou City has established a shoe industry quality management rectification group, which is affiliated with the Shoe Industry Association and has a card at the 104 National Highway toll station. All leather shoes shipped out of Wenzhou must be stamped by the Shoe Industry Association with the rectification group's name Official seal.

Subsequently, a large number of Wenzhou shoes have their own brands - Kangnai, Dongyi, Huangkang, etc. By 1999, a number of well-known shoe companies at home and abroad had emerged in Wenzhou. Wenzhou shoes are once again famous.

After more than ten years of hard work, the Wenzhou shoe industry has finally been recognized by the market and the industry, and has embarked on the road of famous brand development, with the emergence of Kangnai, Aokang, Dongyi, Gilda, Red Dragonfly, There are nearly a hundred well-known footwear brands in Wenzhou such as Spider King, Ritai, Aolun, Ouniao King, and Juri.

In September 2001, the China Light Industry Federation and the China Brand Association awarded Wenzhou the title of "China's Shoe Capital".