Photo: Xinhua

A pair of ‘MADE IN CHINA’ shoes left Wuhou Cuqiao, left Chengdu, winged its way across the ocean and eventually made it onto the feet of the First Lady of the USA. Since January this year the Chengdu company that produced the pair of leather shoes, the Yibailan Shoe Co. Ltd., has been ceaseless in its production, which in the last 3 months has taken over 200,000 orders for the shoe. It is clear that everyone wants a copy of the shoes warn by the First Lady and this is what has turned a small cottage industry company in China’s sleepy southwest into the phenomenon it is today, much to the delight of CEO Wu Deguo.

“You don’t happen to have a pair lying around for me to buy, do you?” I asked Chengdu Baiyilan’s Chairman of the Board, Wu Deqing as we carried out our interview inbetween nonstop phone calls.

Wu told me that on the 19th February they received a letter from the USA saying that during his inauguration ceremony, Obama’s wife, Michelle, wore a pair of Chengdu Baiyilan produced Berry Bandolino black high heels. Last year all 500,000 pairs of the Berry shoes had been sold to the USA. Everyone, including Wu assumed that after that shipment, that would the last they’d hear of that line of high heels again for a while. How wrong could they have been!

Wu Deqing is Wu Deguo’s older brother and has been in the leather shoe business most of his life. There are several pairs of Berry shoes piled up in the corner of his office. Wu Deguo grabbed a pair down and gave them to me to try on. The finish is excellent and they fit wonderfully. “I knew they would sell well”, said Deguo, “just not this well!”

The First Lady has started a trend, continued Deguo, of American women buying well made and economical shoes. The Berry model only set Obama’s wife back a mere RMB 800 (USD 117). What’s being called a landmark date in the Chengdu shoe industry, it is quite obvious that the order of 200,000 pairs made so far will continue to steadily grow.

Photo: wodeyichu.com

Baiyilan employees 1000 people locally in Chengdu to work at their factory. For a pair of Berry high heels to go from being a sheet of leather to the finished article it takes 3 hours of work. All of this includes selecting suitable materials, cutting, stitching and polishing.

Due to the fame brought to the Berry shoe by the First Lady, the factory now has two assembly lines dedicated to making just that one type of shoe. Indeed, Bandolino, the US brand that markets the shoe in the States has a Quality Control worker, Lewis, posted in Chengdu to make sure that each pair produced is up to scratch.

The assembly line manager Xiao Peng is only a young guy, but now he’s been puffed up with confidence in the shoes his people make. “Even the First Lady of the USA is wearing them!” Indeed, over Chinese New Year he gave a pair of the Berry shoe to his wife as a gift. “Now my wife is wearing the same shoes as the wife of the US President, who would have known?!” Needless to say Xiao Peng’s wife is over the moon, and only wears them out for special occasions.

See this article in its original form at Xinhuanet.com

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