Santa's Shopping (Epi)Center

October 16, 2009 6:10 PM

34 industries, 62,000 stalls, 320,000 commodities for sale, 4 million square meters of selling space: welcome to the world-famous Yiwu Wholesale Market in the Zhejiang Province of China, "where Santa Claus comes to shop."

As the factory outlet for the planet’s manufacturing epicentre, it's the perfect place to stock up on Christmas stockings since the city also known as "Sock Town" produces over three billion pairs of socks for Wal-Mart, Pringles and Disney each year. (Licensed exporting to 212 countries probably helps with Santa's distribution logistics.) All is not entirely kosher in Sock Town, however, with reports that "100,000 counterfeit products are openly traded and 2,000 metric tons of fakes change hands daily."

posted by DarlingBri (8 comments total)

Funny then, and yet still relevant today..

Chinese Factory Worker Can't Believe The Shit He Makes For Americans
posted by Joe Beese at 6:13 PM on October 16, 2009

Stoopid communists.
posted by slogger at 6:36 PM on October 16, 2009

Makes me want to go shopping.
posted by notashroom at 7:09 PM on October 16, 2009

Epicenter?
posted by grobstein at 7:46 PM on October 16, 2009

Grobstein, there's an above-ground explosion of counterfeit merchandise, which drives the resulting underground economy. Hence, "epicenter."

(Also, mole people look great in Versace.)
posted by rokusan at 8:00 PM on October 16, 2009

If you are ever in Yiwu, make sure to try out one of the many great middle eastern restaurants there. As a result of the large amount of traders who live there, it has some of the best ethnic cuisine in the country.
posted by afu at 8:07 PM on October 16, 2009

I love flea markets, so I'm sure I would love this place as long as they didn't try to serve me cat or something. Which, if I understand correctly is a delicacy over there, but not something I'd be inclined to eat. To each their own, I suppose.
posted by elder18 at 8:21 PM on October 16, 2009

I read that as "the planet's manufacturing epidemic."
posted by haltingproblemsolved at 8:31 AM on October 17, 2009