China's electric blanket export to Europe hikes amid La Nina

According to the latest monitoring results of the National Climate Center, based on the current situation of marine atmospheric circulation in the equatorial Pacific Ocean and the prediction results of domestic and foreign climate dynamic models and statistical methods, it is expected that the La Nina event will continue until the winter of 2022/2023. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) predicted in August that the current La Nina event would continue over the next six months, with a 70% probability from September to November 2022, but a 55% probability from December 2022 to February 2023.

Almost everyone is most concerned about: will 2022/2023 winter be a cold winter or a warm winter amid the ongoing La Nina event? In fact, at this time of every year, whether it will be a cold winter or warm winter, is the most concerned topic of players on textile market.

Before the mid-1980s, a large probability of a La Nina event would cause a cold winter. But in the context of global warming, the situation has changed, the same La Nina event, but the frequency of warm winters is increasing. Since 1986, in nearly eight La Nina events, the proportion of cold and warm winter was 50% and 50%. La Nina is only one of the factors affecting winter climate.  There are other factors to consider and there is no final conclusion. How this winter will be remains to be further monitored and analyzed.

However, in the textile market, the export of winter  "magic weapons (electric blanket)” has been released ahead of schedule. According to customs data, Yiwu, Zhejiang exported 190 million yuan of thermal products from January to August, 2022, including air conditioners, heat pumps, water heaters and electric blankets, an increase of 41.6% year-on-year.

Among them, customs data showed that the export of electric blanket products with high correlation with fiber and fabric consumption was at 16,310,153 pieces from January to August, with a year-on-year growth of 27.5%. Improving export volume in 2022 was about a month earlier than previous years.

The EU-27, the United Kingdom and Canada saw the most prominent export growth rate. Export of electric blanket to EU 27 nations was at 2,958,432 pieces in January-August, 2022, up 67% on the year, that to UK was at 957,041 pieces, a year-on-year rise of 50%, and that to Canada was at 400,553 pieces, up by 84% on annual basis.

However, US remained the largest trading partner for electric blanket exports from January to August. From January to August, 8,558,195 electric heating blankets were exported to the United States, accounting for more than half of the total exports. The proportion of exports to EU-27 was about 20%.

Among the export origins in China, Zhejiang undoubtedly has a higher proportion of exporters. From January to August, Zhejiang exported 6.468 million pieces of electric blankets, up 32.1% year-on-year, accounting for about 40% of the total exports. Among this, export to the EU-27 was at 0.648 million pieces, up 114.6% over the same period of last years, taking up above 20% of the total export. As the temperature will drop, demand for thermal products would continue to grow from September to October.

The export volume of electric blanket increased, but the gram weight of single fabric decreased, basically conforming to the product structure characteristics of the same period in previous years.

As for the unit price, the price of electric blanket is higher than the same period in previous years in 2022. From January to August, the average price of a single electric blanket was 16% higher than that in the same period in 2021 and 25% higher than that in the same period of the five-year  (2017-2021) average.

The main consumption of electric blanket in polyester fabric is knitted short plush products, such as warp knitting fabric in Haining and circular knitted super soft and imitation super soft varieties in Xiaoshan and Shaoxing. The corresponding polyester fiber prices rose by 7-10% over the same period.

The operating rate of corresponding fabric mills is high now, with that of warp knitting mills at above 90% in Haining and near 60% for circular knitting plants in Xiaoshan and Shaoxing. The consumption of grey fabric was seriously diversified. Some circular knitted fabric and warp knitted fabric perfromed good, mainly knitted velvet fabric. Demand for warp knitted milk velvet in Changshu, super-soft spandex fabric and polar fleece fabric in Haining, dralon fabric and polar fleece fabric in Xiaoshan and Shaoxing outperformed recently. Business of velvet fabric was relatively better. On one hand, some buyers replenished fabrics for autumn and winter home textiles and apparels; on the other hand, the procurement from overseas buyers grew. Export was especially good in Yiwu, mainly woolen blanked and electric blankets.

Take the domestic electric blanket leader "Rainbow" as an example, as of the date of writing, its Tmall flagship store was selling 66 products of electric heating blankets, of which only 6 products were cotton electric heating blankets, occupying 9%. The proportion of flame retardant chemical fiber non-woven fabric was higher. Cotton electric blanket contained not very large proportion of cotton indeed. Therefore, hot electric blankets has something to do with cotton products, but it doesn't have much to do with it.

Actually, since September this year, Rainbow Group has been asked on various occasions whether any related products have been exported to Europe. In response, Rainbow Group said: some models of electric blankets have been certified in Europe, and since May, it has obtained a lot of orders for electric blankets. Although the number of individual orders was low, the company attached importance to it. At present, with energy crisis in Europe, electric blankets will have certain opportunities as energy-saving and environmental protection products.