Raw material cost increases, Santa toys filled with sand

It's been a while since Christmas. Sales of Christmas gifts are in full swing. The author visited some small commodity wholesale markets in Dongguan and saw that in the face of rising prices of cotton and other textile raw materials, some manufacturers of Christmas toys had to “dress up” to the market.

Mr. Chen, who has been doing boutique business for more than a decade in Dongguan Zhangmutou Kangle Street, accidentally entered the empty stomach of Santa Claus this year. He peeled off Santa's clothes and looked through a hole in the back. The silicone was empty. "In the past, Santa Claus used to fill in with cotton wool. This year, Santa Claus in the wholesale market was empty. He got a lot cheaper and was very popular among dealers," said Mr. Chen.

In a shop full of Santa Clauses at the Plaza de Armas in Zhangmutou, the shopkeeper Mr. Gu took up a “sit” Santa Claus and said to the author: “This is our new style this year. The filling in Santa’s body was previously Cotton is now replaced with sand.” Mr. Gu said that the previous use of sand to fill Santa was definitely more expensive than cotton, but now the price of cotton has risen, and the cost of using sand and cotton is almost the same. "Sand old man" sales offer is also higher than the "cotton elderly" a little higher, "so that we are not doing lose money business ah."

The author visited the Xiaoshen Commodity Wholesale Market in Zhangmutou Town. He also saw that some manufacturers used Santa’s clothes to paint directly with paint and paint to achieve the purpose of saving production costs.

According to a wholesaler in Dongguan Shenshen Road, the factory used to be a “climbing rope Santa Claus”. The cost of labor and raw materials was about 16 yuan, and the wholesale price was between 18 and 28 yuan. "The wholesale price will be 23 to 36 yuan, an increase of 30%.