Around 1 p.m. every day, Dongyang Tiktok E-Commerce Base, located in Dongyang China Woodcarving City, begins to get busy. As the lights in the live broadcast rooms are lit up one by one, the network anchors begin a new day’s work in their familiar seats.

“There are a total of 1800 merchants in our base, among which 1200 are active merchants. In these two years, we have incubated a number of billionaire-level and multi-millionaire-level merchants,” said Ma Xiaolei, vice president of Dongyang China Woodcarving City.

Livestreaming is no longer simply an individualized entertainment business. Professional teams and large-scale supply chains have been the key to standing out in the competition of livestream commerce.

Dongyang TikTok E-Commerce Base is jointly built by the Dongyang Municipal government, TikTok E-Commerce, and Dongjia Cultural and Creative Industry Group. Dongyang Fuhong Technology Co., Ltd. (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dongyang China Woodcarving City) is responsible for the base’s operation and management. It is a pilot TikTok e-commerce livestreaming base for wood products and cultural ornaments in the Yangtze River Delta.

After being officially put into operation in November 2020, the base’s gross merchandise volume (GMV) of 2021 reached 1.25 billion RMB. In the first half of 2022, despite the epidemic in the Yangtze River Delta, the base’s GMV still grew against the trend—as of June 30, it had reached 926 million RMB, an increase of 182% compared with last year.

The base is located in Dongyang China Woodcarving City and integrates the advantages of online and offline resources. In addition, the base is equipped with professional blocks, like a quality inspection warehouse and a supply chain center, which lowers the entry requirements for businesses with little experience.

“TikTok is now the largest short video platform in China, and TikTok stores have gradually become a new and popular mode of e-commerce,” said Ma Xiaolei. He also mentioned that TikTok is not only driving the rapid development and growth of the e-commerce industry of Dongyang China Woodcarving City and boosting the transformation and upgrading of the industrial structure of Dongyang, but also promoting it to grow into a professional livestreaming base for wood products and cultural ornaments that accounts for a large proportion in the country.

As for the future development direction, Ma said that they would pay more attention to the introduction of lead merchants, expand their commodity categories, strengthen the guidance to the operation teams, and improve the quality of merchants’ livestreaming. In addition, as the leading e-commerce enterprise in Dongyang, the base will rely on the city’s industrial characteristics, go all out to make livestreaming e-commerce bigger and stronger, create a new and unique benchmark of historical and cultural industries, and find new directions and achieve new growth for the development of Dongyang’s wood carving, rosewood, and wood art industries. (Text by Tong Ying, photo by Wu Yiqiong, translated by Shen Yingying, edited by Kendra Fiddler)