Model car making helps drive local incomes

Workers conduct quality checks on Guizhou Winning's toy components in Bijie in May. [CAI ZHENGLING/FOR CHINA DAILY] 

From January to May, the company achieved an output value of more than 50 million yuan. Last year, the company's output value exceeded 96 million yuan, and its sales revenue reached 70 million yuan, it said.

This year, the labor-intensive processing company aims to achieve an output value of 150 million yuan, and grow the number of its staff members to 1,200 people. It has built two new factory buildings and will further upgrade its production workshops.

Nationwide, total retail sales of toys in the domestic market reached 85.46 billion yuan last year, up 9.6 percent year-on-year. Among the total, sales of toys on major Chinese e-commerce platforms Tmall, JD and Douyin grew 9.3 percent year-on-year, according to a recent report released by the China Toy and Juvenile Products Association.

Particularly, in 2021, sales revenues of model car toys on Tmall, an e-commerce platform of Alibaba Group, increased by 10.8 percent year-on-year, and sales volume climbed 13.5 percent year-on-year, while average prices fell 2.3 percent over the previous year, the report found.

For model car toys, the brand concentration level of the market in China has further increased, and second-tier brands have become less competitive in the market. Products that carry price tags between 50 yuan and 99 yuan have seen the highest sales growth, according to the report.

Now, China stands as the world's largest toy manufacturer, and about 70 percent of toys worldwide are produced in the country. The nation has also become the second-largest toy consumer after the United States. The industry size in the US has passed $25 billion, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.

Toy exports are also on track to recovery since the COVID-19 pandemic. In May, the export value of toys from China, the largest toy exporter, came in at $4.16 billion, up 33.1 percent year-on-year, according to the China Toy and Juvenile Products Association.

Some well-made and creative model car toys produced by Chinese companies have seen booming sales at home and abroad.

Rastar Group, a toy manufacturer based in Guangdong, has been involved in the businesses of toy manufacturing, game development and investment in football clubs. For toys, it mainly produces model car toys such as remote-controlled cars and static car models, and most of its toys have been exported.

Last year, the toy manufacturing business of the company achieved sales revenue of 348 million yuan, up 18.78 percent year-on-year. At the same time, it gained a net profit of 35.39 million yuan, surging 415.95 percent year-on-year, according to its earnings report.

The company said that last year, it launched new styles of toys such as children's scooters, balance cars of BMW, Ferrari F1 assembly car models and Bugatti Divo remote-controlled cars.

This year, Rastar Group plans to introduce new products such as a Ferrari 488 Pista Spider electric stroller, a Lamborghini Huracan STO remote-controlled car and an Audi R8 assembling building block car, as well as 18-inch BMW bicycles and toys of other outdoor riding categories.

The company has been authorized by more than 35 globally renowned car companies, and it has become the world's only authorized supplier of BMW's dynamic car models and children's bicycle series products.

"Toys play a very important role. In addition to helping children develop their intelligence, they can also help adults to alleviate pressures. With a change of consumption habits in most consumers, categories of toys are also being constantly upgraded. Young people have been increasingly paying attention to pop (popular) toys," said the annual earnings report of Rastar Group.

In 2021, nearly 8,000 new companies related to the manufacturing of pop toys registered in China. In the first half, more than 3,900 such new companies registered in the country, according to Tianyancha, a corporate information provider.

From 2019 to 2021, the pop toy market in China witnessed 18 fundraising events, and total funds raised exceeded 1.8 billion yuan. Guangdong has nearly 4,600 pop toy manufacturers, accounting for 15.5 percent of the total nationwide, the highest, followed by Henan and Fujian provinces, Tianyancha found.