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The auditorium of the Alibaba headquarters was full of attendees, leaning against the wall and pressing the stairs. Hundreds of owners of small Chinese companies listed Raptly as a current of Alibaba representatives, the Chinese online shopping giant, stepped on the floor to touch them from China’s resistance to the water rates of America.
“Since the beginning of April,” said Wang Shan, a digital marketing executive, “we have been investigating and discussing, in this type of political environment, in such a fast situation, what should be our methods and attitude?”
“Everyone’s consensus is that the business still has to leave,” he continued. “We believe that what proves in the end is our own ability.”
The mentality of the battlefield has become the standard for a fixed number of Chinese who are dedicated to the online sale business to the United States. The threat they face from rates is immense: the United States is China’s largest export market for online trade, which represents more than a third of sales, according to official Chinese data. That includes individual Americans who trust Shein for cheap swimsuits or TeMU for garlic presses of $ 2, as well as owners of small businesses that use platforms such as DHGate or Alibaba to buy bulk products to resell.
The Alibaba Conference, in the hometown of Hangzhou of the company, in East China, offered an idea of how the country became a giant in online purchases first. And suggested how the sector could resist the crisis.
China’s success in electronic commerce has become a central part of the saga of the largest economic increase in the country. Few people better symbolize the history of rags to wealth of the country than the founder of Alibaba, Jack Ma, whose journey from English to entrepreneur online, any of the richest men in the world.
That trip was partly possible by the fixed ecosystem that China has built to support its export machine. It extends not only factories, vendors and shipping companies, but also suppliers of falling fall, which handle supply and delivery in the name of the sellers; Live Streamers, who sell their products, carnival style, in short video applications; And private tutors dedicated to helping the innumerable owners of small businesses in the country to sell international.
In recent years, the Chinese government has also caused the expansion of international sales online to be a priority, offering companies tax exemptions and encouraging universities to introduce related specialties. Hangzhou is dotted with glamorous towers that offer discount office space for electronic commerce entrepreneurs.
Now with rates, government support and companies are increasing even more. Officials in Hangzhou have promised to help companies turn non -American markets with legal paperwork. Amazon employees, which is a center in Hangzhou to provide training to the people who sell on their platform, organized a session last week about the tariffs of their own Mercan.
At the Alibaba conference, which was open to anyone interested in learning about the sale abroad, the company’s employees attended would help them take care of customs procedures. Online platforms have also promised dozens of millions of dollars to help exporters to advertise at the national level.
As a result, the mood of many entrepreneurs at the Alibaba headquarters was worried but without flinching.
Qiu Leisi, 36, who plans to open large -scale clothes online to retailers in the United States and Europe, said Sid simply passes tariff expenses to their customers.
“American business owners should see that injustice comes from their own people,” he said, sitting in a cafeteria outside the Alibaba auditorium. (In a sign of how much interest, drawn, the baristas cited a 50 -minute waiting wait).
Mrs. Qiu was not concerned that Americans could resist the highest costs. Their parents directed a hardware factory where a third of the businesses came from the United States, but had downloaded part of their inventory not sold to India with a slight discount.
“They will give concessions to people who are friendly to us,” Qiu said about their parents. “Even if we lose America, there are many other countries that will take a step forward.”
In fact, a key part of China’s strategy is to channel its exports to other countries. Even before the last rates, as US-China tensions grew, Chinese businessmen had focused on expanding in Southeast Asia and Europe.
But that transition can only be made so fast, especially for people whose clients are mainly American.
That includes Shawn Zhao, whose company, Hypersku, helps the owners of small foreign companies to obtain goods such as Yoga estuaries from Chinese factories. Around half of his business comes from the United States, and had the latest estimates of weekly review costs for his clients there, since the rates rose more and more.
To adapt, it has reduced its advertising budget for the United States and is focusing more in Europe.
It has also focused on custom products that expects buyers to think that they are premiums, such as recorded earrings or fillings with the photos of their pets. That’s where China’s supply chain was irreplaceable, he said, because it could be highly specific goods, in small lots, better than any other country.
Even so, the expected at least a 20 percent drop in income.
“There are some things in the market that are beyond their control, such as political factors,” Zhao said about lunch in one of Hangzhou’s high -end shopping centers that show his state as the China’s high -tech capital. “You can only try to evaluate, under the sausage stage, can the company continue? Be sure to have a clear accounting.”
Optimism at the Alibaba conference can also face other realities.
Some vendors suggested to move around rates by redirecting goods through a third country. But under the pressure of the Trump administration, some countries have promised to take energetic measures against practice.
Several people also said that looking abroad was less an option than a necessity. China’s domestic market is hypercompeteitive, and due to a deceleration economy, people are reluctant to spend. That is a reason why the government itself has also anxious to boost electronic commerce abroad.
“The market is so large, and the merchas are very saturated, so our part of the cake is becoming increasingly narrow,” said Fu Sicong, a 27 -year -old with hip box glasses, who with two friends directs an online store that sells. After his national business had fallen by 20 percent in the last year, he decided to try Europe and the United States, where profit margins are generally high. “Only if we can’t do it well, we still have to do it.”
More than government subsidies, or the guarantees of electronic commerce companies, it was that the resolution to do business, regardless of what seemed to be feeding the confidence of many entrepreneurs.
Within an office building called Building Dreams, in one of the numerous industrial parks of Hangzhou dedicated specifically to cross -border electronic commerce, Li Tongzi, 30, eliminated the fact that sales of bracelets and fortunate accessions. It would be folded in the Chinese market, despite the profits of the reduction.
“It’s just a matter that you do more or less,” he said. “Only if we only win 10 cents, we dare to do it.”
Siyi Zhao Contributed research.
