01

A diverse group of entrepreneurs gather, and the number of new market entities leads the province

The huge market opportunities in Yiwu attract tens of thousands of people to start businesses here. As of April 18th, in 2025, 69,600 new business entities were established in Yiwu City, ranking first among all counties (cities and districts) in the province. The total number of business entities reached 1.1913 million. Based on historical data, in 2024, Yiwu ranked first in the province in terms of the number of new market entities added throughout the year. According to the monitoring of Yiwu Index data, individual business households accounted for over 70%, becoming the backbone force driving the prosperous development of the Yiwu market.

The group of entrepreneurs who come to Yiwu for inspection is diverse and each has its own characteristics. There are senior practitioners in the trade field from large e-commerce brand companies, mainstream e-commerce platforms and various links of the supply chain, as well as technical talents from big companies such as Internet programmers and product managers. There are also people who originally worked in traditional industries such as legal consultation and banking, as well as emerging groups such as self-made college students, live-streamers and independent buyers. These entrepreneurs, leveraging their expertise in professional fields such as product selection, operation, user analysis, and software development, have ventured into the trade sector to drive business transformation.

The population and economy of Yiwu drive and promote each other, jointly forming a mutually beneficial and interactive development pattern. The reason for this is that Yiwu, with its complete and efficient entrepreneurship support system, has created a high-quality business environment, which has become a key factor attracting entrepreneurs.

The advertisement on the vehicles on the streets of Yiwu. Source: Yiwu Index

02

Five major business environment advantages make it the top choice for business and trade entrepreneurship

The goods are complete. The International Trade City features 26 major categories and over 2.1 million kinds of goods, ranging from accessories to toys, from hardware and electrical appliances to bedding, almost covering all aspects of People's Daily lives. The couple, Ah Tian and his wife, who quit their jobs from big companies to start an e-commerce business in Yiwu, mentioned in an interview: "The trade city is so huge that we were completely at a loss at the beginning." Later, it was found that each area had its own specific classification. After getting familiar with the market, it became very convenient to get goods.

International Trade City Image source: Yiwu Index

Fast updates. The rapid iteration of styles and functions of small commodities requires the market to keenly capture the demands of downstream consumers. Market dynamics, trend information and other business opportunities are highly concentrated and rapidly spread here, shortening the response cycle for product production. Li Xuepiao, who switched from being a lawyer to doing e-commerce in Yiwu, said, "In Yiwu, it might only take three days from discovering a business opportunity to listing a product." For instance, for a certain product that has recently gone viral, I saw the news in the morning and the sample came out the next day. Many people even say, "If you don't visit the Small Commodities City for two months, all the shops will look brand new."

The cost of purchasing goods is low. As the world's largest distribution center for small commodities, Yiwu offers entrepreneurs highly flexible purchasing solutions, reducing purchasing costs. Merchants who have smoothly passed through the "painful period" of starting a business said, "At the very beginning, we had no idea how to get goods at all." The bosses are all very down-to-earth. They will proactively tell you which ones are for volume sales and which ones are for profit. They also suggest that you can try getting goods worth a few hundred yuan first." This flexible purchasing model enables entrepreneurs to implement a business strategy of "small batch and fast turnover", effectively controlling inventory risks.

International Trade City Image source: Yiwu Index

Yiwu's efficient market response speed is attributed to a series of complete industrial supporting systems, including logistics, warehousing, platforms and parks. Entrepreneurs can focus more on the sales process, while other links can be handled by the local mature supply chain system.

In terms of logistics, Yiwu has nearly 1,000 cross-border logistics enterprises and 1,829 domestic logistics enterprises. Over 2,000 dedicated road lines cover all cities at or above the county level across the country, and the vast majority of county towns can achieve direct logistics in both directions with Yiwu. Numerous international and domestic logistics enterprises offer entrepreneurs efficient and low-cost logistics transportation solutions. Since the beginning of this year, the Yiwu Express (Cross-border) Supervision Center has processed over 2.3 million cross-border e-commerce export parcels, and the cumulative volume of express delivery services has exceeded 2.94 billion pieces, demonstrating the strong competitiveness and efficient operation capacity of Yiwu's logistics and transportation.

Image source of Chinagoods Shared Cloud Warehouse: Yiwu Index

In terms of warehousing, from large-scale comprehensive warehousing parks to small warehouses scattered across various blocks, Yiwu's warehousing distribution is extensive. Some are close to markets, facilitating the rapid allocation of goods. Some are located near transportation hubs, which is conducive to the transportation of goods in and out. Meanwhile, numerous business entities rely on the stalls, shops and other Spaces in the spot market for temporary storage and turnover of goods, complementing professional warehousing facilities and enriching the warehousing forms in Yiwu.

In terms of e-commerce, since 2013, Yiwu has actively promoted the "e-commerce for market" policy, using policy levers to drive the deep integration of traditional trade and e-commerce industries. The mall Group has built the Chinagoods platform to provide merchants with precise and efficient digital service support. In recent years, major e-commerce parks in Yiwu have flourished by offering policy support such as rent reduction and tax incentives to the enterprises that have settled in. In 2024, Yiwu achieved an e-commerce transaction volume of 492.4 billion yuan throughout the year, representing a growth of 11.3%. Among this, the transaction volume of cross-border e-commerce reached 140.1 billion yuan, increasing by 15.6%, becoming an important engine for Yiwu's economic growth.

In other cities, you have to hand over your business card when making friends, but in Yiwu, all you need to do is show the pictures of the best-selling products on your phone. "Working in a big city, everyone will ask about your work resume and talk about working on a multimmillions investment project. But when you take a walk around the market in Yiwu, everyone is discussing which product has recently received a huge order." " A 90s entrepreneur in entrepreneurship mentioned in an interview. Thanks to its industrial foundation and market influence and radiation capacity, Yiwu has attracted a large convergence of people flow, goods flow and capital flow.

It's very easy to "form a circle" when starting a business in Yiwu. Many entrepreneurs, recommended by their relatives and friends, come to Yiwu to start businesses. This diffusion effect bound by trust has further expanded the scale and boundaries of the entrepreneurial "circle". Entrepreneurs in Yiwu hold irregular entrepreneurship sharing sessions, which are scattered across various Settings such as community activity centers, specialty restaurants and bars, and independent bookstores. Some have reached cooperation intentions with Middle Eastern clients in coffee shops, while others have found like-minded technical partners in community-organized exchange activities, injecting key technical strength into their entrepreneurial projects.

These "circles" allow for continuous exchanges that break boundaries, bringing new possibilities to trade. People from different regions and industries come to Yiwu with their own resources. When those in the foreign trade circle talk about the new RCEP policy, a designer from the cultural and creative circle nearby might suddenly interject, "We can do packaging for national trends..." When the network of relationships becomes a resource pool and different circles spark off each other, everyone who has taken root here will understand that in Yiwu, starting a business is not an adventure of going it alone, but a journey of multi-party collaboration and mutual benefit.

In Yiwu, starting a business is not a high-cost transaction. Compared with first-tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, the rent and living costs in Yiwu are only about one third. An entrepreneur who came to Yiwu from Guangzhou made a detailed comparison: "In Guangzhou, just the rent alone costs two to three thousand yuan. Plus food and transportation, the fixed monthly expenses are at least 5,000 yuan." In Yiwu, we rented a small single room for only 900 yuan. The food was also very cheap. A few hundred yuan could cover our basic living expenses. This significant cost difference enables entrepreneurs to invest more funds in business development.

In Yiwu, multiple entities have worked in concert to promote the mutual collision and integration of business strategies from different perspectives.

As the official training and study tour department of the Yiwu China Commodities City Business School, it organizes study tour activities, connects industry chambers of commerce and top resources in the Yiwu market, visits the International Trade City, has face-to-face communication with entrepreneurs, and at the same time connects with channel resources such as product selection, procurement, marketing and supply chain, providing supporting back-end services to help entrepreneurs have a more systematic understanding of the Yiwu market.

Image source of the "Enter Yiwu" event: Yiwu Index

Major e-commerce platforms such as Alibaba, SHEIN and Xiaohongshu have come to Yiwu to carry out theme activities to help entrepreneurs connect with platform resources. Participants recalled, "Last year, Xiaohongshu held an official event in Yiwu, inviting platform executives and top bloggers. Everything was free and open to the public. We were able to directly connect to platform resources on the spot."

In addition, in response to the actual needs of entrepreneurs, each street has designed diversified training sessions. The training content covers popular fields such as e-commerce operation, short-video product promotion, and cross-border trade, helping practical entrepreneurs quickly master core skills.

The International Youth cross-border E-commerce Training Special Session was jointly hosted by the Human Resources and Social Security Bureau of Yiwu City and Beiyuan Sub-district

In Yiwu, you can always hear discussions about making money. People don't engage in empty talk; they just do business in a down-to-earth manner. By connecting with platform resources and conducting practical training, entrepreneurs can achieve the practical effect of "coming with problems and leaving with solutions" in their entrepreneurship.

03

The development and dissemination of the entrepreneurial ecosystem

With its unique market genes and commercial endowments, Yiwu has built a highly recognizable entrepreneurial ecosystem. As early as the beginning of China's reform and opening up, Yiwu actively encouraged its people to join the entrepreneurial wave. The form of self-employment with regional characteristics, "exchanging chicken feathers for sugar", became widely popular, opening up a unique business path. This pioneering entrepreneurial spirit has been integrated into Yiwu, gradually fostering a strong entrepreneurial atmosphere that has attracted a large number of entrepreneurs and laid a solid foundation for the prosperity of Yiwu's business.

In recent years, Yiwu has been making every effort to deliver a "combination punch" for entrepreneurship and innovation. It has introduced a "1+X" full-chain entrepreneurship support policy system, completed the "One Thing for Entrepreneurship" reform, and launched the "Youth Entrepreneurship Support Program"... By constantly improving the policy system and optimizing entrepreneurial services, Yiwu has created a favorable development ecosystem for entrepreneurs.

With the development of the digital economy, Yiwu continues to attract entrepreneurial dreamers from all over the world. What they bring is not only new business models but also innovative business concepts: some focus on vertical e-commerce in niche fields, some develop original design brands, and others keep up with The Times by applying AI technology to traditional trade, quickly landing their startups. Today's entrepreneurs in Yiwu are more adept at using digital tools, pay more attention to brand building, and are also better at telling good product stories. This transformation is reshaping the commercial DNA of Yiwu.

Starting a business in Yiwu, success is not accidental but a replicable model. With the continuous improvement of the support system, Yiwu is expected to become a "lifelong school" for entrepreneurs in the new era, allowing every dream to take root, sprout and thrive here.