Domestic

Chengdu company primed on pumps

By Huang Zhiling (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-11-14 10:10

Wu Xifan, a young businessman in Cheng Du,the capital of Southwest China's Sichuan province, is excited when he talks about US President Barack Obama's visit.

Wu, 25, is upbeat about prospects that the trip will bolster collaboration and constrain disputes between the countries.

His company, whose chairman is Wu's 60-year-old father, Wu Deguo, makes Bandolino Berry shoes and many of its customers are Americans.

Berry shoes seems to have caught the imagination of many Americans after coolspotters.com, a fashion website in the country, posted a photograph of first lady Michelle Obama in a J. Crew dress with Bandolino women's Berry pumps on Jan 20 with the caption: "This sweet and tangy Berry is a thoroughly delicious treat."

The Chengdu Roeblan Footware Co Ltd, with 1,300 workers in the suburbs of Chengdu, is the world's only producer of the Berry shoes.

Before Michelle Obama was seen wearing its shoes on the day of Obama's inauguration, Roeblan had made 500,000 pairs of Berry shoes for the US market. The shoes cost $79. Orders for another 400,000 pairs have been placed from the US since January, Wu said.

Many Chinese customers - men and women - have called Roeblan to order the same shoes worn by the American first lady.

"Both my father and I receive a lot of calls because callers do not know the Berry shoes are not sold in the Chinese market," said Wu, who studied international business in Singapore.

Company employees and their family members are proud of the company's rising prestige. Peng, a young team leader at the company, said wives of many co-workers wanted a pair of Berry shoes from their husbands as a gift.

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But Roeblan is not entitled to sell the shoes in China. It has been entrusted by the Paramont (Asia) Ltd whose headquarters are in Dongguan, in South China's Guangdong province, to produce the Berry shoes only.

"We have to tell both our workers and callers that we hope, Paramont, which is a Brazilian company, will sell the shoes in China one day," Wu said.

Berry shoes, which have leather uppers and are classic pointed toe pumps, look simple but are hard to manufacture, according to Wu Deqing, the twin brother of the company's chairman.

It takes several workers four or five hours working together to produce one pair, said Wu Deqing.

To endure tear and wear, the Berry shoes need three nails in the bottom of the heel. The nails can break the shoes during the production process.

"It took experts in the company three months to solve the problem," said Wu Deqing, who has spent more than three decades as a shoemaker.