Success and the price of going for the CHINESE TOUCH
China DailyThe rise of China chic has prompted the popularity of guochao makeup. "The original price of a trench coat was a little more than 100 yuan, but just with the addition of two embroidered pockets, it now costs more than 300 yuan," she says. Guo Xin, a marketing professor at Beijing Technology and Business University, says: "People are becoming more savvy, and even if brands gain customer traffic by cashing in on the guochao fad, it's unsustainable to just cobble together a collection of meaningless oriental cultural elements such as cranes, auspicious cloud patterns and Chinese characters, and then slam a guochao label on it thinking you have a sales winner." However, Heimao Tousu, a third-party customer service platform under Sina, says one lipstick brand alone attracted more than 300 complaints last year. Grounds for complaints included "Quality problems have not been resolved", "Failed to receive refund for subpar products" and "Poor attitude of sales staff".