Why Lectra believes the Chinese furniture market has legs
22/06/2017
In its report on the results of the survey, Lectra offered three main reasons for its optimism for the furniture sector in China.
First, it said a “booming local market” is now encouraging a shift among Chinese furniture manufacturers. From an avowed concentration on export business, these companies are now addressing the needs of the domestic market. It quoted a December 2015 study by Boston Consulting Group that said China’s consumer economy will grow by around 50% to reach $6.5 trillion by 2020. What Lectra referred to as an increase in the number of “middle-class and affluent households”, and a “newer generation of freer-spending, more sophisticated consumers” make it confident spending on good-quality furniture will be one of the areas to claim some of this consumer spend.
Its second reason for optimism about the furniture market in China is that a tourism boom is driving a considerable increase in the provision of hotel rooms and hotel rooms, of course, require furniture. China is now the fourth most-popular tourist destination in the world, with approximately 56.9 million visitors in 2015, Lectra said, quoting figures from London-based newspaper The Daily Telegraph. To accommodate the growing number of tourists, the number of hotel rooms is predicted to grow from the current figure of 2.5 million to 6.1 million by 2025.
Lastly, office furniture manufacturing is another growth market in China. The country has already surpassed the US to become the world’s leading office furniture manufacturer. And, taking into account only the major cities, Lectra quoted its research partner for the survey, Milan-based CSIL, in saying that almost 2.8 million square-metres of new office space were expected to be in place by 2015, with an additional 4.2 million square-metres predicted to be complete by the end of 2016.
“There are challenges to overcome, but these changes present a wealth of growth opportunities for manufacturers producing upholstered furniture for the Chinese market,” Lectra concluded.
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