Bulkland (2017) - full transcript

DISTORTED AND TINNY MUSIC

This is a dollar store,

also known as a discount store,
a Pound store, a Euro Store.

Everyday shoppers spend
billions in Dollar stores.

Since 2008 and the GFC
our shopping budgets

have been slashed and dollar
stores have prospered.

In the USA the amount of
dollar stores has doubled

and there are now more dollar
stores than pharmacies.

It's much the same story
around the world.

They don't stock any
recognisable brands

or anything of
much value at all.



And whether you're
in Omaha or Oman...

this is where it comes from.

China is the world's leading
manufacturer of cheap goods

and this market in
Yiwu is its showroom.

In May of 2014 Yiwu exported

$77 million US dollars worth
of small plastic decorations.

$44 million worth of unnamed
plastic manufactured products.

$36 million worth of
imitation jewellery.

In one month.

It might seem like nothing

to buy
a cheap plastic toy as a joke

or accessories you expect
to wear only once.

To the people here it's
a very serious matter.

This is the city the
dollar store built.



MUSIC

RAINDROPS

MUSIC

Summer, don't forget
we have to go

to the market to
stock plush toys.

Try and find a supplier.

Gotta be cheap and we need
to find generic animals.

Like ocean animals is okay.

Also gecko.

Umm lizard.

Any, any animal really.

But we can't have
anything licensed, okay?

And it's gotta be cheap.

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

Maybe next month I'll
go back to England.

Maybe...

Whoa!

LAUGHTER

That happens!

As long as it's none of my
goods - that's the main thing.

MUSIC

My name's Nigel. Nigel Cropp.

My main job is trading.

I have a trading company.

We service discount
chain, importers,

retailers, from all
around the world.

South America,
Australia, Europe.

We accompany customers
around the market.

Sourcing products.

In the market there's many
booths selling the same thing.

Usually I go to 4 or 5. You
know what the price is then.

We go to the market and the
supplier will give us a price.

And then we do the ordering.

The goods are delivered
to my warehouse.

And we 'QC' the goods.

Which is the most important
thing for my job.

Quality control.

Lot's of people have this bad
perception of Chinese goods.

CHATTERING

The niche I have is
that I'm a Westerner.

I speak English obviously.

And I have the Western eye

I know what products
are not going to sell,

I know the quality expected.

It's quite an important
thing, I think.

Originally I come from a
place called Hertford,

which is the county
town of Hertfordshire.

A nice little market town.

Lots of nice old
buildings and nice pubs.

I was living in
Melbourne at the time

and I started talking
to this guy in the pub,

an English guy - and he
said he was going to go

and teach English in Japan.

And a few days later
I was sitting down

and I happened to open a
newspaper and on the back page

was an advert for a seminar
teaching English overseas.

I went to the seminar and I
thought 'Oh this is great!'

Saved up. Did the course,
passed the course.

And within one week this
job in Yiwu came up.

I looked on the map and
I couldn't find it.

And eventually I found
where Yiwu was located

and it wasn't far from
Hangzhou, Shanghai.

And it was just a small city.

I had no idea of
what Yiwu was about.

My perception of Yiwu was
pagodas, canals, bridges.

Y'know?

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

Well obviously I got here
and it was very different.

So I started teaching at this
English training centre.

And I was teaching adults and
they were factory bosses

and trading company bosses.

So little did they know I
was teaching them English

but at the same time
they were teaching me

how to do the business
here, how it all worked.

I used to do day trips
to the Futian markets

and they used to show me around.

Still today some of those
students are my suppliers

and we still get on very well.

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT

SHOPPING MALL AMBIENCE

DISTORTED AND TINNY MUSIC

SNORING

DISTORTED AND TINNY MUSIC

PHONE RINGING
AND CHATTERING

CHATTERING

HORN

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

SHOPPING MALL AMBIENCE

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

MUSIC

For Halloween we
export witch brooms,

and there's one village that
will make these brooms.

There's a town that just
makes wheelbarrows.

You go to a town for
toys or wooden puzzles

or Christmas decorations.

Each town has its niche.

A lot of the factories they will
sub work out to these towns.

And they'll be working
out of their homes.

So when they finish
farming on the land

they'll come back and they will
continue to work.

A bit like the cottage industry

back in the industrial
revolution in England.

Where it took Great
Britain 200 years

it's taken China 20-30 years.

But you have to be
careful with the quality

when they start subbing work out
we have to be on our guard.

Make sure we check
properly and carefully

because obviously there might
be an issue with the quality.

We export jewellery into Europe
and even if you're,

because we're ordering products
from the same villages,

workers might change,

and the quality of the
product may go down.

So you can't get complacent.

CHILD CRYING

CHILD SHOUTING

MUSIC

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

MUSIC

People call me 'The
Grey Wolf 'in Germany.

"Der Graue Wolf".

My name is Marco Tonelli.

I had a vision four years ago
to produce my own notebooks.

Not by some Chinese supplier
or German supplier.

I came to Yiwu because we were
producing notebooks in Germany

and the labour costs and all
the other costs in Germany

were quite high.

So we decided to give
it a try in China.

Come here don't be
frightened guys.

Read.

To find workers we tried
several things actually.

But in the end we decided to
go to the "Labour Market."

It's called 'Talent Market'
but there's not that much

talent so I call it
'Labour Market.'

So anybody of you can do this?
Yes or no?

The most important for them is
money and how long they work.

So we have to focus
on this one too.

What has he done before?

At least we get a
lot of people here.

Half the street.

Don't worry about that!

CHATTERING

Yeah, yeah, yeah!

And tell him to talk
with other people.

So when you arrive
there the first view

of the labour market
in Yiwu is horrible.

There are homeless people,
there are dirty people,

there are uneducated people.

And after I would
say 15-20 minutes

we were quite cool with it,

and we started really
to have interviews

on the spot with the people,

and actually we
found this one guy

and he showed us his
books what he'd done.

And I was really
surprised in the end.

Photo albums, they're
photo albums.

In the end they're nice people.

So it's good that not every time
the first thought is fulfilled.

Maybe the cameraman
can translate?

So I'm happy that I was wrong.

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

China is a moving country
so in every city

you have not real
Shanghainese or Yiwunese.

But you see it from the
faces that they are

coming from different
parts of China.

We have different types of
foreigners here of course.

There are quite rich
successful foreigners here.

Mostly I think from
Arab countries because

we have a big Arab
community in Yiwu.

It's very big. We have a big
Russian community here.

And we have the
rest of the world.

So this is Yiwu. Yeah.

ISLAMIC MUSIC

ISLAMIC MUSIC

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

CHILDREN CHATTERING

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

FAINT MUSIC

MUSIC

FAINT MUSIC

CHATTERING

MUSIC

MUSIC

DJ ANNOUNCEMENT

Yiwu was actually a farming
village not so long ago.

And suddenly this market
has just rapidly grown up.

Maybe 30, 20 years ago.

Very different to
what it used to be.

The market was just
a street market.

People started making like
Christmas decorations

and arts and crafts.

More and more people started
to come to this market.

And that's how it's grown up.

Yiwu people have been lucky,

they've been at the right
place at the right time.

Made lots of money.

Ah, this is ah...

Ling Ling's great
great grandmother!

Great great grandmother.

Uh?

90 years old!

She wants me to go
and eat something.

Upstairs.

Okay we'll go upstairs
to eat something.

You got any cold beer?

No cold beer? We
only like cold beer.

Yes we do.

Huh?

Uh?

London, London, London.

In December 2014 Yiwu
reached a new milestone

with the inauguration of the
world's longest railway.

The train carried 1400 tonnes
of toys for Christmas

and crossed Kazakhstan,
Russia, Belarus,

Poland, Germany and France.

Before finishing in Spain.

But since then the cracks
in the Chinese economy have

been exposed to the world.

And exports have fallen.

Thousands of workers
have been laid off,

China is moving away from
manufacturing cheap goods,

and the party in Yiwu
is drawing to an end.

It's one of the most competitive
cities that can be.

Because you have this big market

you have really big
business in Yiwu,

everybody's fighting
for every RMB here.

It's not talking about thousands
of dollars, it's for one RMB

you have to make fights here.

I bought two machines.

You have to fight for every
goods for every taxi,

for every meal.

Sounds a little bit strange
but it's a jungle here

and everybody just wants
to make money here

and nobody wants to live here

and that is why this
city is so competitive.

Because everybody is aggressive,

everybody's out for money.

What's the last price?

There are there no
rules in this city.

You see it when they're driving,

you see it when they
are doing things.

I think that's the
big difference

between established cities

like Guangzhou for
example and Yiwu.

So 'xie xie'.

Make the contract, we buy
some money and then...

If this is not working we give
it back to you my friend.

You can't make the
jobs and the deals

what is done here in Yiwu in a
city like Shanghai or Guangzhou.

You would face really big
problems with the government.

Here you just have to pay money.

So it's really
like the wild west

in the 18th century in America.

Money counts and
toughness counts.

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

We went to the labour market
to get our first workers here,

and surprisingly enough
we found somebody,

which suits our company.

CHATTERING

Let's talk about money wise.

We have the range from $400 a
month to $400,000 a month.

Somebody could say "I am
doing this for $3000 a month."

and he's happy.

For myself I wouldn't do this
for less than $20,000 a month.

CHATTERING

Having success in Yiwu
means not only money.

I think having success
is being responsible,

having your own business,
with your own people,

taking care of your workers.

Making it a little bit different
than the Chinese factories,

because in Chinese factories
Chinese living like animals.

My workers will have
their own apartments,

we are paying more
salary and we will take

more care of our workers than

probably anybody
else in the city.

And then another week, and then
we had, another week's holidays.

So it's been a big pain.

I know!

You know my staff?

They all have the
Chinese holidays,

and because I'm a Westerner,

they want to Western holidays.

They even ask me for a
day off for Halloween!

My god!

We don't even have
that in England!

And the Queen's birthday!

In England we don't
have a holiday

for the Queen's birthday.

Y'know?

They want everything.

Take, take, take.

Yiwu has a reputation
for cheap goods.

Obviously the prices in
China are increasing

and more and more
people are looking

at other countries
for their products.

Such as Vietnam, Laos,
Bangladesh, India.

Because it's cheaper.

My wage bill has increased
40-50% in the last three years.

The standard of
living has gone up

and people want to have
a better lifestyle,

and obviously at
the end of the day

that will push the price
of the products up.

LAUGHTER

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

FIRECRACKERS

TRAFFIC AMBIENCE

Here we say every
morning is a Monday

and every evening is a Saturday,

because we are working
24/7 in Yiwu.

In an average year I spend six
to eight months here in Yiwu.

I'm spending the rest of my
time in my lovely house

with my lovely
family in Germany.

CHATTERING

Two days.

Ah, I was asking
for the warranty.

Three months.

No, no! One year!

CHATTERING

I've never felt home in China.

This is because I don't
speak the language.

You only can feel at home if
you can talk with the people

and if you can get
what you need.

You know?

Not only food but also respect.

I feel more home in Europe,
I speak five languages.

I'm home in Italy,
I'm home in Spain.

I've never felt home in China.

CHATTERING

There are a lot of things
I don't like about Yiwu.

It's like a jungle here,

everybody's fighting
for himself.

There's no real friendship

and it's not a nice city
like say Beijing or Shanghai

where you have nice places.

The whole city is Grey.

The quality of life
is very bad in Yiwu.

In the end it's my dreams
keeping me here in Yiwu.

I always wanted to have
my own factory in China.

That's what's keeping me here,
I want to have success.

Oh shit.

Oh shit.

Don't swear!

Don't copy your dad!

I've always felt
part of the family.

They've always accepted me.

I've never felt like that "She's
brought a foreigner home!"

They've always made
me feel very welcome.

I've never felt any different.

He got it as well! He got it!

How'd I meet Jessie?

When I started the
trading company

she had a booth in the
market selling bags.

And also she was one
of my students.

Jessie's family, they
live in the countryside

so sometimes we go and see them.

There are many nice
places to see in Yiwu.

It's not all just
factories and buildings.

There is actually some
nice scenic countryside.

I do... I miss back home.

Obviously I miss my
family and friends.

What are they making over there?
Nah, I'm alright.

Ah okay.

LAUGHTER

But now the world's
a lot smaller.

You have Skype, you have
all this social media.

It's not like you have to
write a letter or send photos.

And also it's a very
happening place.

I'm never bored.

I never have time to think about
my life back home, you know?

I'm always doing something,
I'm always busy.

So these guys...

- And hide it?

And tomorrow the actor will
come and try and find,

We'll find out in a minute.

Looks like they're gonna do
another charge over there

with the Japanese army.

Two movies going on
at the same time.

If I don't go back to England or
if I don't move to Australia.

I could see myself
moving to Hangzhou,

which is quite near here.

I think Hangzhou is
a very nice city.

It's cleaner.

Obviously my wife's from Yiwu,
I have a daughter here.

I wouldn't have got
married to a local person

if I thought I
couldn't live here.

I can't see myself living
here for the rest of my life,

but Yiwu will always
be a part of me.

MUSIC