How Yoga Pants Finally Became Popular in China, Even in Lower-Tier Cities
Only 5-6 years ago, girls seldom wore yoga pants on the street in China. They only wore them at gyms. However, in recent years, yoga pants have become Chinese girls’ daily wear, just like in Western countries. Now, you often run into people wearing yoga pants, holding a cup of coffee, sitting in a café.
So how did yoga pants become publicly accepted in China?
While the rise of athleisure and growing interest in sports and fitness has fueled some of this change, one of the main drivers behind Chinese consumers’ acceptance of yoga pants, especially in lower-tier cities, was the re-framing and re-naming of yoga pants by top fashion bloggers into just another type of pants, removing the athletic connotations.
Let’s take a closer look.
Lululemon Drove Popularity in 1st Tier Cities
The brand entered the Chinese market in 2016, with the athleisure trend. Many of China’s 1st-tier fashionistas knew about the popularity of Lululemon abroad and were quick to embrace the brand. Plus, because of Lululemon’s fashionable design, for example, its pants don’t show underwear lines and they have a butt-lifting effect, people start wearing those pants in public places. Around this time, fitness also started becoming trendy in China, mainly among white-collar workers in 1st-tier cities. Wearing yoga pants showed you were part of that trend.
Giving Yoga Pants a New Name Helped Them Go Mainstream in China
But at that point, yoga pants were still only being worn by a small group of people. One of the limiting factors keeping them from going mainstream was the price (we’ll talk more about that in a moment). The other was the name “yoga pants” or “exercise pants”.
This name signaled that one needed to be exercising in order to wear them. But at that time, the vast majority of women in China, especially in lower-tier cities, didn’t have the habit of going to gyms or doing yoga. This means they didn’t have a reason to wear yoga pants.
So in 2016, popular Taobao fashion influencer Eve Zhang (Zhang Dayi) gave them a new name: Shark Skin Pants or Shayu Ku (鲨鱼裤). The name described the look and texture of shiny, thick yoga pants and the tightening and slimming effect they have.
Because it is such a fashionable and easy-understanding name, it took off. Many Taobao stores started following Eve and referring to their yoga pants as shark pants.
Now with the new name, wearing yoga pants was no longer confined to a specific occasion. People started wearing them with their everyday looks.
They really went mainstream in 2020. I remember in winter last year, I saw so many girls wearing them on the street. Girls love matching shark pants with an oversized hoodie or a sweater on top. They also wore long socks with a pair of sneakers.
Top Chinese celebrity Yang Mi (杨幂), whose street looks influence fashion in China, wore shark pants in one of her airport looks, causing them to become even more viral. But the funny thing is that she was wearing Lululemon’s yoga pants when the picture was being taken.
Nowadays there are many KOLs promoting yoga pants such as Douyin influencer Hu Chuliang (胡楚靓). Hu launched yoga pants in her store last year. She managed to sell 253 million RMB worth of yoga pants within the first year.
Mass production makes prices affordable
Now alongside the new name, another key reason why yoga pants were able to go mainstream was that they became cheaper. At around 800 RMB a pair, Lululemon is expensive which made it hard for the trend to spread to the mainstream.
Before 2016, only a few factories in China produced yoga pants. But after Eve Zhang introduced the name shark pants and the trend started taking off, some factories spotted the potential popularity of yoga pants and started transforming their business.
For example, a factory called Mutuzhe (沐途者) used to mostly produce swimwear (80-90%) and yoga clothes (10-20%), and most of its products were sold overseas.
With the history of producing swimming wear, Mutuzhe easily shifted its business into yoga pant production for the domestic market. Because the needs for yoga pants grew dramatically, Mutuzhe opened another two new factories in 2018 and 2020.
To create ordinary yoga pants, it doesn’t require expensive materials and high-end technology. It only costs around 45 RMB to produce one pair, and that’s why there are many cheap yoga pants on Taobao or Pinduoduo.
E-commerce platforms are speeding up the yoga pants trend
Besides the new name and lower prices, e-commerce and social channels such as Taobao Live, Douyin, Kuaishou and Pinduoduo really helped spread the trend to lower-tier cities.
Live streaming has become a key sales channel for yoga pants, especially those that promise slimming or lifting effects. Unlike skincare products, which require days to see its effects, or bras, which are not appropriate to wear outside publicly, yoga pants, on the other hand, are easy to show viewers their effect.
For example, a Chinese yoga clothes brand molyvivi, which was just founded in 2020 managed to achieve over 5 million RMB sales through its livestream. It has a store on Pinduoduo, and the best selling pants in the store are only 49 RMB.
Key Takeaway
While price, sales channel, and product quality are all important – sometimes these alone are not enough to make a new trend take off. Cultural factors need to be considered as well. Reframing yoga pants as shark pants changed consumers’ perception and made them a product anyone could wear at any time. This case study is important to keep in mind when bringing any product to the China market.
Read more: 下沉的【瑜伽裤】|趋势分析
