Celebrating brand day is unique to coastal city

Coastal city Qingdao in Shandong province is revving up efforts to revitalize the real economy and lead high-quality economic development by building up brands.

Statistics show that Qingdao is home to two top 500 global brands, 68 Chinese-brand products, and 700 Shandong-brand products.

The Five Golden Flowers－represented by Haier, Hisense, Tsingtao Brewery, Double Star and Aucma－have earned Qingdao the reputation of "brand capital".

On June 25, the standing committee of the Qingdao city people's congress designated July 17 every year as the Qingdao Brand Day.

In recent years, Qingdao has taken brand building as an important measure to promote high-quality development and cultivate a new generation of enterprises and high-end brands.

The establishment of the Brand Day will strengthen the brand awareness of enterprises and help to improve products quality, build brands, and achieve growth.

It will also help to form a strong regional brand, and bring about the continuous optimization and extension of the industrial chain.

"This reflects Qingdao's attitude toward high-quality development, a strong brand market and the future," said Zhou Hongning, head of the industrial brand cultivation expert group of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Zhou added that Qingdao has reached the stage of brand competition in industrial development.

Bi Kaichun, a first-level inspector of the Science and Technology Department of the ministry, said Qingdao has built a large number of excellent manufacturing brands.

The digital transformation of global industries has brought about a wave of corporate brand "renewal", and more Chinese companies have been able to emerge on the international stage.

Li Huagang, senior vice-president of Haier Group as well as chairman and president of Haier Smart Home, said Qingdao-based Haier has entered more than 200 countries and regions around the world, serving 1 billion households.

Haier has achieved brand leadership with the world's first home appliance brand and one of the world's ecological brands, leading the formulation and release of 84 international standards.

Chen Weiqiang, senior vice-president of Hisense Group Holding, said Hisense has always greatly valued brand building, and recognized that the Chinese home appliance industry, as a fully competitive world industry, cannot form lasting core competitiveness without building its own brands overseas.

"Therefore, Hisense, through localization of research, production and sales, allows its brands to take root in overseas markets," Chen said.

"It constantly explores the path of building a world-class brand."

In the future, Qingdao will guide enterprises to improve their core competitiveness and follow the ethos of "Working and Empowering Qingdao to Build a Strong City with Wisdom".

Protecting independent brands will improve the city's self-confidence, magnetism and sense of honor while also attracting young people from home and abroad to gather in the city.

Titled "City and Brands Growing Together", Qingdao Brand Day, the first such event at city level in China, launched recently at the Qingdao International Conference Center.

It included the Outstanding Development Forum of Chinese Brands, the Power of Bloom Qingdao Brand Experience Show, and the Qingdao Brand Open Day.