The eighth China Outdoor Furniture & Garden Leisure Products Exhibition attracts a total of 186 companies and 2015 purchasers, the most on record so far. [Photo/taizhou.com.cn]

Intended orders from overseas totaling $14.57 million were reached during the recently concluded China Outdoor Furniture & Garden Leisure Products Exhibition in Linhai, a county-level city of Taizhou.

The figure represented a yearly uptick of 11.7 percent, official data shows.

Meanwhile, the fair also saw the signing of domestic intended orders worth 56.6 million yuan ($8.44 million), up 13.5 percent.

The event, now in its eighth year, attracted a total of 186 companies and 2015 buyers, including 425 from overseas, the most on record so far.

The past three decades has witnessed Linhai growing to be a significant manufacturing hub for outdoor leisure products.

Official statistics show that the city is currently home to over 1,000 manufacturers of outdoor leisure products, with furniture, awnings, and umbrellas being sold to more than 130 countries and regions across the world.

In 2018, the output of the city's outdoor leisure product industry surpassed 21 billion yuan. This year, exports by homegrown brands in the city stood at 7.08 billion yuan in the first three quarters, an increase of 12.7 percent.

In 2003, Linhai was awarded the title of "China Outdoor Leisure Products Production Base", and nine years later, it was designated the "China Outdoor Furniture and Garden Leisure Products Export Base".

Affected by the on-going Sino-US trade frictions, many local companies are scrambling for market share in Europe, according to Pang Yingying, CEO of Zhejiang Yongqiang Group, a leading outdoor leisure products manufacturer in Linhai.

In the past, more than half of overseas orders for the company were from the US, but now the company has to shift more investment and manpower to Europe, Pang said.

Meanwhile, more businesses are tapping into the domestic market, which is showing strong potential. Luo Bangren, secretary general of Linhai leisure products industry association, pointed out that 90 percent of outdoor leisure products are sold overseas, but with the rise in consumption, prospects for the domestic market are promising.

Chen Yonghui, president of Zhejiang Zhengte Co, predicted that in the next five to eight years, the domestic market will rival that of Europe.

In addition to the market shift, some local enterprises are planning to relocate plants to neighboring countries such as Vietnam and Cambodia.

Luo said that the labor cost in China is 30 percent higher than in Vietnam, despite the cost of renting land being almost the same.