Antai Textile: Acrylic Yarns Hot Both Domestically and Internationally, Three Decades of Deep Cultivation 'Weaves' New Industry Opportunities

In Zhangjiagang in July, the summer heat is gradually intensifying, but the office building of Antai Textile exudes a momentum even more fervent than the weather. Li Xiong, the Marketing Manager, stands by the floor-to-ceiling window, holding a freshly printed industry weekly report in his hand. His fingertips glide over a line of data: 'The SW Textile Manufacturing Index rose 2.3% this week, outperforming the SW All-A Index by 0.7 percentage points.' He turns to look at his desk, where another report has an eye-catching line: 'From January to May, China's exports of textile yarns, fabrics and products reached 58.48 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 2.5%.'

'Lao Li, what are you pondering? You're smiling like you've found a treasure.' Factory Director Huang from the Production Department walks in with a thermos cup, the cuffs of his work clothes still stained with a few strands of light blue acrylic fibers—samples of colored acrylic sliver just randomly inspected from the workshop.

Li Xiong pushes the report over, points at the data, and smiles: 'Look at these two sets of figures. The textile manufacturing sector outperforms the market, and export yarns are still growing. Our acrylic yarns and colored acrylic slivers are probably going to "go viral" this year.'

Director Huang leans in for a look, his eyes also lighting up. He has worked at Antai for nearly thirty years, from an apprentice to the factory director, witnessing how this Zhangjiagang local enterprise, founded in 1993, has grown from a single acrylic yarn producer to a 'versatile expert in yarns' now covering acrylic yarns, acrylic slivers, colored acrylic slivers, and fancy yarns. 'Absolutely. Last week, we just shipped a batch of "starry sky blue" colored acrylic slivers to a clothing brand in Guangdong. They said they want to make new autumn knitwear and specifically requested ours with color fastness reaching level 4 or above.' He thinks of the imported German dyeing unit in the workshop, 'Insisting on installing this set of equipment back then seems worthwhile now—for small-batch, multi-color orders, we can deliver in three days. How can those factories relying on traditional cotton yarn dyeing keep up with this pace?'

This is true. Since this year, fluctuations in the cotton market have made many textile enterprises anxious: the domestic cotton price B index rose to 15,198 yuan/ton this week, while international cotton prices fell by 0.9% (ICE Cotton No. 2 main contract dropped to 67 cents/pound). The 'scissors gap' in raw material prices has led more and more downstream customers to turn to chemical fiber yarns such as acrylic. 'Acrylic itself has the advantages of being fluffy, warm, and brightly colored,' Li Xiong adds, 'Now that cotton prices are unstable, our colored acrylic slivers directly save customers the subsequent dyeing process, reducing costs and shortening the production cycle. No wonder they've become hot commodities.'

As they speak, Li Xiong's phone rings; it's an old customer from a foreign trade company in Zhejiang. 'Manager Li, the feedback on the "slub fancy yarn" sample last time is very good. The European customer has added an order for 300 tons. Can you deliver it by the end of the month?' The voice on the other end of the phone is urgent. Li Xiong glances at the production schedule on the wall, turns to Director Huang, and asks: 'Can the current flexible production line in the workshop be adjusted?' Director Huang immediately understands: 'Don't worry, the intelligent production scheduling system we upgraded last year isn't just for show. We'll postpone a batch of regular acrylic yarns next Wednesday by two days to prioritize this fancy yarn order.' After hanging up the phone, Li Xiong smiles and says: 'You see, national clothing retail sales grew by 3.3% from January to May, domestic sales are recovering; export yarns have also increased by 2.5%. We have to grasp both domestic and foreign markets.'

Over three decades of deep cultivation, Antai Textile has thoroughly grasped the 'pulse' of the yarn market. From initially opening the market with acrylic yarns, to later developing colored acrylic slivers to solve the pain points of traditional yarns such as 'difficult dyeing and large color difference', and then to the launch of fancy yarns like 'segment dyed yarn' and 'loop yarn' in recent years, each step has been in line with industry demand nodes. 'I remember when we first produced colored acrylic slivers in 2018, customers were worried about color instability. We stayed in the workshop with the technical department for a month, testing color fastness and tensile strength every day, and managed to increase the qualification rate from 85% to 99.5%,' Director Huang says with pride. 'Now the national cotton sales rate has reached 94.4% (as of July 3), indicating strong downstream demand, but raw material inventories have decreased (imported cotton port inventories fell 3.08% week-on-week). At this time, whoever can respond quickly and provide differentiated products will be able to gain a firm foothold.'

The afternoon sun shines through the glass windows onto the workshop's production line. Light pink, lake blue, and light gray acrylic slivers shuttle through the machines, quickly turning into rolls of evenly colored yarn. Li Xiong looks at the jumping production data on the monitoring screen and remembers someone asking him at an industry meeting last week, 'What is Antai's secret?' He didn't say much then, but now he has the answer—it's the original aspiration of 'making China's best acrylic yarn' when starting the business in 1993, the acumen of the marketing department when monitoring index fluctuations, the meticulousness of the production department when guarding the workshop furnaces, and more importantly, the tenacity to turn 'trends' into 'opportunities' over more than three decades.

'By the way,' Director Huang suddenly remembers something, 'We need to send samples to an old customer in Shandong next week. They want to try blending our acrylic sliver with wool to make high-end scarves. I asked the laboratory to adjust a few ratios first; take a look later?' Li Xiong nods, picks up a pen, and writes in his notebook: 'July priorities: Follow up on blended new product development, sort out export order production capacity.' Outside the window, in Zhangjiagang's textile industrial park, the chimneys of several factories are slowly emitting white smoke, and Antai Textile's story continues to grow in these continuously extending yarns.