Before most people in the world were even aware of an assassination attempt of US Republican party presidential candidate Donald Trump, Chinese manufacturers were already churning out T-shirts emblazoned with an image of a defiant Trump.
It was less than two hours after the former president narrowly escaped an assassination attempt at around 6.15pm local time on Saturday in the US state of Pennsylvania.
The first batch of T-shirts went on sale on Taobao, a popular Chinese e-commerce platform, at 8.40pm – before most governments around the world had scrambled together a response.
That is China’s speed.
Within three hours, more than 2 000 orders had been placed from both China and the US. It takes an average of one minute for a T-shirt to be printed and ready for sale.
Demand for “election- and rally-themed” custom T-shirts is quite strong in the US market, according to Guangdong–based Allen Yao, co-founder of Xinflying Digital Printing Production.
Earlier this year, Yao opened a fully automated factory in California, with a daily production capacity of around 3,000 T-shirts, a total that is expected to increase to 8,000 by next month.
“The T-shirts are imported from Vietnam and stored in US warehouses, and the production speed is very fast,” Yao said.
Trump is hugely popular among Chinese netizens.
