Annual clothing sales in China will grow 25 per cent in 2019 compared to 2014. Which means China will surpass the US as the world's largest apparel market by the end of the decade. Despite strengthening of Chinese currency and rising raw material and labor costs which directly impact the Chinese clothing market, China still continues to be a global leader.

Chinese e-commerce giants such as Alibaba and others will constitute up to 50 per cent of the global e-commerce market by 2018. Apparels made in China for the US export has an applied tariff rate as high as 9.63 per cent for textiles and 16.05 per cent for clothes; free trade agreements under negotiation may see that replaced by products made in Asia.

China is one of the world’s biggest apparel producers and apparel retail markets. The country’s apparel retail sales in 2013, increased 11.6 per cent from the previous year. However, the double digital growth rate was still lower than the 18 per cent year-on-year growth in 2012 and 24.2 per cent in 2011.

Household spend on clothing in China in 2013 accounted for 10.6 per cent of their total annual expenditure compared to around three per cent of household annual expenditure in the US.