Climbing into the stove
Around 100 kilometers west of Panyu, by the side of an eight-lane highway in the neighboring city of Foshan, are two sprawling logistics parks, each housing dozens of cavernous warehouses.
Known as the Dongbai and Anbo warehouses, the parks are the main portals connecting Shein’s Chinese supply chain with its customers around the world. Purple trucks packed with newly made outfits continually stream through the gates. Inside, thousands of order pickers rush to sort the items for delivery.
Working at the facilities, which operate 24 hours a day, isn’t for the faint-hearted. Chinese migrant workers call it taking the “Shein Challenge” — trying to withstand the brutally intense work so that they can claim the relatively attractive wages on offer.
On Kuaishou, a short-video platform, users swap stories about how quickly they quit due to the intense workload. One commenter likened working at the warehouses to “getting into a stove.” On forum site Baidu Tieba, another user said order pickers at the warehouses had to walk what felt like 50 kilometers per day.
But many are still willing to accept the challenge. Zhang Xiaojun — who spoke using a pseudonym for privacy reasons — told Sixth Tone he earns more than 10,000 yuan per month working as an order picker at the Dongbai warehouses, which he considered a good income. But he added the tough demands of the job had taken a toll on his health.
The 30-something said he’d lost a lot of weight due to the physical exertion of sorting packages in the warehouse. He also struggled to sleep due to the warehouses’ rotating shifts: Every two weeks, he has to switch between an 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. and an 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. schedule.
“I have no time to sit and take a rest,” said Zhang. “I feel exhausted at the end of the day.”
After another two years, Zhang said he’d probably no longer be able to physically cope with the work. Yet he wants to hold on as long as he can, in an attempt to pay off the mortgage on his home in his native region of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region before he turns 40. Previously, he earned just 6,000 yuan a month working at an electronics factory in the southern metropolis of Shenzhen.
“It’s much more exhausting, but it’s my personal choice,” Zhang said.
Other warehouse staff who spoke with Sixth Tone pointed to another potential issue at the facilities: Their use of dispatch agencies.
A promotional photo used by Shein to show its logistics operations. From the website of Shein
When Sixth Tone arrived at the Dongbai warehouses, two young women from the eastern Anhui province were carrying their luggage to the staff dormitory. They said they had been hired to work as order pickers at the warehouse just a few days previously.
The pair — who were both still in their teens — had got the jobs via a recruitment agent who had advertised the role on 58.com, a Craigslist-like classified ads platform. They had no previous warehouse working experience, but were attracted by the promised salary and low entry threshold.
“The HR said workers are paid by the piece, and beginners can earn 7,000 yuan a month,” one of the women told Sixth Tone. “We want to give it a try.”
Shein appears to rely extensively on agents to staff the warehouses. According to a manager at the Dongbai facility — who requested anonymity as he’d signed a confidentiality agreement with the company — Shein stopped directly recruiting workers for its logistics centers two years ago and now uses dozens of dispatch agencies to hire new staff.
Labor dispatching has become common in China, as it enables employers to outsource responsibility for processing employees’ wages, income tax, benefits, and social security payments. But many in China oppose the practice, as dispatch agencies are associated with a host of labor problems.
“The biggest problem with dispatch companies is that they don’t pay the promised wages at the agreed time,” Li Qiang, a labor rights expert, told Sixth Tone. “However, the dispatching agencies are sometimes too small to be held accountable, which makes it more difficult for workers to defend their rights. It also helps manufacturers and large companies minimize their legal responsibilities. When labor problems arise, they are directed to dispatching agencies.”
A screenshot from a recruitment ad for one of Shein’s warehouses in Foshan, Guangdong province. From Kuaishou
On Baidu Tieba and Kuaishou, several users have posted comments below recruitment ads for Shein’s logistics centers warning that some agencies don’t pay the promised salary to workers. However, Sixth Tone wasn’t able to verify how extensive disagreements over wages are inside the facilities. Several calls to the Sanshui Labor Security Supervision and Law Enforcement Bureau, the local body that supervises the warehouses, went unanswered.
For Huang, Shein’s “ultra-fast-fashion” strategy — with its unpredictable order volume and pressure for extreme delivery turnarounds — provides incentives to companies across the fashion supply chain to make use of labor dispatching.
“The turbulent market conditions force every section of the supply chain to rely on temporary workers, resulting in a lot of chaos in order subcontracting and labor dispatching,” said Huang.
Chinese labor laws state that dispatch workers cannot account for more than 10% of a company’s total workforce. However, many companies — including Foxconn, a major supplier to Apple — have been accused of exceeding this limit at its Chinese facilities. It’s unclear whether Shein violates the quota.
Sixth Tone sent multiple requests to Shein for comment on its use of dispatch agencies and other issues raised in this article. The company had not responded by time of publication.
