Manchester is the world capital of fast fashion and it’s tailor-made for Shein’s new hub

Manchester has given birth to two titans of Premier League football – Britpop’s most famous band, Oasis, and suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst – but it is the textile trade that really put the city on the map.

Known as “Cottonopolis” in the 19th century for its dominance in the textile industry, it was nicknamed “Madchester” in the 1990s as many factories were converted into party venues. It has since become the world’s fast fashion hub.

Home to Boohoo, PrettyLittleThing and Missguided, Manchester is at the forefront of the fashion industry, selling glamorous bodycon dresses for as little as £10.

And now controversial Chinese giant Shein is about to enter the fray, opening a hub in the city’s trendy Barrio Norte, packed with cafes, bars, workspaces and young fashionistas.

Shein will occupy an office minutes from Boohoo’s headquarters on Dale Street.

The area is full of Grade II listed buildings, including converted warehouses and Victorian mills, and is renowned for its bustle of shoppers and sellers.

The move pits Chris Xu, the mysterious billionaire founder of Shein, against Boohoo’s Kamani family, the city’s dominant fashion clan.

For Shein, which is currently based in Salford, the move to central Manchester is another sign it has joined the establishment as it heads towards a £50bn London flotation, possibly as early as this autumn.

While the Boohoo building looks dated, developers down the street are building a sleek fashion hub for Shein.

Parts of the 1,400-square-foot headquarters may still be covered with tarps, but it will soon be a bright, minimalist space that will house 75 employees by the end of this year. It will also feature facilities for creating videos and content for social media sites like TikTok.

The Shein Manchester team is the first outside of China to have full control over product creation with a highly active creative team that creates mood boards, designs garments and then sources fabrics.

A new brand, Musera, was launched earlier this year. Within a month, there were already 200 Musera styles on offer, with new collections being released every week.

Although the garments are designed in the UK, they are still manufactured in Chinese factories at an astonishing rate. If a product sells well, it is replicated in various new colours and lengths.

It is this speed, combined with low prices, that has allowed Shein to steal market share from Boohoo, Asos and PrettyLittleThing, and the company is confident it can dominate the industry for years to come.

Analysts predict the company will become the UK’s sixth-biggest clothing retailer by 2027, up from 11th in 2023, according to data firm Global Data.

Shein made £1.5bn in profits on £34bn in sales (by gross merchandise value) last year, catering to younger, budget-conscious shoppers in 150 countries.

During a tour of the building, product director Gemma Dunne, formerly buying director at PrettyLittleThing, is very confident about the move.

She told The Mail on Sunday: ‘I don’t think there’s really anyone who can match us, Shein is leaving everyone behind.

‘Setting up in Manchester, the birthplace of fast fashion, was probably one of the best decisions Shein could have made in terms of positioning itself in the industry.’

But Shein’s business model is not without controversy. It has been reported that some of Shein’s suppliers use forced labour from China’s Uighur Muslim minority, allowing the company to sell clothes at bargain prices. A shirt can cost as little as £4.

The company also admitted that it discovered two cases of child labor last year after an audit of its thousands of suppliers.

The company says it has a “zero tolerance” policy towards child labour.

Dunne defends the business model, saying: “When you grow at the rate that Shein has grown, you’re automatically setting yourself up for more press and more negative feedback. That’s just a natural human instinct.”

The quality of the clothes has also been criticised by the fashion press, but Dunne says: “We’re very concerned that even though it costs £15 it doesn’t mean you only wear it once. You can wear it as many times as you like and it will last. Just because it’s cheap doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not good.”

With a London Stock Exchange debut in its sights, Shein has hired bankers from Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley, and joined the British Retail Consortium in a bid to conquer the City.

This comes after the British Fashion Council (BFC) warned that the planned IPO is a “significant concern” for the industry.

Some high street retailers are also understood to be unhappy with the Labour government’s apparent support for the listing.

Stuart Trevor, founder of All Saints, is the latest to launch a criticism: “Shein is making as much noise as possible, desperately trying to make it seem like it has some sort of respectable business practices in the hope that the British government will be stupid enough to allow it to go public, which is ridiculous and cannot be allowed,” he said two weeks ago.

Shein has filed paperwork with the Financial Conduct Authority, the first step towards listing on the stock exchange. But the Mail on Sunday revealed this summer that Chinese officials are unhappy with the level of criticism Shein has faced since it revealed its plans.

The Kamani family and the rest of Manchester’s fashion world will no doubt be watching closely.