The Tianjin Free Trade Zone (Tianjin FTZ) recently launched its first project, the Tianjin European Shopping Center.

Customers shop at the No 2 boutique store of the Tianjin European Shopping Center in the Tianjin FTZ on Feb 9. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Shipping directly from Europe, new products can be released in the shopping center on their official release day. In addition, the products sold in the shopping center enjoy a custom bonded policy. The price of the products can have discounts of up to 20 to 70 percent off.

As the second custom bonded and direct selling shopping center in Tianjin, it is estimated that the entire European shopping center will be open to the public in the second half of this year.

Since the opening of the first demonstrative store in the Tianjin European Shopping Center last December, the sales value has reached more than 5 million yuan ($799,500). Attracting a great number of consumers from Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei, the number of visitors to the store per day has reached 3,000.

Opening last weekend in the Tianjin Airport Economic Area, the No 2 boutique store of the Tianjin European Shopping Center is a two-story shopping mall with an area of up to 2,000 square meters.

Customers can find as many as 60 direct-sale European brands and more than 50,000 varies of products. All the commodities are ordered directly with the European vendor. Without any middleman, the whole process is monitored by customs.

Different from the No 5 demonstrative store opened prior, the No 2 boutique store mainly carries fairly-priced luxury products and imported baby products and aims at establishing affordable luxury products.

A dozen brands have joined the shopping mall. Among which, many designer brands have become hot spots of the new stores, which include Gucci, Zegna, Burberry and Prada. Italian Furla brand handbags sell for only thousands of yuan in the store.

In addition, apart from the physical store, the Tianjin European Shopping Center has applied the O2O pattern and launched and operated an online shopping platform.

With a total area of 40,000 square meters, the underground area of the Tianjin European Shopping Center is under construction. Moreover, the construction and transformation of the above-ground European Shopping Street will be launched after Spring Festival. It is estimated that the entire shopping center will be open to the public in the second half of 2015.

The shopping center will include a large-scale luxury outlet store, an imported European food store, a baby product store, a European home supply store, an education and training center, European-style catering, coffee and desert shops, bars and recreational areas.

Many culture and artistic activities will be held, which include a culture week featuring different countries, folk culture festivals and art exhibitions.

With the support of the preferential policy of the Tianjin FTZ, the Tianjin European Shopping Center has established the first custom-bonded and direct-selling shopping mall and has realized O2O sales and operation. In addition, the shopping center has established an online shopping platform for customers.

In the future, the shopping center is going to establish a European lifestyle experience center and a destination for tourists to shop at.

Sun Wei, manager of the Tianjin European Shopping Center, said, "Enjoying similar preferential policies as the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, the Tianjin European Shopping Center is able to order commodities directly from the original European stores. The commodities go directly to the bonded warehouse with no middle steps."

Sun added, "The shopping center enjoys a custom bonded policy that cuts a great amount of costs during merchandising. Therefore, the price of the commodities sold in the shopping center is much lower."

With lower insurance, transportation fees and merchandising costs, the price of a commodity sold in the Tianjin European Shopping Center can enjoy a 20 to 70 percent discount.