Fabric VS Leather: The New Revolution of Automotive Interiors Fabrics

     With the rapid development of the automobile industry in China, the structure of the consumer group tends to be younger, and the consumption concept is gradually mature, and more and more people pursue the environmental protection, comfort and convenience of car life. With the rapid development of the automobile industry, the structure of consumer groups tends to be younger, and the concept of consumption is gradually mature. More and more people are pursuing environmental protection, comfort, convenience and individuation of car life. Especially for the interior space, look forward to highlight the atmosphere of self and home. Based on this, many interior and material manufacturers began a new research and development process, to meet the needs of the new era of car owners, including the development of new automotive fabrics. Now in the automotive fabric market, or is labeled as "tall and high" leather world, how to base the new fabric, and how to expand in the future? Recently, the reporter interviewed the Johnson controls automotive interior business unit senior manager Zou Li group in China automobile fabrics, discusses the above problem, owner demand at present in China's auto market in a battle, 80 has gradually become the main consumer groups, and the future of younger after 90 will also become the important purchasing power, the auto market in consumer demand and value system of the characteristics of the diversification and individuation. And 60, 70 consumer groups, although relatively conservative, but the idea is changing gradually. In fact, in Europe, 80% of car seats are new fabrics such as fabric, mainly consumers think that new fabric plasticity and selectivity is stronger, can better highlight personality, release ego.

      The Chinese consumer is changing in this regard, especially the younger group, we can see this through the SUV sales, so we have a lot of confidence in the Chinese market." "Zou said. She told reporters that Johnson Controls will pay more attention to their value appeal of "identity, diversity, personalization and harmony with nature" in new fabric design for the main models of the post-80s and 90s generation, and have more colors and patterns for them to choose from. For those born in the 60s and 70s who are fond of leather, Johnson Controls will also use imitation leather grain fabrics and some leather substitutes, such as PVC tape and yarn, to process special Mithy fabrics to meet their needs to some extent. Leather relative to fabric will be told, or relatively single, fabric has a variety of permutations and combinations, can meet the needs of different consumers. The environmental protection coefficient is compared to the PM2.5 outside the car, and the interior suffers from the erosion of VOC toxic gases. The word "environmental protection" has gradually changed from the government's leading role to people's conscious acceptance. Forty-seven percent of Chinese consumers said they would consider green "labels" and features when buying a car. For the leather that seeks hegemony market all the time, or usher in new challenge. Tracing the carbon footprint from the initial livestock production to the final production application, the total carbon footprint for the entire life cycle is very high, with a total carbon dioxide emission of 110kg per square metre, more than five times that of the average fabric. Relatively speaking, the fabric has the advantages of soft touch, noise reduction, low energy consumption (not easy to absorb or release heat), low carbon emissions and many other advantages. For the new fabric used in the chair, Zou said that in addition to being breathable and scratch-resistant, it also needs to be able to pass Total VOC and smell tests. With post-processing technologies, such as Freshper4mance, car fabric coatings can be as clean as splashing a cup of coffee on a chair and wiping it with a rag. In addition, Zou Li told reporters that the fabric fabric is light, while for different parts of the fabric, can achieve different thickness, compared with leather, the weight can be reduced by 60%-90%, in order to meet the car factory lightweight and energy saving needs. For OEMs, the preference of consumers is the key factor in their choice of fabric materials. At this stage, how to get the OEMs to accept this concept first will be a big challenge for new fabrics. For this, Zou Li said that before the OEMs did not promote fabric products, mainly because of the limited consumer awareness and acceptance, and that the fabric is more difficult to take care of, the ultimate reason is because the market before the choice of fabric fabric technology is still too little.

      With the continuous exploration of fabric composite processing technology and new fabric materials, Johnson Controls has seen many possibilities. If the fabric seat can not only resist dirt and bacteria, warm in winter and cool in summer, but also beautiful, but also can achieve a lot of personalized graphics and design, I believe that consumers will be willing to choose the fabric seat, O&M will also respond to this trend. In addition, the fabric has a very important advantage lies in its highly flexible and modular, fabrics need to adopt a base cloth (the traditional three plain black, grey, beige), on the base fabric with different design elements (design, pattern, color), adopt different composite processing technology (such as laser welding, embroidery, silk screen printing, inkjet, etc.), can present the effect of the beautiful, even achieve the result of imitation leather. This is very pleasing for OEMs, which can not only reduce costs, but also highlight the differentiation and individuality of different models. At the same time, Johnson controls in the acquisition of Michel Thierry, implements the fabrics in the field of vertical integration, through the EPDP product development process (optimization), deep understanding of OEM customers car design theme and professional insight for the future design trends and designer fabrics can be involved in OEM customers ahead of interior concept design phase, with the fabric design prophase communication, and for OEM customers and consumers' needs, developing all kinds of fabrics of innovation solution.