Thai Consumer-Stock Watch: Bai Jingting's Business Empire and Brand Expansion

Recently, a massive enclosure quietly went up along the street in Shanghai's Yanqingfang area, bearing the GOODEES WORLD brand. This is the first store in China for a sub-line under GOODBAI, the brand led by well-known actor Bai Jingting. Nearby are his coffee shop, clothing store, and 24-hour vending machine.

Two months earlier, GOODBAI had also opened a pop-up space here, and Bai Jingting's giant posters drew countless visitors. As a result, Yanqing Road was once dubbed 'Bai Jingting-themed street.' Many celebrities run brands, but in terms of business ecosystem, channel building, and expansion pace, Bai Jingting is one of the most business-savvy bosses in Chinese entertainment.

First store on Yanqing Road: GOODBAI drives repeat purchases with a multi-product lineup

The five-bay Western-style house along Yanqing Road is GOODBAI's first physical store in China. The brand was founded in 2021 and is a clothing and lifestyle brand created by well-known entertainer Bai Jingting. When GOODBAI opened in 2023, it sparked long queues and reseller activity, with some people waiting nearly seven hours.

Even three years later, on an ordinary weekday afternoon, the store is still busy with foot traffic, and many customers are shopping, trying items on, and taking photos for social media.

The store design is retro yet minimal, with dove motifs everywhere. In terms of product categories, GOODBAI covers clothing, shoes, hats, bags, and accessories. Compared with other celebrity streetwear brands, GOODBAI is not especially expensive, with prices mostly ranging from 39 to 2,900 yuan. For example, its short-sleeve T-shirts are mostly 199 yuan, shoes are mainly priced between 159 and 799 yuan, and canvas bags, hats, and jewelry are generally in the tens to a few hundred yuan range.

One of GOODBAI's breakout products is the Wander Shoe, priced at 459 yuan. It ranks ninth on Tmall's athletic-casual shoe repurchase chart, ahead of products from major sports brands and well-known labels such as Adidas, FILA, Anta, ASICS, and Xtep. That ranking reflects GOODBAI's influence to a certain extent.

GOODEES WORLD: a healing-cute IP with offline sales conversion

GOODEES WORLD, which is about to open its first store, also has a dedicated area inside the shop. This sub-line comes from its original IP—the pom-pom-like character shown on the enclosure. Unlike GOODBAI's casual-sports style, GOODEES WORLD is positioned as 'cute, warm, and healing,' with products that include shoes, apparel, phone cases, plush charms, and hair accessories.

In its Tmall flagship store, the 129-yuan twelve-zodiac plush charm has sold more than 7,000 units; and in the Yanqing Road vending machine, the 99-yuan baseball cap keychain is already sold out.

Since its launch, GOODBAI and its sub-lines have released collaboration products with many brands, including Salomon, Diptyque, New Era, Levi's, BABY-G, Holiland, and Line Friends minini. The lineup includes today's hottest middle-class favorites as well as household brands and streetwear labels, covering a very broad range.

From apparel to coffee: channel expansion and public-opinion risk go hand in hand

Beyond shoes, apparel, and IP derivatives, Boss Bai's business empire also includes coffee and baking. Not far from the GOODBAI Yanqing Road store is Bai Jingting's coffee shop, where a cup of coffee costs 28 to 48 yuan, similar to the pricing at other specialty coffee shops in Shanghai. In 2024, the 21-yuan price for two cookies from the 'GOODEES Big Satisfaction' line sparked online controversy.

Beyond Yanqing Road, GOODBAI has opened two more physical stores in Chengdu and Aranya, and has also launched pop-up and slow-pop-up stores in Beijing, Paris, Seoul, and other places. In addition to its own online and offline channels, GOODBAI has also entered some multi-brand stores, such as Musinsa, often called the 'Korean Uniqlo.'

From selling shoes and apparel to coffee and IP derivatives, Bai Jingting is building a consumer ecosystem centered on young people's lifestyles.

Brand strategy and risk: quality and reputation constraints behind collaboration-led expansion

In the entertainment industry, many artists build their own brands. Why are celebrities so keen to create brands? In an interview with Men's Bazaar, Bai Jingting once spoke about Somerset Maugham comparing the feeling of fame to someone handing you a string of pearls. Bai Jingting often thinks, 'Can I find another string of pearls like that?' Brands such as GOODBAI are the second string of pearls Bai Jingting found for himself in pursuit of a sense of security.

Celebrity brands have a natural traffic advantage, and their path to popularity is similar to that of many emerging apparel brands today: social-media seeding, pop-up stores as trial runs, and opening first stores in core business districts. The difference is that celebrities and their friends are walking billboards—many stars have worn GOODBAI products in public.

But celebrity-founded brands also often fall into the controversy of 'milking consumers,' or simply fade away after a while. At the same time, because the brand is deeply tied to the celebrity, it is easy for both to rise and fall together.

GOODBAI has also faced negative publicity over product quality. In 2024, the Shanghai market regulator reported that a denim jacket it tested had a pH value that did not meet the requirements of mandatory national standards. In 2025, a 599-yuan GOODBAI sweatshirt was reported to have its heat-transfer print peeling off, with the back graphic transferred onto a car seat. After the incident, the related company issued an apology, announced a recall of the affected batches, and promised corrective action.

It is worth noting that the related company behind GOODBAI, Zhetinghao (Shanghai) Brand Management Co., Ltd., is owned by Bai Jingting, Shangguan Zhe, and Li Yong, with stakes of 41%, 29%, and 10%, respectively. Shangguan Zhe's own brand has appeared at London Fashion Week and other events, and Li Yong has also spent many years in the apparel industry. So Bai Jingting's shoe and apparel business actually brings in industry insiders, with professional support in design, production, and supply chains.

From Bai Jingting's personal perspective, he is a well-known 'shoe king' in Chinese entertainment and is passionate about many sports. He is also a spokesperson for sports and outdoor brands such as New Era and Salomon. As sports demand becomes more segmented and diversified, GOODBAI has gradually developed niche clothing lines such as football (916 express) and tennis (polomove).

And beyond GOODBAI's casual-sports style, companies associated with Bai Jingting also include teenteens for young women, the women's fashion brand Ayrae, and the trendy outdoor brand 30C. Taking 30C as an example, it chose to enter the outdoor boom with a fashion-forward style, fitting current broad outdoor consumer demand and its own design strengths. 30C has already opened a store on Xiaohongshu, and Bai Jingting's same-style vest has sold out in multiple sizes.

In fact, from hit casual-sports sneakers, to booming trendy IP plush toys, to the broad outdoor segment, Bai Jingting has basically moved in step with every trend. From that perspective, Boss Bai's business success clearly depends on more than luck and traffic.

Looking at the collaborations mentioned above, some brands already have partnerships with Bai Jingting himself. The biggest fear for celebrity brands is becoming nothing more than celebrity merch. How to move beyond fan economics into a broader market may be exactly what Bai Jingting's brands are doing now—and what they will need to keep doing in the long run.

As Bai Jingting said, 'Even if it's separated from me as a person, if consumers still recognize it, if many people still like it and think it looks good, that is my ultimate goal.'