ARTY MARKET: Over 300 boxes in the Fengguo Box are used as sales outlets of original handcrafted items. The venue has proved a big hit with the younger crowd (LIU YU)

It's a strange sight being in a store without sales counters, cash registers and legions of over-zealous sales staff. Instead, the Fengguo Box, covering an area of 200 square meters in Zhongguancun Plaza in north Beijing, has come up with a compartmentalized approach to selling. It contains more than 300 wooden boxes that are all in the same shape but each with a different theme matching the goods sold in it.

Entering the box space, shoppers can find adorable stuffed dolls, eye-catching emblems, T-shirts and bags, all handmade and all displaying artistic uniqueness. "Each box represents a single element of this city and the soul of every designer as its owner," reads a slogan. Being the first domestic outlet for creative designers, the Fengguo Box provides shoppers with something totally different with what they find in other department stores.

Most box owners of the Fengguo Box are designers, who pay 200 yuan per month ($29.2) to rent their small space. Different from mass-production or low quality markets, submissions for a box stall are assessed by originality and artistic merit. Since it was launched last year, the Fengguo Box has recorded good sales to the younger set, most notably the so-called post 80s and 90s generations.

In five months, the Fengguo Box earned 1.7 million yuan ($248,200) by leasing boxes, plus charging 20 percent commission on sales. "If the 10 percent growth rate can be maintained, the sales revenue is expected to reach 4 million yuan ($584,000) by the end of this year," said Sun Xiao, Fengguo Box's branding and marketing manager.

Birth of the Fengguo Box

The concept has been a long time coming. Young crafters and artists always find it difficult to balance pursuing artistic creativity and making client-tailored designs. Inevitably they opt for self-employment, but they need a platform to share their creations with the public. This has inspired Wang Sanshi, the founder of the Fengguo Box.

Initially Wang launched an online sales model, but as more artists joined in, he found that many artists were keen to set up face-to-face deals with the buyers in order to see their reaction to the craft on sale. At the beginning of 2007, Wang opened an idea-Mart at the Zhongguancun Plaza, and the response was overwhelming. Since then, idea-Mart bazaars have been regular monthly events in Beijing. In late 2007, 108 stalls covering 5,800 square meters were set up in the Place Shopping Mall in east Beijing, attracting more than 30,000 people, and the sales broke new records.

Wang himself is an oil painter and knows well how hard it is for an artist to survive in the market and to be recognized. As the business grew, he thought more on how to find a permanent venue for i-Marts. A small box workshop for designers' exchanges in Shanghai gave him the idea to open a similar store. In February 2007, the Fengguo Box, a talent pool, was opened. Some designers registered on Wang's online shop have been the trial renters of those box stalls and are now developing their own brands through this initiative.

Free spirit

The Fengguo Box has helped a large group of young designers change their present lifestyle. "It allows me to live another life, one not determined by working schedules. And it is a good place for you to see artists, idealists and consumers," said Meng Xiao, a box renter. The 25-year-old art major, who follows a non-restrictive and free lifestyle, chose to become a resident designer in the Fengguo Box after college graduation. "I can take care of my box stall here, and it boosts my creativity by talking with other designers," said Meng.