According to Financial Times News, Shein’s planned Paris boutique opening at Galeries Lafayette turned into a disaster with street protests and French customs blocking all Shein packages for 24 hours. The government is pushing for an EU-wide ban and potential fines up to 6% of global revenue after discovering third-party sellers offering machetes, knuckle dusters, and disturbing child-like sex dolls on Shein’s marketplace. Founder Xu Yangtian, who changed his English name from Chris to Sky, has maintained near-total anonymity despite his company once being valued at $100 billion. The controversy comes as Shein has shifted IPO locations from New York to London to Hong Kong, with investors now pushing for a $30 billion valuation to speed up the listing process.
The Ghost in the Machine
Here’s the thing about Xu Yangtian – even his own employees might not recognize him. The 1983-born founder from Zibo, China has never given a media interview, hasn’t posted on social media in nearly a decade, and keeps zero biographical information on Shein’s website. He’s what you’d call aggressively private in an era where most founders can’t stop talking about themselves. But when your company employs 7,000 contract suppliers and faces multiple international controversies, how long can you really stay hidden?
His background reads like a classic entrepreneur story – started with international trade in college selling everything from gaskets to spark plugs, moved to Nanjing for ecommerce, then co-founded wedding dress seller Sheinside before transforming it into the fast fashion behemoth we know today. Now he lives in Singapore where Shein relocated its headquarters in 2022. Partners describe him as “rough around the edges” and introverted. Given the current firestorm, can you blame him for staying out of sight?
The Algorithmic Fashion Machine
Shein’s business model is basically supply chain witchcraft. They use algorithms to scrape the web for trends, feed them to designers, then test designs with ultra-small orders before scaling up. This lets them offer millions of designs compared to tens of thousands at traditional retailers. US supply chain consultant Brittain Ladd calls it turning “supply chain agility into a strategic weapon” that’s disrupted H&M, Zara and Forever 21.
But there‘s a catch. Western retailers argue Shein exploits customs tax exemptions for small packages (de minimis in the US) to undercut domestic competition. When Trump ended these exemptions and similar moves happened in the EU and UK, Shein’s valuation took a hit right when they needed it most for their IPO. It’s a classic case of regulatory arbitrage coming back to bite you.
The Never-Ending IPO Saga
Shein’s path to going public has been messier than a fast fashion clearance rack. They started with New York, then shifted to London over forced labor allegations, then pivoted again to Hong Kong because Chinese and UK regulators couldn’t agree on risk disclosure language. Now they’re filing confidentially in Hong Kong while investors push for that drastic valuation cut from $100B to $30B.
Professor Sheng Lu from University of Delaware puts it perfectly: “Shein is at a critical point of figuring out its business model for the next five to 10 years. The challenge is the growth, how to keep expanding, how to further satisfy their investors.” And let’s be real – when your marketplace starts selling weapons and disturbing sex dolls, that growth gets complicated real fast.
Why France Is Furious
The French situation is particularly brutal. Finance minister Roland Lescure called the marketplace “horrors” “disgusting” – and when French officials use that kind of language, you know you’ve messed up. The government isn’t just blocking packages; they’re calling for EU-wide action and those potential 6% of global revenue fines are no joke.
This all started when Shein launched its third-party marketplace in 2023 to compete with Temu. Diversifying sounded smart until you lose control over what sellers are offering. Now Xu Yangtian’s extreme privacy makes perfect sense – who’d want to be the public face of this disaster? The French backlash probably just confirms his belief that staying anonymous is the way to go. But when you’re running a company this massive with global ambitions, can you really hide forever?
