Bowei Gong, Shanghai Office Bord Bia – Irish Food Board
2018 marked a decade of the Double 11 online shopping festival in China. Equivalent to Black Friday, Double 11 is derived from a sales promotion day first conceived by Alibaba, helping retailers clear stock by offering huge discounts to consumers. The event has long spread beyond its original platform and is now an essential date for every ecommerce platform as well as offline retail channels.
Chinese big data company, Syntun, has estimated that the total gross merchandise value (GMV) across China’s major platforms on 11th November was at RMB 314.32 billion. Tmall accounted for 67.9% (RMB 213.5 billion), followed by JD (17.3%, RMB 54.3 billion), Suning (4.7%), Pinduoduo (3%), Amazon (2.3%), and Vipshop (2%). Tmall’s final GMV grew by 26.9% compared to 2017. Moreover, Lazada, a Southeast ecommerce platform acquired by Alibaba in 2016, were also engaged into this game this year. Overseas market is a potential growth driver for Alibaba ecommerce kingdom.
Consumers
Consumers in Shanghai, Beijing, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen spend most during Double 11. These five cities also registered the highest GDP across China in 2017. The mid-high level consumer segment is growing rapidly. The growth of “heavy consumers”, who spent over RMB 5,000 on the day was 3.4 times higher than those who spent just RMB 500-1,000.
Imported products
The strength of imported brands, as well as cross-border brands, continues to increase in ecommerce. This year, 19,000 foreign brands from 75 countries participated in this year’s shopping carnival. Sales value for the overall food and beverage sector was RMB 18.86 billion on Double 11 in Tmall platform. Cross-border business accounts for 6.6% of the value of this category.
2018 Double 11 rankings on Tmall
For more information, please contact: bowei.gong@ucdconnect.ie.
References: