The Singles' Day shopping festival loses its shine under China's lagging economy

HONG KONG -- Businesses and consumers in China found the annual Singles' Day shopping festival less attractive this year amid a sluggish economy, forcing e-commerce firms to look abroad for growth.

Online service provider and e-commerce platform Alibaba started the now-famous event on Nov. 11, 2009, offering attractive discounts to entice shoppers to spend more. The extravaganza, also known as “Double 11,” has since expanded to other platforms in China — like JD.com and Pinduoduo — and abroad.

It has long been regarded as a barometer of consumer sentiment.

While Singles’ Day was previously a one-day event, shopping platforms in China now kickstart the festival weeks ahead to drum up sales volume. Even some brick-and-mortar stores join the festival by launching sales campaigns and hanging promotional banners and posters in the hopes of luring shoppers.

But amid China’s lagging domestic economy, dragged down by a real estate crisis and deflationary pressures, consumers no longer go all out during the shopping extravaganza.

Meanwhile, e-commerce platforms grappling with a slowing domestic market have turned to overseas markets to seek new growth, offering promotions like global free shipping and allowing merchants to sell worldwide with ease.

Alibaba, for example, said in a blog post on its Alizila site that some 70,000 merchants saw sales double with global free shipping. In markets like Singapore and Hong Kong, new customers also doubled, the e-commerce company said.

Since the festival began in late October, “I have only spent a few hundred yuan on daily necessities,” said Wang Haihua, who owns a fitness center in the capital, Beijing.

Wang said that the prices offered on e-commerce platforms during Singles’ Day are not necessarily cheaper than usual. “They’re all tricks and we’ve seen through it over the years,” she said.

Zhang Jiewei, a 34-year-old who runs a barber shop in the city of Xi’an, echoed Wang’s sentiments, saying that he no longer trusts Singles’ Day promotions as some merchants tend to raise the usual prices before offering a discount, giving consumers the illusion they are getting a deal.

“I used to buy a lot two or three years ago and I even purchased a mobile phone (during Singles’ Day),” he said. However, following the coronavirus pandemic, he stopped “because of lower income.”

“I am not going to buy anything this year,” Zhang said.

Some experts say that Beijing’s recent stimulus measures have had little impact on boosting consumer confidence.

“People are not interested in spending and are cutting back on big-ticket items,” said Shaun Rein, founder and managing director of China Market Research Group in Shanghai. “Since October 2022, the weak economy means that everything has been on discount year-round, 11.11 is not going to bring in more discounts than the month before.”

Rein said he expects low growth for the Singles’ Day shopping festival as consumers tighten their spending in anticipation of difficult economic times ahead.

Categories such as sportswear and fitness, however, have been doing well as customers “trade down a Gucci bag for Lululemon sportswear,” he said.

Jacob Cooke, CEO of e-commerce consultancy WPIC Marketing + Technologies, said that despite the luxury downturn, the shopping festival still showed strong sales for goods in premium price brands across categories like mother-baby, personal care and toys, as well as outdoor and sport.

“There’s a clear shift in consumer priorities towards experiences, hobbies, and health,” Cooke said. “With record-level platform subsidies and generous membership programs like Alibaba’s 88VIP, consumers actually showed a preference for premium branded goods during this year’s festival.”

Platforms like JD.com and Alibaba previously used to publish the total value of the festival's transactions, but have stopped since 2022. While yearly growth used to be in the double digits, estimates of recent figures have dwindled to low single-digit growth.

Syntun, a data provider, estimated that last year’s gross merchandising volume sales across major e-commerce platforms grew just 2% to 1.14 trillion yuan ($156.40 billion), a far cry from double-digit growth before COVID-19.

Alibaba also owns popular e-commerce platforms Taobao and Tmall,

Even some merchants who typically participated in the festival say the high cost of advertising no longer pays off as sales dwindle.

Zhao Gao, who owns a garment factory in eastern Zhejiang province, said that after paying to advertise on e-commerce platforms, he would only break even after sales.

“The platforms have so many rules for promotions and customers have become more skeptical,” he said. “As a merchant, I no longer participate in the Singles’ Day promotions.”

Another merchant, Du Baonian who runs a food company processing mutton in Inner Mongolia, said consumers spend less and his overall sales were down by 15% compared to the past year.

He still takes part in the Singles’ Day promotions but said the higher expenses do not typically generate returns because of slow sales.

“We are seeing shrinking revenue, but advertisement on the platform can help us maintain our leading sales position,” he said, adding that he was considering advertising on more e-commerce platforms to target more consumers.

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Associated Press researcher Yu Bing in Beijing contributed to this report.