Week 5:Chinese consumers splurge on ‘Singles Day’ spree

Chinese Internet users yesterday spent billions of dollars in the planet’s biggest online shopping splurge, as “Singles Day” hit new heights, despite slowing growth in the world’s second-largest economy.

The cumulative national bill for the day-long orgy of commerce dwarfed what Americans spent online over the five-day frenzy from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday last year.

Singles Day is not a traditional Chinese festival, but e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) has been pushing Nov. 11 — a date heavy on ones — since 2009 as it looks to tap the country’s huge, and expanding, army of Internet shoppers.

At first it was marketed as an “anti-Valentine’s Day,” featuring hefty discounts to lure singletons and price-sensitive buyers.

However, with sales hitting new highs year after year, it has become a massive — and highly lucrative — business opportunity embraced by the nation’s digital retailers.

Competition for a slice of China’s online population of 668 million is turning increasingly fierce.

Alibaba kicked off this year’s mammoth event with a television spectacular at Beijing’s Water Cube Olympic swimming venue, featuring Chinese and foreign celebrities, including James Bond actor Daniel Craig, and US actor Kevin Spacey.

And the company’s efforts were paying off in spades, with shoppers splashing out more than US$10 billion in the first 14 hours of the sale.

This year’s tally had already outstripped last year’s gangbusters effort, with the last year’s total of US$9.3 billion matched a little more than 12 hours after the promotion’s midnight start.

In comparison, desktop sales for the five days from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday in the US last year stood at US$6.56 billion, according to Internet analytic firm com-score.

“The 2015 sale has eclipsed last year’s final results in a little over half the time,” Alibaba said.

In an earlier release, Alibaba’s chief executive officer Daniel Zhang (張勇) said: “The whole world will witness the power of Chinese consumption this November 11.”

Another one of China’s main online retailers, JD.com Inc (京東), said it had completed more than 10 million transactions by 10am. That was almost twice as many as last year’s total.

The task of putting customers’ purchases into their hands is huge. Alibaba said its logistical arm and its partners would use more than 1.7 million personnel, 400,000 vehicles, 5,000 warehouses and 200 airplanes to handle deliveries.

The event has received vocal support from the government at a time when China’s economic expansion is slowing and Beijing is trying to transform its growth model into a more sustainable one driven by consumption.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang’s (李克強) office phoned Alibaba chairman Jack Ma (馬雲) hours ahead of the promotion, “congratulating and encouraging the creation and achievement of the 11.11 event,” said a posting on a social media account of Tmall (天貓), the group’s business-to-consumer arm.

Chinese Internet users yesterday showed off their acquisitions — with many lamenting that they had spent far too much money.

“I can only afford to eat dirt for the next half year,” said a user on Sina Weibo (微博), with an attached screen grab of a Taobao (淘寶) app showing she had bought 42 items.

.Structure of the Lead：     

      WHO-Chinese Premier Li Keqiang’s (李克強) office phoned Alibaba chairman Jack Ma (馬雲)             hours ahead of the promotion      WHEN- 11/11

      WHAT-Singles Day

      WHY-hefty discounts

      WHERE-shopping websites

      HOW-not given

keywords:

splurge   揮霍 

cumulative  累積的

orgy  狂歡

singletons  單身
lucrative  賺錢
embrace  擁抱
kicked off  拉開序幕
tally  符合
outstripped  超越
eclipse  失色