This year’s Double 11 Shopping Festival has once again exceeded all expectations, smashing last year’s gross sales figures registering a scarcely believable gross sales figure of 410.1 billion RMB ($58 billion) in 2019, up 29% YOY compared to 2018. Tmall by Alibaba Group still dominated, but its market share was eroded by 2% while PDD (Pinduoduo) & Suning took up the slack and continued to grow.
Data of Tmall - the major player
What' s different?
According to the CEO of Tmall Mr.Jiang Fan, an expansion in the number of users, larger discounts and more engaging sales experiences contributed to growth in this year’s GMV.
Live-streaming played a significant role in driving online sales. 90% of brands on Tmall leveraged live-streaming this year. More than 50% of merchants saw an increase in GMV attributable to live-streaming and dozens of them achieved sales of over 100 million using live-streaming.
The TOP 2 prominent anchors on Taobao Live Wei Ya & Li Jiaqi respectively attracted 43 million and 36 million viewers during Double 11 2019.
Wei Ya also partnered with Kim Kardashian to promote the launch of Kim Kardashian’s latest fragrance product. The show attracted 13 million viewers and generated 15,000 product sales.
Other sales and marketing strategies included new products release, augmented reality events, countdown galas, price slashing, membership incentive schemes and events combining both online and offline elements. Over 200,000 new brands were released on Tmall this year.
Voices of skepticism
Although the GMV of Tmall Double 11 has grown by 4000% in the last decade, according to Bloomberg the large GMV does not imply profitability for the brands involved nor does it guarantee the long term sustainability of the event. Bloomberg anticipates that interest and engagement in the annual event will plateau and consumer interest will eventually subside. However, at ChemLinked we disagree with Bloomberg’s prediction on principle as the event is without any real historical precedent. Although 11-11 does bear some similarities to Black Friday in that it’s a one day shopping event with large reductions that’s really where the similarities end. In comparison to 11-11, Black Friday is not supported by the digital infrastructure and ecommerce development of China and also lacks the innovative retail models driving growth in China.
Criticism has also been leveled at the accuracy of the GMV data and the methods used to calculate the figures. One particular criticism draws into question the large number of canceled orders and returned purchases that are not factored into the final GMV calculation.
The environmental issues caused by Double 11 are also significant- 11-11 sales are expected to require 2.8 billion deliveries of over 1 million boxes from November 11 to 18. Although many logistic enterprises have set up recycling centers or scaled up capacities in anticipation of 11-11, negative environmental impact is inevitable.
Other highlights
POP MART was the most popular toy brand.
Domestic cosmetic brand Perfect Diary was the #1 makeup brand.
Over 299 brands reached 100 million RMB ($14 million ) GMV.
Wigs, pet foods and Chinese wolfberry (枸杞) were most liked by the 90s.
Relevant readings
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