Alibaba sells $2 billion worth of goods in first hour of Single's Day sales in China
Black Friday in the United States pales in comparison to Single's Day in China which is underway on November 11. Alibaba, the online retail giant in China, said about $2 billion worth of goods were sold on the e-commerce giant's websites within the first hour and 12 seconds of its annual shopping festival.
Last year, Alibaba alone generated $5.8 billion worth of orders through 20,000 participating merchants on Tmall, exceeding sales from America's Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.
Meanwhile, sales for this year is expected to reach at least $8 billion for Alibaba, up 42 percent from last year, according to market research firm IDC. Alibaba's domestic business continues to snowball and as it officially brings the shopping festival to the overseas market for the first time.
"Alibaba has picked up on it and made it its own, much like Hallmark has picked up on Valentine's Day and every other holiday," said Marlene Morris Towns, marketing professor at Georgetown University's McDonough School of Business. "It's been great for their business so far, and I think Amazon would do well to jump on it as well."
Singles' Day, a Chinese twist on Valentine's Day, was invented by students in the 1990s, according to the Communist Party-owned People's Daily. When written numerically, the date is reminiscent of "bare branches," the Chinese expression for bachelors and spinsters.
In 2009, Alibaba - which was then known mostly for its e-commerce website Tmall or Taobao - Alibaba reintroduced Singles Day to the Chinese as a day to treat yourself to some retail therapy.
The online sales event offered slashed prices and unbeatable shipping rates and saw revenue growth every year that followed.
According to Alibaba, the online shopping festival has grown from just 27 participating vendors in 2009 to 27,000 now.
