Workers deal with express packages at an assembly line in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, Nov. 12, 2014. (Photo : Getty Images)
Alibaba set another jaw-dropping sales record on China’s Singles' Day, the world’s biggest shopping event, with the e-commerce giant reporting that around 91.22 billion yuan ($14.33 billion) worth of sales were made in 24 hours on Wednesday.
In comparison, sales on Cyber Monday, the biggest online shopping day in the U.S., reached $1.35 billion, according to data analytics firm ComScore.
Alibaba, which comprises 8 percent of the total retail volume in China, said that its sales total for this year was a 60-percent increase from the 57.1 billion yuan it generated in 2014.
Held annually on Nov. 11, Singles' Day has grown exponentially since Alibaba started promoting it as a shopping day in 2009. This year, the company said there were more than 40,000 merchants and 30,000 brands from 25 countries selling goods on its platform. Taobao, Alibaba's marketplace app, also reported visits from more than 130 million users, surpassing that of the previous year.
Alibaba founder and executive chairman Jack Ma said on Wednesday that Singles' Day represents only a small portion of the huge potential for domestic demand in China.
"China has a middle-class population of 300 million. We believe there will be 500 million within the next 15 years, which would bring huge demand for high-quality products, therefore boosting economic growth," he said.
The country's online fever has sent shivers through China's malls and department stores. On Nov. 4, Commerce Ministry spokesman Shen Danyang said that retail stores are under increasing pressure from the online shopping sector, with some stores closing or canceling their leases.
By the end of June, nine major retailers including Dalian Wanda, Parkson and Marks & Spencer closed down at least 25 stores in Beijing, Shanghai and other cities, the Xinhua News Agency reported on Wednesday.
Experts attribute the success of online shopping in China to wide choices, competitive prices and heavy marketing campaigns by retailers.
"China is a big market with close to one billion smart connected device users--it is a good news for both Alibaba and their competitors," said Kitty Fok, China manager for market research firm IDC.
Alibaba is not the only e-commerce player to profit from Singles' Day. Suning Commerce Group, a Nanjing-based online retailer, also said its number of orders tripled on Singles' Day.
Online shoppers have ordered 37,000 health products from the U.S. within 11 hours of the start of Singles' Day, said Sun Weimin, vice chairman of Suning.
By 6 p.m., more than 220,000 Xiaomi smartphones and 380,000 units of mobile phone chargers were ordered by customers, the company said in a statement.
JD.com, Alibaba's biggest e-commerce rival in China, also posted record sales within 12 hours of Singles' Day. By 5 p.m. on Wednesday, it had received more than 20 million orders online, the company said.
Approximately 70 percent of Alibaba's and JD.com's orders were placed through mobile channels such as smartphones and tablets.
