Alibaba 6.18 sales surge, Versace leaps, cross-border sales grow

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Jun 21, 2019

Just a few days after JD.com reported record-breaking sales for the mid year 6.18 shopping Festival, rival Alibaba Group has also said that it shattered multiple records for the event.

And Alibaba echoed JD’s comments that the 18-day festival, which ended on June 18, saw increased demand for higher quality products for consumers in less-developed cities.

For Alibaba, 6.18 was its biggest mid-year event yet with over 200,000 brands taking part. The owner of Taobao and Tmall said “innovative marketing campaigns and tools provided by Alibaba’s core platforms” helped more than 110 brands each generate gross merchandise volume in excess of CNY100 million (€12.8m/£11.4m/$14.5m).

And Tmall’s Luxury Pavilion sales more than doubled year-on-year, also boosted by customers in emerging cities, as well as shoppers born after 1995. “Premier brands hit better-than-expected results [and] sales of Versace jumped 20 times compared with last year, “ we’re told.

“The results are encouraging,” said Jiang Fan, president of Taobao and Tmall. “It has proven to be a celebration that can match the enthusiasm and scale of the 11.11 Global Shopping Festival.”

The exec added that the number of customers and GMV from third- to fifth-tier cities both hit 100% growth. “We believe this group of customers will continue to grow into a strong and sustainable force for brands who are looking at further developing the Chinese market.”

Alibaba said that with an increase in discretionary income, consumers in China’s less-developed areas “are quickly becoming a crucial driver of China’s solid consumption. These consumers were a main engine powering this year’s 6.18 Shopping Festival.”

Tmall said that 48% of newly launched products on the platform during the event were purchased by customers outside first- and second-tier cities.

Sales from consumers in third- and fourth-tier cities on cross-border trade platform Tmall Global also rose 153% with the top five countries on the platform being Japan, the US, South Korea, Australia and Germany.