Singles in China will spend Tuesday with Alibaba. November 11 had become known as Singles Day in China. The annual event is where online retailers cut their prices and eligible shoppers in China buy themselves discounted products.
Singles Day was popularized in 2009 by Alibaba and has become hugely popular.
Industry watchers speculate that last year’s new record of $5.7 billion will be topped this year.
Many cannot believe when told the biggest single shopping day in the world is in China does not involve many Americans.
Alibaba attracted companies from the U.S. this year as American Eagles Outfitters, Calvin Klein and Costco will all participate for the first time.
Double the number of servers for Alibaba will be operating overseas for the extravaganza on Tuesday.
An arrangement has been made with the postal service in China that ensures goods will be shipped to over 220 countries across the globe.
Not many believe that Single Day will become a hit in the U.S.
One reason is it is close to Veteran’s Day and also is just after the period of back to school and a few weeks prior to the start of the holiday shopping season that in itself is a month long.
That causes many to wonder just what amount of discretionary spending would be left to use.
Last year, Singles Day was over doubled the merchandise volume of online sales in the U.S. during both Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Companies might try to spur on spending by hitting the social media with a number of spending holidays such as National Doughnut Day or National Coffee Day. However, making a new one successful is far more difficult than actually declaring it.
Alibaba is not where Singles Day first originated. It was in Nanjing University when a group of students in 1993 decided to celebrate being single each November 11.
However not until 2009 did Alibaba spot an opportunity and thus encourage its retailers to offer discounts that day.
