Singles Day matches Chinese New Year for wine sales, says ASC

China’s Singles Day, also known as ‘double 11’, has made November as important as Mid-Autumn festival and Chinese New Year for wine retailers, according to leading distributor ASC Fine Wines.

ASC’s chief executive, John Watkins, told DecanterChina.com that its sales in its T-Mall platform rose by 11% on this year’s singles day versus last year.

The annual 11 November shopping event has become a major fixture in retailers’ calendars, particularly for online sales.

‘From a top-line sales perspective, November is now just as important as the Chinese New Year and Mid-Autumn festival sales windows,’ Watkins said.

During this year’s ‘double 11’ day, ‘when we included the sales of our strategic e-commerce partners, our year-on-year sales grew by 45%, exceeding our overall sales target’, Watkins said. ASC did not provide specific sales totals.

Much of this growth is attributable to the rise of online retail platforms, which Watkins said tend to attract a younger demographic and also more female consumers.

Online retailer Alibaba sold CNY57.1bn of products during this year’s ‘double 11’ shopping day, although this included sales from abroad.

A spokesperson for Alibaba could not be immediately contacted for clarification on how much of that total constituted wine sales.

Several well-known wine merchants in China have been running discounts on stock this week as part of the double 11 festival.

Yesmywine was running a series of discounts that were still active at the time of writing. Shoppers could buy one bottle for half price and a second for the quarter of the original price.

Those who spent at least CNY40,000 during 11 to 13 November can receive a free bottle of Chateau Lafite Rothschild 2013, available as en primeur.

Rival retailers, including COFCO’s online store, jiu.womai.com, Wangjiu.com, 1919.cn, jiuxian.com were also running discounts on wines that extended beyond the day itself.

1919.cn was selling the Légende Bordeaux wines from Domaines Barons de Rothschild for CNY79 per bottle (originally CNY198), Penfolds Rawson’s Retreat Shiraz-Cabernet at CNY44 per bottle (originally CNY118) and Casillero del Diablo of Concha y Toro at CNY64 (originally CNY169) per bottle.