Can China Teach the World to Shop on Singles Day?

Alibaba’s online “shopping festival” raked in $9.3 billion in sales in only 24 hours. Can it go global?

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By Susan Berfield

November 13, 2014 at 10:33 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

This article is part of the November 17, 2014 issue of businessweek.

Jeffrey Wu, a college student in Beijing, went online in the early morning hours of Nov. 11 to participate in a ritual of recent origin and immense popularity: bargain shopping on Singles Day in China. Wu bought Levi’s jeans, Nike sneakers, and an espresso machine; his girlfriend picked out skin cream. “We’re celebrating Singles Day as a couple,” he jokes.

It’s fair to assume that many of the millions of Chinese who purchased $9.3 billion worth of discounted mobile phones, refrigerators, down jackets, hoodies, mixed nuts, Wagyu beef, stewpots, diapers, laundry detergent, and even silkworms in only 24 hours aren’t single either. “The day doesn’t have anything to do with singles anymore,” says Bai Tiantin, who’s in her 20s (and single). “It’s just a shopping holiday.”