8 crazy facts about Singles Day, China’s biggest online shopping day

With Alibaba having broken Singles Day shopping records in China, netting sales worth 14.2 billion USA dollars, or a 60 percent rise, in 2014, the company has set its sights on replicating this success overseas.

Breaking down that $5 billion, the company claims that 74% of the sales went to mobile phones, showcasing that the smartphone market in China is still growing.

 In comparison, Cyber Monday, the biggest online shopping day on the U.S. calendar, netted $1.35 billion, according to the data analytics firm ComScore.

Of all the celebrants of China’s annual “Singles Day” November 11 holiday, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. was probably the happiest.

Nasdaq-listed rival JD.com said it received more than 20 million orders by 5pm, four times higher than a year ago. E-commerce giant Alibaba smashed the singles day sales record at noon, and all this frenzied shopping is making someone a little envious.

The numbers were boosted this year by adding the sales from various new channels, including its affiliates and investees.

Alibaba said more than $1bn was spent within eight minutes of midnight.

The company is looking forward to bring goods from United States small and medium size enterprises to customers in Asia, where there is demand for high-quality and unique items, Ma said as Alibaba was winding up its shopping promotion for Singles’ Day. The pace of total transactions recorded-measured by gross merchandise value (GMV) -indicated the company was on track to meet a few analysts’ expectations that the total GMV for the day would hit or exceed a few $13 billion, analysts said. That was nearly twice as many as last year’s total.

Alibaba’s chief executive officer, Daniel Zhang, said: “The whole world will witness the power of Chinese consumption this November 11”. Originally, lonely singles were encouraged to pamper themselves and other unattached friends by going shopping for gifts. The e-commerce giant expected its partners to deploy 1.7 million deliverymen, 400,000 vehicles, 5,000 warehouses, and over 200 airplanes to handle the deliveries following the Singles’ Day event.

Total number of mobile buyers on Tmall.com and Taobao Marketplace was 95 million. Earlier, the Chinese Premier Li Keqiang sent his best wishes for the e-commerce promotion, a sign of the economic and political importance of Singles Day to China.

He promised consumers “a new surprise every hour” over the 24-hour marathon, especially mobile users.