Taiwan shoppers sold on consumer craze
Print Edition
AN online shopping holiday that originated on China’s mainland has spread to Taiwan, with intense media coverage and websites launching major sales.
Leading e-shopping sites like Yahoo, Rakuten and GOMAJI, held “Singles Day” sales yesterday, emulating the binge on the Chinese mainland’s platforms.
Yahoo is offering discounts of up to 50 percent for the next 10 days, while Japan-based Rakuten featured more than 10,000 discounted items from about 400 vendors. Taiwan-based ET Mall promoted merchandise with discounts of up to 11 percent, and GOMAJI handed out coupons worth NT$8 million (US$244,000).
Posters for “Singles Day” sales were seen at subway stations in Taipei and on social media, including Twitter and Facebook.
“Singles Day” started in the 1990s as an excuse for the unattached to celebrate — or poke fun at — their status, but it has evolved into an online shopping spectacle for everyone.
Rakuten said in a press release yesterday that visits to its website increased by 50 percent from the previous day, and sales doubled for high-end electronics, such as smartphones and digital cameras.
As one of the earliest e-shopping sites to follow the mainland craze, Yahoo launched a similar campaign last year and reported total sales nearly four times the average.
Mainland e-commerce companies have wooed overseas consumers. Taobao.com launched a special platform for the day for shoppers in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia, promising fast and reliable delivery.
Taiwan customs even set up a special squad to cope with the increase in imported goods, the agency said late last month. Last year, its Taipei office received about 1.5 million applications for customs clearance of small imported goods.
However, some consumers were reluctant to buy from mainland websites. A survey conducted by the Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute, a Taipei think tank, showed that 37 percent of 313 respondents said they were interested but cautious about shopping on mainland websites.
Lu Mei-rong, a civil servant, said she will shop on local websites, but is hesitant to use mainland platforms.
“‘I’ve not shopped on Taobao before, and I worry about how to get the goods delivered to Taiwan,” she said.
The mainland and Taiwan signed the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement in 2010, which reduced tariffs on goods moving between the two sides.
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