Singles Day is an unofficial Chinese holiday celebrating singles, it is locally known as the “bare sticks holiday” because of how it looks numerically (11/11 or November 11).
Singles Day began as an antidote to Valentine’s Day in the 1990s by students at Nanjing University, who bought presents for each other to celebrate their bachelorhood.
Jack Ma (Founder of Alibaba, the world’s largest retailer) has made clear his vision of capturing the hearts and minds of shoppers around the world and making retail fun for Chinese millennials, who make up three-quarters of Alibaba users in 24 hours. Now it is the world’s biggest online shopping festival.
Close to midnight, Alibaba founder Jack Ma himself appeared inside a box on stage and performed a series of magic tricks, culminating in the evening’s big celebrity reveal, when he made Hollywood star Scarlett Johansson appear on stage. Celebrity appearances before him includes David Hill, Victoria and David Beckham, Josephine Skriber, Alessandra Ambrosio, Sui He, Kobe Bryant,
FACTS:
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This year’s online shopping bonanza hit $17.8 billion easily topping the previous record of $14.3 billion set in 2015.
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This record is is bigger than America’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined
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$1.3 billion worth of orders Were placed in the first five minutes
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Over 40,000 merchants participated.
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The First Complete VR Shopping Experience
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115 Million shoppers placed orders on singles day
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94.6 Million shoppers placed their orders with smart phones
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80% of the shoppers used their smart phones
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Over 16,000 brands participated
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over 14,000 “international brands” participated
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650 Million delivery orders placed
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Over 1.7 Million delivery personnel packed and shipped the orders from about 5000 warehouses
CONCLUSION:
The final total marked a 32 percent rise from 2015, but growth was significantly lower than the 60 percent increase last year, a reflection of more caution among shoppers who opted to spend less money on each purchase than in previous years.
Finally, don’t forget to share these facts with friends.
