Alibaba Breaks Double 11 Single’s Day One Day Retail Record

Alibaba’s iconic anti-valentine Single’s Day event is growing up. In 2018, it hit a gross merchandise value (GMV) of over $30.8 billion in sales in the 24-hour shopping event.

It grew in 2018 YOY 27% compared to 39% in 2017 with a total of 213.5 billion yuan. In its 10th edition this year, it’s becoming more known now as ‘double 11’, since it is held on November 11th (11.11) each year. JD.com also participates and this year went to Thailand in a big way. The $30.8 billion in sales is just for Alibaba. I’m a bit eager to see all told how much Chinese retailers managed this year.

The annual retail celebration is now the biggest one-day retail event in the world and is growing at a rate that demonstrates the supremacy of the Chinese consumer and its influence on Asia at large.

While the Chinese Yuan is down, China’s consumers don’t appear to be any less eager to participate in Double 11. JD.com itself generated $19 Billion in 2017 and, with advanced logistics and global expansion, they could eventually catch up to Alibaba especially in global markets. JD have a significant chance of bringing Single’s Day as a retail event to the U.S.

In China there will be 30 million more men than women by 2020, so double 11 has a very weird connotation. Alibaba has combined its physical retail play with Hema into yet another way to scale the event.

Still, if Chinese retailers are becoming tech companies Alibaba, JD.com and Pinduoduo deserve more attention. The $30.8 billion that was generated in sales is a significant increase from 2017 when customers spent $25.3 billion. It’s hard to even fathom a $5 Billion increase in a one-day event. It’s also connecting Asia in ways that show it’s far superior in E-commerce to the rest of the world. This is retail convenience at a whole new level.

It may not be a popular idea, but it’s also making one question the relevance of the American consumer. For comparison, the total online sales on Black Friday reached $5 billion in 2017, according to Adobe Analytics data. Cyber Monday sales last year reached about $6.6 billion. For all intents and purposes, Black Friday has shrunk in physical in-store traffic, and E-commerce has disrupted it, not necessarily in a positive way.

Since not many Western retailers participate, it’s an epic lost opportunity for the American consumer. Not many online retailers in the US are participating in Double 11, even as the event goes global further down in South East Asia and even in Europe and Russia. America is in a sense living in a bubble, where trade wars can be implemented and a “me-first” attitude is leaving the country behind.

According to JD.com’s twitter:

• It made RMB 159.8 billion which is USD $22.97 Billion. If that’s true it means Single’s Day is really worth at least $53.77 Billion. That’s ten times as much sales as Black Friday in the U.S.
• Few Americans have even heard of JD or Alibaba, but both companies technologically are innovating at a faster pace than most American retailers including, I believe, Amazon.

Alibaba will be more dominant in the Cloud and with smart speakers than Amazon is with AWS and Alexa in the U.S. This is because the combined innovation of Baidu, Huawei and Xioami isn’t moving as fast as Google is with its Google Home devices that have a stronger AI with Google Assistant (Duplex, etc…). This essentially means Alibaba is becoming Amazon faster than Amazon can do everything it wants. Alibaba also leads Amazon in physical retail initiatives.

Yet Amazon’s stock on the NYSE is worth more than 10x Alibaba’s (BABA).