How ‘China chic’ young adults are making economic statements with glow-ups
- Consumer trends could also reflect challenges for foreign brands that are trying to cash in on China’s huge middle class
More than half of China’s online shoppers have purchased trendy Chinese brands, and the picks of young adult shoppers reflect a reshaping of the world’s second-largest market for consumer goods, according to new findings.
Around 530 million internet users favour China-made products following the trend of “guochao”, or “China chic” trend, underscoring a significant market for homegrown goods that is awash with internet consumers, according to a report released by the China Internet Network Information Centre (CNNIC) on Friday.
“China-made trendy products” refer to local products that combine China’s advanced manufacturing technology and trendy design - usually dubbed “Chinese fashion trend” - including clothing, footwear, beauty products, electronic products and automobiles.
The inward-facing consumer trend naturally reflects a challenge for foreign brands that strive to cash in on China’s 400-million-strong middle class.
The report stated that 230 million people, or 25 per cent of online shoppers, used online channels to buy green and energy-saving products in the past six months, according to the report.
During the “618” shopping festival - an online event last month with big discounts - Chinese brands occupied six spots among the top-10 brands in terms of online retail sales, the report indicated.
“New Chinese-style” clothing, which combines traditional Chinese elements in its design, is a representative product in the trend of China-made goods, and its market size was about 1 billion yuan in 2023, People’s Daily reported on May 11, citing figures from the Dewu e-commerce platform.
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By and large, shoppers born after 1995 were the main consumers of domestic “trendy products” last year. Chinese brands are also competitive in overseas markets. Customs figures showed that the country’s exports of own-brand products for the first two months of this year grew by 14.3 per cent, higher than the overall export growth of 10.3 per cent.
Exports of mobile phones, furniture and cosmetics grew in the period by 55.7 per cent, 60.7 per cent and 37.3 per cent, respectively, according to official customs data.
The CNNIC report said that about 90 per cent of those born from the mid-90s through the first decade of the 2000s shop online, making them the most prolific consumer group in the digital era.
Also, the number of mobile internet users in China reached 1.09 billion in 2023, an increase of 25.62 million from a year earlier, according to the centre’s findings.
CNNIC also noted that the “silver population” is another driver of healthcare, as well as entertainment and traveling, as 69.8 per cent of people over the age of 60 shop online.
Other big e-shoppers are women who particularly like to buy cosmetics, fashion and jewellery, and people from rural villages reported an online shopping rate of 76.7 per cent, it added.
