Western Luxury: Agitation in China

        The picture above acts as the hottest news on Chinese version’s twitter in these days. The girl, Zhou Rui, is a famous magazine model in recent years and she twitted this picture to show how she enjoyed her birthday. However, the picture was deleted quickly by Zhou Rui. Even if she had made prompt action, the netizens had discovered that the man beside her was wearing a Hermes belt.
        Although the whole economic situation among European countries is unsatisfied and worrying, the luxury brands have found their new supporters nowadays. According to the survey conducted by TNS, we can see mainly three things in the graph below. Firstly, Chinese Mainland market ranks No.1 in all areas of the luxury business. Secondly,Chinese Mainland market is six times or eight times higher than other markets. Other markets such as European market and North American market are totally overshadowed by Chinese market. Thirdly, Chinese Mainland market is only part of the whole Chinese market. When it pluses Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan markets, it is indeed an incredible market with huge growing potential.

(Source: luxury brands in China)

(Source: luxury brands in China)

        

        From the graph above, we can know that the top reason why Chinese people buy luxury brand goods---they trust in high quality. Moreover, the Asian people tend to appreciate more about western culture as well as western fashion. With Chinese economic developing, more and more mainland people have a crush on the luxury brands. It is good news for every luxury company to develop their business in Chinese Mainland. Up to now, the speed of launching new stores in big cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong as well as small second or third tier cities is unbelievable. However, luxury business is not fully developed in mainland. Chinese consumers’ attention greatly paid to watches, cosmetics, and handbags. Other areas, for instance, furniture, cell phones, wines, are falling behind.

（Source: China luxury market study 2010）

        Due to Chinese citizens’ incredible purchasing capacity, things changed gradually. More and more Asian models are hired in European fashion week. Significant numbers of Chinese stars are invited to the fashion shows. At the same time, Chinese citizens’ attentions are deeply drawn by the European fashion trend.

(Asian Model wears Givenchy in Paris Fashion Week) 

(Chinese super star Fan bingbing attended in Festival De Cannes) 

        In conclusion, the great purchasing capacity of Chinese market should not be ignored. The western luxury products are no longer unfamiliar to Chinese people. There are grounds for people to believe that the intermingling of western luxury products and eastern culture will make a difference.