GUANGZHOU, China, Dec. 18, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Vipshop
Holdings Limited (NYSE: VIPS, vip.com), the largest online discount
retailer for brands both in China
and globally, as well as the No.1 female-oriented vertical
e-commerce retailer in China, has
initiated and partnered with The Economist Intelligence Unit of the
Economist Group on a survey regarding the growing buying power of
female consumers in Asia.
The report, titled "On the rise and online: Female consumers in
Asia" was released today, and it
surveyed 5,500 women across major urban areas in Greater China, India, Japan,
South Korea and Singapore, as well as consumer analysts, major
retailers and brand owners. The study found that women are driving
the growth of online shopping in the region, with many preferring
online to offline. Among survey respondents, 63 percent browse the
Internet at least once a day for products and services, with nearly
30 percent doing so twice or more per day. Slightly fewer than 80
percent of women regionally buy groceries online, 83 percent for
cosmetics and the figure rises to nearly 90 percent for clothing
and accessories.
Asia's rapidly growing consumer
markets are the great hope of many companies across the world. In
2015, retail sales in Asia are
forecast to grow by an average 4.6 percent on a volume basis, to
US$7.6trn. This compares with 2.5
percent in North America and 0.8
percent in Europe, according to
Economist Intelligence Unit forecasts. "Women are a unique and
important driving force in the Asian market. And at Vipshop, over
80 percent of the accumulative 90 million members are females, who
contribute to 90 percent of our sales. The partnership with the EIU
allowed us the opportunity to learn more about consumer shopping
habits and to further expand upon its leadership position in
China's online retail market.
Based on the survey results, we are confident in our ability to
address the growing and diversified user demands for quality
products and services. We also hope this survey can provide some
insights to brands that wish to further reach female Asian
consumers," said Eric Shen, Chairman
and CEO of Vipshop.
Perhaps most troubling for retailers focused on the
brick-and-mortar business, nearly half -- 49 percent -- of women polled agreed or strongly agreed
that they preferred the experience of shopping online to doing so
in stores. The figure was as high as 69 percent in mainland China. Notable outliers include Hong Kong, Singapore and especially Japan, where only 18 percent of women said
they preferred online shopping to shopping in stores -- the lowest rate in the region. This no
doubt reflects the highly developed retail markets in these
places.
Moreover, youth lead the way to the future. Among the youngest
(18-29) demographic surveyed, 53 percent prefer shopping online and
58 percent shop online with their smartphones at home, versus 38
percent of 40-49 year olds.
Additional key findings from the report:
- Women in Asia's major cities
are increasingly empowered. Region-wide, 43 percent of the women
responding to the survey were in managerial, executive or
professional services jobs. Of those, eight percent described
themselves as sole breadwinners and 41 percent said they were joint
breadwinners, while 83 percent contribute to household income. The
trend is particularly notable in mainland China, where 62 percent described themselves
as joint breadwinners, and 91 percent contribute to household
income.
- Women are showing increasing independence in handling their
finances. Just over two-thirds reported having their own bank
accounts (this ranged from 76 percent in mainland China, to a low of 47 percent in Macau), and 48 percent held their own credit
cards.
- Most women are in charge of budgeting decisions on cosmetics
(81 percent), clothing and accessories (73 percent), groceries (67
percent) and maternity and children's products (57 percent), and
they are at least co-decision makers in most other product
categories like electronics and travel services. In Macau, Singapore and India, women reported having a comparatively
smaller role in household budgeting decisions, but were still the
clear authorities in areas like clothes and cosmetics.
- At least on the Internet, many Asian women do not seem to be
living up to the stereotype of selfless, family-focused
individuals. Over 62 percent of women are buying for themselves
most of the time when shopping online; in mainland China that rate rises to 74 percent, and to 77
percent among 18-29 year olds. Women do, however, engage in guilt
shopping; 41 percent said they would buy something for their
partner, children or family when they feel they have bought too
much for themselves. That figure rises to 67 percent among women in
mainland China.
- Brick and mortar retailers need to improve their operations,
notably on inventory management and customer service. Women have a
variety of reasons to prefer online shopping. Most point to cost
(62 percent) and time (60 percent) savings, but they also feel that
online retailers can be relied upon to have the products they want
to buy (59 percent) and they appreciate the range of choice online
shopping offers (56 percent). Across the region, nearly half (48
percent) say they feel pressured and stressed in traditional shops,
and 27 percent feel store staff talk down to them because they are
women.
- When choosing an online retailer, women say price (83 percent)
is important or very important, but so are quality (83 percent),
genuine products (82 percent) and convenience (77 percent). Notably
the rise in women's purchasing power and online shopping are
together reshaping retail, many of the trends emerging are nothing
new. Women still place an immense amount of value on the advice of
friends and family. A good name counts for more than just about
anything.
- The online shopping craze offers opportunities in cross-border
trade for brands and retailers, but brands and retailers need to
work on logistics. Regionally 36 percent of women agreed or
strongly agreed that they shop online specifically to get products
from overseas, and 41 percent said they bought products from abroad
because they were better than those produced domestically. This
perceived quality gap was especially pronounced in Macau and mainland China, where 53 percent and 63 percent of
women respectively saw products from abroad as superior.
- Getting the messaging right will be tricky. Given their rising
economic power, one might reasonably expect women to be more
attracted to messaging that appeals to their rising independence.
The reality is more complicated. While messages that address them
as independent, intelligent consumers were found to be appealing to
56 percent of women, nearly the same percentage (54 percent) said
they found messages addressing them as wives, mothers or
girlfriends to be attractive. Successful messaging will no doubt be
that which somehow manages to marry the two.
- The future of online shopping looks mobile, and impulsive.
Mobility in online shopping also means women are increasingly
shopping anywhere and everywhere, and online retailers will need to
have a strong mobile interface. The percentage who prefer shopping
online climbed to 53 percent among the youngest (18-29) demographic
surveyed (compared to 49 percent overall). In this age range, 58
percent of women shop online with their smartphones at home, versus
38 percent of 40-49 year olds. While overall some 43 percent
reported spending more money online than they do in physical shops,
again the rates among those 18-29 were even higher (56 percent).
This may be connected to the typical lack of youthful restraint;
over half of women 18-29 agreed that they were more likely to buy
impulsively online. Asian women enjoy online window-shopping, which
is regarded as an important social activity by them. Sixty-three
percent reported they will go online window-shopping, no matter
whether they will purchase the products; Fifty-nine percent said
they would on online window-shopping even though they will not
afford the products. Also, 45 percent said they will purchase
"impulsively" when online window-shopping, and 33 percent admitted
themselves "spend too much online."
Laurel West, editor of the
report, said, "Women are controlling spending in a variety of
categories where you would expect them to, such as clothing and
accessories, cosmetics and groceries. But they also have an
increasing influence in bigger ticket items such as electronics.
Many brands are realising this and making efforts to better
understand what is important to female consumers."
Since its foundation in 2008, Vipshop has been focusing on
"online discount retail" model, well-known for the features of
"selected brands and genuine products" with "discounted prices" for
"flash sales." According to the EIU
report, Asian women regard "quality (83 percent), price (83
percent) and genuine products (82 percent) as the top three factors
when they choose online retailers. Obviously, Vipshop's business
model of "online discount retailing for branded and genuine
products" naturally matches with women's demands and criteria for
online shopping.
The EIU report also reveals that women have dominant online
spending control in the buying of clothing and accessories,
cosmetics, maternity and children's products, and home goods, which
coincidently proves the rightness of Vipshop's she-economy
strategies that it conducted one year ago. Since then, Vipshop has
expanded its categories from apparel and accessories to cosmetics,
maternity and children's products, as well as home goods to
leverage the increasing power of the she-economy.
With forecasts of the growing trend of female consumers' mobile
shopping habits in 2009, Vipshop launched its mobile APP and
continuously kept optimizing the mobile interface ever since. In
July 2014, Vipshop founded its first
overseas R&D center in the Silicon Valley, USA to focus on big data research and
application, and providing a personalized landing page and
customized services for women to enhance their online shopping
experience. Moreover, Vipshop initiated "8
pm sales activities specialized for mobile purchase" this
year, which is tailor-made for those women who are fond of mobile
shopping in bed at night. This activity specifically relates to the
EIU report, which found that 30 percent of the Asian women surveyed
said they would shop online in bed at night due to the convenience
and popularity of mobile shopping.
Fully understanding women's comprehensive roles and shopping
demands both as independent career women and good
wives/mothers/daughters, Vipshop provides the goods of 12,000
brands for women and their families. And in September of this year,
Vipshop launched its "Global Sales" business to enrich the online
shopping offerings to women.
Tony Feng, Vice President of
Vipshop, said at the survey launch
press conference, "At Vipshop, we are continually pushing ourselves
to deliver the best products and services in the best format, and
this study is born from these efforts aimed at the rapidly growing
women's market. It showcases our determination to go further in
focusing our resources on better understanding and creating bigger
innovations and deploying them at scale in areas where we want to
win."
To view the full report, please visit
http://www.economistinsights.com/marketing-consumer/analysis/rise-and-online or
http://going-global.economist.com/.
About Vipshop Holdings Limited
Vipshop Holdings Limited (NYSE: VIPS) is the leading online
discount retailer for brands both in China and globally. It is also the No.1
female-oriented vertical e-commerce retailer in China. It offers products including apparel
and accessories, cosmetics, maternity and children's products, home
goods and other lifestyle products at a significant discount to
retail prices.
Since it was founded in August
2008, Vipshop has rapidly built a sizeable and growing base
of 12,000 brands and accumulative 90 million members, of which 80
percent are female. It was listed on the NYSE in March 2012. For more information, please visit
http://www.vip.com/ or http://ir.vip.com.
About The Economist Intelligence Unit
The Economist Intelligence Unit is the world leader in global
business intelligence. It is the business-to-business arm of The
Economist Group, which publishes The Economist newspaper. The
Economist Intelligence Unit helps executives make better decisions
by providing timely, reliable and impartial analysis on worldwide
market trends and business strategies. More information can be
found at www.eiu.com or www.twitter.com/theeiu.
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