SHANGHAI: Alibaba Group’s annual ‘Singles Day’ shopping spree is set for its most sober tone ever this year, as the retail giant preaches sustainability rather than hyping the usual sales boom amid calls by Beijing to promote “common prosperity”.
In 2020, Alibaba expanded what it calls the world’s biggest online shopping festival from a one-day Nov 11 event into a 11-day extravaganza, with celebrity performances and a sales metric ticking over live on a scoreboard that ended with the news that it had racked up US$74bil (RM306.98bil) in orders, or ‘gross merchandise value’ (GMV), flashing big and bright.