The Singles’ Day (simplified Chinese : 光棍节) or Double 11 (Chinese : 双11), originally called Bachelors’ Day, is a Chinese unofficial holiday and shopping season that celebrates people who are not in relationships. The date — 11.11 — was chosen because it is written as four ones, or singles standing together.The four ‘1’s also abstractly refer to the demographic group of single people. The holiday has become the largest physical retail and online shopping day in the world. Singles’ Day will continue to be a long-term cultural and business event that has been brought on by a technology evolution and explosion of ebusiness and ecommerce

A FESTIVAL THAT ORIGINATED AS CELEBRATION OF SINGLEHOOD AND A CULTURAL UNIVERSITY EVENT
TO RESHAPING SHOPPING HABITS GLOBALLY BECOMING THE LARGEST SHOPPING IN THE WORLD

WHAT IS THE SINGLE´s DAY ?

The Singles’ Day (simplified Chinese : 光棍节) or Double 11 (Chinese : 双11), originally called Bachelors’ Day, is a Chinese unofficial holiday and shopping season that celebrates people who are not in relationships
This is an informal, anti-Valentine’s Day that celebrates people who aren’t in relationships
The date — 11.11 — was chosen because it is written as four ones, or singles standing together
The date, 11 November (11/11), was chosen because the numeral 1 resembles a bare stick (Chinese: 光棍; pinyin: guānggùn), which is Chinese Internet slang for an unmarried man who does not add ‘branches’ to the family tree
The four ‘1’s also abstractly refer to the demographic group of single people
Paradoxically, the holiday has become a popular date on which to celebrate relationships : more than 4,000 couples got married in Beijing on this date in 2011, far greater than the daily average of 700 marriages
2011 marked the Singles Day of the Century (Chinese pinyin: Shiji Guanggun Jie) as this date had six “ones” rather than four, increasing the significance of the occasion
In 2011, an above-average number of marital celebrations occurred in Hong Kong and Beijing on 11 November

WHAT ELSE IS PART OF SINGLES DAY ?

The holiday has become the largest physical retail and online shopping day in the world
The event is not an officially recognized public holiday in China although it has become the largest offline and online shopping day in the world
Singles’ Day will continue to be a long-term cultural and business event that has been brought on by a technology evolution and explosion of ebusiness and ecommerce led by giants like Alibaba, JD.com and others across the world
It’s the world’s largest single-day sale
2021 – The emphasis is on sustainability
livestreams continue to be an important component for Singles Day with online platforms featuring 100s of key opinion leaders, celebrities, and brand reps
Livestreaming has been embraced by Alibaba, which promotes presenters who peddle products on broadcasted discount frenzies
Pitch fest is identifying and incubating several of the small emerging brands and fast-tracking them
In 2021 – E-commerce giant JD starts accepting China’s digital currency on Singles Day for the first time
China’s digital yuan is not a cryptocurrency – Instead, it is a digital form of the country’s currency, designed to replace coins and cash in circulation
When formally rolled out, it will be issued via banks and other financial entities by the People’s Bank of China, the central bank
In December 2020 – JD became the first online platform to accept the Chinese digital currency. And in April, the company said it had paid some employees using e-CNY
Alibaba would traditionally boast its sales numbers in real-time to the public, though it’s not doing so this year

Singles’ Day
An illustration for the Chinese e-commerce holiday Singles’ Day
Observed by	Chinese
Type	Commercial
Significance	Biggest shopping day in the world
Celebrations	Shopping, festivals, clubs/bars
Date	11 November
Next time	11 November 2021
Frequency	Annual

WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF & BACKGROUND FOR ´´SINGLE´s DAY´´ 11.11 ?

IS IT OF RELEVANCE TO AND CELEBRATED ONLY BY MEN ?

THE HOLIDAY WAS INITIALLY ONLY CELEBRATED BY YOUNG MEN – HENCE THE NAME BACHELOR´s DAY

HOWEVER – IT IS NOW WIDELY CELEBRATED BY BOTH MEN & WOMEN

The Singles’ Day, or Bachelors’ Day, originated at Nanjing University in 1993
Singles’ Day celebrations spread to several other universities in Nanjing during the 1990s
11 November (11/11), consisting of four 1’s, was chosen as it represents four singles
There are several ideas explaining the creation of the Singles’ Day festival
The most widely accepted idea is that the holiday grew out of Nanjing University’s dorm culture
One origin story is that in 1993, four male students of Nanjing University’s Mingcaowuzhu (all single men) dorm discussed how they could break away from the monotony of being single and agreed that 11 November would be a day of events and celebrations in honor of being single
November 11 would be a day of events and celebrations in honor of being single
It started as a paean to being single, where solo students at China’s Nanjing University chose November 11 (because 11/11 looks like a group of sticks) to celebrate, rather than lament being partnerless
It quickly grew into a fun, unofficial holiday in which single people across China treat themselves to nice dinners and splurge on goods they wouldn’t otherwise buy for themselves.
These activities spread through the university and eventually to other universities, appealing to both men and women and so name changed from Bachelors day to singles day
An unofficial holiday that is primarily celebrated in China, it was created in 1993 as an antidote to Valentine’s Day, giving young Chinese singletons the chance to celebrate at events across the country and meet one another
These activities spread through the university and eventually made their way into wider society

IS ´´SINGLE´s DAY´´ MEANT ONLY TO CELEBRATE SINGLEHOOD ?

OR

IS IT OK TO MINGLE AS WELL ?

Singles’ Day now serves as an occasion for single people to meet, with parties and other social gatherings organized
It’s a popular date for weddings, as well
On this date – the Chinese media discusses and covers love-related issues and relationship topics
Blind date parties have become popular on this day, in an attempt to alter the single status of the participants
Some universities sometimes organize special programs to gather singles together for the celebration
Singles may take on an annoyed or self-deprecating attitude in response to remaining single as a university student, but some university initiatives sometimes have helped curb that negativity
Although this date is meant to celebrate singlehood, the desire to find a spouse or partner is often expressed by young Chinese people on this date, while other love-related issues are discussed by the Chinese media.
The spread increased with social media use, and the event has become increasingly popular within contemporary Chinese culture and society

WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE & SYMBOLISM OF THE DATE 11.11

The following symbolism has been associated with the special date:
1 – the digit 1 symbolizes an individual, a single person.
11 – two individuals finding each other and being together on one side of the special date (11.11)
2 x (11) – a celebration of two or more couples, each comprising two single individuals finding each other on the special date (11.11)

WHAT IS THE CONNECTION TO BETWEEN SINGLE´s DAY & SHOPPING ?

HOW DID 11.11 METAMORPHASIZE

FROM

SINGLE´s DAY INFORMAL CONCEPT OF HONOURING & CELEBRATION OF BACHELORHOOD IN CHINA

TO

BECOMING A WORLDWIDE SHOPPING EXTRAVAGANZA BECOMING THE LARGEST PHYSICAL & ONLINE SHOPPING HOLIDAY IN THE WORLD ECLIPSING THE BLACK FRIDAY

FROM

A FESTIVAL THAT ORIGINATED AS A FRINGE CULTURAL UNIVERSITY EVENT

TO

RESHAPING SHOPPING HABITS GLOBALLY

Traditionally youngsters, mainly university students, celebrated the notion of self-care by buying themselves presents, fine meals and having a night out with friends and they would pay for themselves to demonstrate their independence

Alibaba launched the first Singles Day Shopping Festival on November 11, 2009
Since that first occurrence – Singles Day has ballooned into a shopping frenzy observed not just by Alibaba, but also by other e-commerce companies that offer their own steep discounts and promotions
Singles Day is typically a 24-hour shopping event in China that sees huge discounts across millions of products on e-commerce platforms run by Alibaba, JD.com and other players
It generates more sales than Black Friday and Cyber Monday in the U.S. combined
In 2020 – the event generated about $74.1 billion in gross merchandise volume for Alibaba alone from November 1 to 11
In 2020 – JD.com – reached sales of $41 billion
In comparison – US online sales for Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday altogether totaled $25 billion in 2020
11.11 is currently many times bigger than Black Friday and Cyber Monday and Thanksgiving put together
People can shop for almost everything and anything in the Singles’ Day sales

SINGLES DAY 11.11 IS A DAY OF BREAKING E-COMMERCE TRANSACTION & DELIVERY LOGISTIC RECORDS

AS WELL AS

TEST THE PERSISTENCE AND PERFORMANCE OF IT SYSTEMS & E-COMMERCE SYSTEMS

On Singles’ Day 2017 – Alibaba set a world record for most payment transactions during the festival
Its mobile wallet app Alipay processed 256000 payment transactions per second
At the event’s peak last year, Alibaba handled 583,000 orders per second
A total of 1.48 billion transactions were processed by Alipay in the entire 24 hours, with delivery orders through Cainiao (Alibaba’s logistics affiliate) reaching close to 700 million, breaking the previous record set in 2016
Cainiao, the logistics arm of Alibaba is using more than 3,000 chartered flights and long-haul cargo ships to bring goods into China
A total of three million people across Cainiao and its partners will be involved in the logistics globally at warehouses and ports
It will also be using more than 10000 mobile lockers to allow customers to pick-up parcels without human contact
Cainiao also plans to operate more than 700 chartered flights to deliver parcels outside China
Artificial intelligence, predictive algorithms and big data analytics will empower merchants with demand forecast data and allow them to accurately pre-stock their goods in the right quantity and location
Singles’ Day is the overtime event of the year for workers – Some distribution centers hire temporary staff to help with sorting goods
Deliverymen use Delivery trucks, electric bikes, rickshaw cabs and are overloaded on this day
Bullet trains – In 2020, railway companies said they organized 1,000 trains to deliver Singles’ Day goods along 600 routes
Not all packages are sorted through big distribution plants — sometimes deliverymen have to sift through the orders on the street
Some consumers choose to receive their parcels at designated pick-up points, forming massive queues on Singles’ Day
Three million workers helped by 4000 planes and ships, are getting ready for the world’s biggest online sale !

IS SINGLES DAY CELEBRATED OUTSIDE OF CHINA ?

YES

SHOPPING WITH DISCOUNTS BECOMING THE MAIN FOCUS PROMOTED BY VARIOUS ONLINE & OFFLINE BRANDS WORLDWIDE FROM CHINA TO CHILE

Singles’ Day has since been popularized through the internet and is now observed at several places outside of China as well
Singles Awareness Day (or Singles Appreciation Day) is celebrated on February 15 each year
In the United Kingdom, Single’s Day, also called National Singles Day, is celebrated on 11 March
It is a celebration of love in all forms recognizing the love between friends, family and loving yourself
In Korea – Black Day is an unofficial holiday observed on April 14 each year. It is mostly observed in South Korea by singles
The holiday has particularly grown in Southeast Asia
MediaMarkt, a German company, promotes Singles’ Day in their stores
In 2016, Electronics retailer Elgiganten promoted a Singles Day campaign in Norway before implementing it in the other Nordic countries the following year
Singles’ Day shopping starts between China’s Golden Week (early October) and Chinese New Year (early February), filling an otherwise slow spell for retailers, while Black Friday and digital-era companion Cyber Monday signal the kickoff of winter holiday shopping in the U.S
Singles’ Day vs. Prime Day : There’s also Prime Day, which Amazon debuted in July 2015 with special deals only for Amazon Prime customers