Major U.S. retailers team up for Singles Day

It would take a pretty big event to cause Nordstrom, Saks Fifth Avenue, Bergdorf Goodman, Saks Off 5th, and Neiman Marcus to all align their online discount offers.



Singles Day, coming up on Nov. 11, is just that size of an event. Once an informal celebration of the Chinese singles dating scene, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba formally turned Singles Day into a shopping holiday in 2009. The occasion generated gross merchandise volume of more than $9.3 billion on the Alibaba Alipay mobile and digital payment platform alone in 2014.



While Alibaba is still the leading platform for Singles Day sales, U.S. retailers with a global reach are also trying to reach Chinese consumers, both in China and in the U.S., in other ways. Dealmoon.com, a Chinese website that curates product recommendations for consumers, is helping these five leading U.S. luxury retailers team up to offer an online “department store blowout.”



"We are not only serving up some of the best deals of the year on Nov. 11 for luxury brand shoppers," said Dealmoon.com co-founder, Jennifer Wang, "but these department stores are excited to partake in the traffic we can generate for them. On Nov. 10 at midnight, we will unveil an incredible list of promotions. Many of the brands offers are steeper discounts than their own Black Friday deals.”



Singles Day offers one-day sales volumes that dwarf Black Friday, Amazon Prime Day or any other one-day shopping events that U.S. retailers more traditionally participate in. As U.S. retailers increasingly discover the Chinese market, as well as the potential represented by U.S.-based consumers of Chinese descent, Singles Day will likely continue to grow in importance for retailers on this side of the Pacific.