As I stood at a busy intersection on People’s Avenue South in Chengdu, China, I am dazzled by the high-end designer labels I see. Louis Vutton, Dior, MaxMara, and many other luxury brands all opened up shop here. With the fast economic development during the last decade, there has arisen a new class of rich Chinese consumers who spend their money generously on these luxury goods.
Photo by Flickr user yachtfan | CC 2.0
Of course, those who can afford to buy luxury brands are still far and few in between. According to the World Bank, 1% of Chinese families now possess 41.4% of China’s wealth. This represents a bigger gap than that of the United States, whose corresponding number is 5% families owning 60% of national wealth. The Gini coefficient, an index used to measure income inequality, has also surpassed the warning level of 40 in China ten years ago to reach 47 today.
Although the wealth in China is concentrated in a very small group of consumers, the sheer population in China makes this small group not so small in absolute size. Together, these consumers spent $9.4 billion on luxury goods last year, well on the way to overtaking the US to become the second largest market for such goods, only after Japan. According to the same China Daily article that reported this number, the luxury buyers in China fall into three different groups:
- The really wealthy consumers
- The trendy young consumers who want to be on the cutting edge
- The white-collar professional workers who earn a sizable salary in China
The article reports that one unique characteristic of the luxury goods marketplace in China is this third group of consumers. While in the US these professional workers are often well-educated bargain hunters, the same group of consumers are major consumers of luxury goods. I contribute this to two reasons. One is the much higher than average income of these workers, especially those who work for foreign-owned or joint venture enterprises. The other reason is the low quality plaguing many domestic products and the general low consumer confidence in businesses. Take my parents’ landline telephones as an example. In the last few years, they have had to replace multiple phones because they all broke within a short period of use. In contrast, the phones that I bought more than ten years ago in the US are still functioning perfectly. No wonder Chinese consumers are willing to shell out money to buy quality products that they can trust.
Before I end this discussion about the new rich in China, I’d like to leave you with a humorous video from China Daily. It will give you a flavor of rich Chinese’s obsession with luxury goods and its related issues. Enjoy!