China’s 200 Million Singles are Shaping Businesses Models By Barnaby Lofton
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hina reportedly has 200 million people, or 14% of its population, who are single, with businesses vying to capitalize on the large consumer group. The hashtag #中国超2亿人单身# (Over 200 million people in China are single) took the top spot for trending topics on the Chinese internet last month, with a flood of posts about why more people are opting for the ‘single life.’ One of the top comments noted, “Being single is sometimes an awakening. Marriage for the sake of marriage is never what I want. Some are icing on the cake. No one can live freely.”
A Xinhua article claims that single people are more willing to spend money to be ‘spiritually fulfilled.’ For example, a single Gen Z girl in Hangzhou went on a blind date for her cat and spent RMB10,000 to buy high-end pet supplies as a ‘dowry’ for her cat. Businesses are taking note and changing their business models to accommodate this emerging market. Fitness, tourism, cosmetics and pets are key industries to watch in this space. Single-person dining tables, isolated from others, are popping up more and more to attract customers. Luxury brands are also taking the hint and starting to cater to singles’ with more personalized products. Jing Daily, a Chinabased luxury consumer trends digital publication, notes that Jo Malone allows shoppers to create their own fragrance using any combination of 26 perfumes on Jo Malone London Tmall store. From a worldwide perspective, Europe actually has the highest percentage of one-person households (OPH), with figures as high as 20-40%. Lastly, let’s not forget that Alibaba’s Single’s Day last year raked in a whopping RMB372.3 million.
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A popular tech blogger on Weibo gave a fairly profound breakdown of the phenomenon in China. They posted, “There are many reasons why more and more Chinese people are single, but it can be summed up to these few [reasons].” They went on to list five reasons for the phenomenon: 1. The urban gender imbalance 2. More people staying at home, refusing to socialize 3. Society as a whole is less focused on getting married and having kids 4. The requirements for marriage are getting higher and higher 5. Internet is causing more people to drop out of society CCTV Finance reports that because single people have no family burdens, they have “less awareness of savings than non-single people.” Unsurprisingly, Nielsen data shows that 42% of singles consume for pleasure compared to 27% for non-single people. Statistics show that in first-tier cities, 40% of young singles are living in a ‘moonlight’ stage of life as they spend more money on themselves. As the tier of the city lowers, monthly income decreases and the proportion of ‘moonlighters’ actually increase significantly.
