Burberry teams up with Tmall

British luxury brand Burberry has opened a virtual storefront on Tmall to take advantage of the growing Chinese e-commerce market.

Burberry’s partnership with Tmall comes at a time when Chinese shoppers’ online spending is forecast by iResearch Global to increase to 4.5 trillion yuan ($729.7 billion) by 2017.

Sales through Tmall, which hosts 70,000 brands and 50,000 third party merchants, grew tenfold to 273.7 billion yuan ($43.8 billion) over the past three years, estimates Euromonitor.

In March, Burberry partnered with Internet company Tencent, launching an official account on Weixin as the first stage of the partnership. Followers gained access to exclusive content, which showcases the inspiration and details behind key runway looks of the season. Users can also follow VIP guests at the show, including “Angelababy”, to receive exclusive imagery, audio and text messages.

Besides the virtual storefront, Burberry also has 78 physical stores in China.

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