China’s luxury travellers up shopping spend

China’s luxury travellers were more enthusiastic about shopping on their travels last year than in 2015, with RMB220,000 (US$32,380) of their average travel budgets of RMB380,000 devoted to retail therapy, up 57 per cent.

Their favourite purchases were cosmetics, local produce, bags and suitcases, clothes and accessories, and jewellery.

This data comes from The Chinese Luxury Traveller 2017, a 26-page report on the travel model, retail and trend of high-net-worth individuals. It was released by the Hurun Research Institute and International Luxury Travel Market Asia (ILTM Asia), based on a survey between March and last month in association with luxury travel agencies 8 Continents, Diadema, HHtravel and Magic Travel.

From 12 Mainland China cities, the 334 respondents had an average age of 42 years, 41 per cent were male, and they had a per-capita wealth of nearly RMB22 million.

Cosmetics topped the list of holiday purchases by the luxury travellers, being bought by 45 per cent of them.

Following were local produce (43 per cent), bags and suitcases (39 per cent), clothes and accessories (37 per cent) and jewellery (34 per cent).

Mainly women

Other than local produce, the four most popular purchase categories were all dominated by female consumers. Compared to two years ago, there was a noticeable increase in the percentage of travellers buying cosmetics.

With regard to the purpose of the purchase, 76 per cent of purchases were personal, 47 per cent were gifts, and 4 per cent on the behalf of others.

In contrast with data from two years ago, luxury travellers are expanding their horizons, travelling not only for leisure but also to satisfy individual tastes. Making an appearance in the top 10 anticipated travel trends are island hopping and culinary tours or wine-tasting.

When travelling, the luxury tourist likes to try local dishes, with 56 per cent opting for the cuisine of the country they are visiting. Their next preferences are Japanese (32 per cent) and Cantonese fare (31 per cent).

Cuisines ranked in the top 10 include French, Italian and Sichuan. Hotpot and Korean cuisine failed to make the list.

According to the Hurun Research Institute, there are about 3,380,000 individuals in Mainland China with RMB6 million in assets. There are about 1,340,000 millionaires, 89,000 billionaires, and 57,000 individuals with assets totalling US$30 million.

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