Online Chinese malls make whopping sales, packages overflow onto streets

Brisk business is always good news for retailers. But Chinese online retailers might be facing the worst problems of having good business.

Singles' Day promotions in China this year have led to delivery problems as overwhelming orders swamped the online malls and their delivery companies. 

Singles' Day or Guanggun Jie in China is a day for people to celebrate being single. It falls on November 11, and is often accompanied by major sales and discounts in stores.

This year's Singles' Day was marked by 24-hour madness sales and promotions on China's online shops.

As a result, express delivery services became overloaded with goods for courier. The large amount of goods to be delivered piled up in the courier companies like mountains, with many of their warehouses overspilling with parcels.

Reports stated that sales made during a Singles' Day promotion on online mall Taobao set a record of 19.1 billion yuan (S$375 million) in one day.

This is more than twice the combined amount made by 130 major commercial enterprises in Beijing over a period 8 days during the Golden Week holiday this year.

Many of the online shops were not able to deliver the goods on time because of the sheer volume of goods which needed to be delivered.

Some even told customers that they would take up to a month to complete delivery.

ljessica@sph.com.sg