Chinese tourists still love to shop during their overseas trips with shopping remaining at the top of Chinese outbound travellers’ expenditure categories, according to the ‘2019 Chinese Outbound Travel Consumption Report’.
Published by Trip.com Group and UnionPay International, the report revealed those born in the 1980s spent the most on shopping, while female tourists showed the most enthusiasm for this activity accounting for 55% of the total outbound travellers who shopped.
Female shoppers also tend to look for bargains and discounts when they travelled overseas, with 64% of the coupons on Trip.com shopping channel obtained by this group. However, the average shopping expenditure per capita by their male counterparts was 1.15 times more.
The top 10 overseas shopping destinations for Chinese travellers in 2019 were Japan, UAE, United Kingdom, France, Singapore, United States, Spain, South Korea, Italy and Australia.
Despite Chinese travellers’ love for shopping their consumptions are increasingly diversified to include accommodation, tour guides, places of interests, performances, transportation, local entertainment activities, self-driving and cruise
Quoting statistics from the State Administration of Foreign Exchange the report stated Chinese nationals made more outbound travel expenditures than travellers from any other country, with total consumption reaching US$127.5 billion.
The study combined big data derived from outbound travel product orders and overseas bank card transactions by Chinese nationals to arrive at the insights into these cross-border travel consumption trends.
Other findings from the report:
- Online Travel Agencies (OTA) and UnionPay banks are the dominant tools for Chinese travellers for their overseas trips.
- In 2019, the outbound travel products purchased by Chinese nationals covered 158 countries with 17% growth year-over-year.
- More than half of the outbound consumption and bookings by Chinese travellers occurred during their trips, instead of booking in advance.
- The top 10 sources in China in terms of outbound travellers who spent the most were Guangdong, Shanghai, Beijing, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Sichuan, Hubei, Shandong, Fujian and Liaoning (UnionPay International’s statistics).
- Data from the ‘Things-To-Do’ platform on Trip.com showed that the order of museum tickets in foreign countries increased 105%, overseas ride-hailing orders on the mobile app by over 300% with average spending per capita over RMB70 (US$9.90) , and orders for local tour guides by 40% with the average order exceeding RMB800 (US$113.60).
• Featured image credit: imtmphoto/Getty Images
