Courage and convenience: Chinese New Year 2022 trends

Chinese New Year, often shortened to CNY, is a major celebration and commercial event in China and for the more than 60 million overseas Chinese across Asia, the Americas, and Europe – but in 2022 the festival is changing following a difficult two years of pandemic.

Why it matters

CNY, Lunar New Year or Spring Festival as it is known in China itself, tends to spur the largest annual human migration anywhere on earth as literally billions of people reunite with friends and family and look ahead in a spirit of hope. This year, when the festival falls on Tuesday 1st February, the commercial trends emerging speak to the deep disruption of the pandemic.

Trends

• Convenience: In China, many buyers are looking to meal kits and prepared food for their CNY celebrations. One platform, Dingdong Maicai, registered a quadrupling in orders year-on-year ahead of the festival. SCMP reports sales of the category could grow by 20% versus last year.
• Travel: Many people are choosing to stay at home rather than travel to meet relatives, according to data from Dada Group, an on-demand delivery and retail platform, which has registered a 1.4x increase in orders placed from different cities from the delivery destination.
• Tradition and modernity: CNY is a critical time for luxury brands which are increasingly getting involved with red pockets, or Hong Bao, virtual red envelopes that build on an important gifting tradition within the festival.
• Tiger as a rich creative gift: Associated with courage and power, and generally a gift to designers, brands are engaging with this year’s Zodiac. Notably, Bulgari has designed a collection and campaign around the symbol, engaging Chinese celebrities to appear in a campaign that elides the brand with traditions.

What to do about it

Ultimately, brands need to be sensitive to an occasion that reflects the mood of those celebrating. 2022 has not seen the world entirely liberated from COVID-19, and with the Winter Olympics set to begin in Beijing just after the festival there remains great uncertainty in China and around the world.

The best work around the festival tends to reflect the mood, respect traditions, and give people experiences worthy of the festival’s key themes of hope and reunion.

Sourced from Unesco, National Geographic, SCMP, Dada Group via Bloomberg, Jing Daily, WARC. [Image from Pexels]