Stores shut in lockdown, yet sales rise in China as live-streaming retail staff, and internet celebrities, sell skincare, fashion and more online

Live streaming in China is a mix of product education and entertainment. Big retailers and small players alike are using it as customers avoid physical stores

Chinese internet influencers have a head start. One recently sold 70,000 boxes of spicy duck necks in seconds to her online audience of nearly 20 million people

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Online customers are shown a shoe in a live-stream from the Neiliansheng footwear store in Beijing. Retailers in China are embracing live-streaming as a sales channel as people continue to be wary of physical stores. Photo: AP

Published: 3:45pm, 17 May 2020Updated: 4:41pm, 18 May 2020

As shoppers stayed home at the height of China’s coronavirus outbreak, skincare products maker Forest Cabin closed more than half of its 300 stores across the nation. With sales plunging, founder Sun Laichun decided it was time to reach his customers more directly.

“We knew it was time for us to focus on an online strategy to survive,” Sun said. The company didn’t launch an online ad blitz or announce big giveaways – instead, it trained hundreds of its salespeople to begin hosting live video streams where viewers could get skincare tips and buy products without ever cutting away from the online patter.

Within just a month, Sun said, Forest Cabin’s February sales were up by 20 per cent compared to a year earlier, despite a plunge in store sales.

These days, shoppers are making their way back to once deserted malls and shops as China emerges from its long winter of coronavirus shutdowns. But so many of the region’s retailers ended up embracing live streaming that they’ve kicked off a new boom in Chinese “shoppertainment” that lets retailers interact with distant customers in real time.

Zhang Mofan (right), an online celebrity, sells items like disinfectant wipes through live streaming at her house in Beijing. Photo: AP

Some of China’s largest e-commerce companies are betting big on live streaming. Alibaba’s Taobao Live platform saw a more than seven-fold increase in first-time business customers in February, while Pinduoduo’s live-streaming sessions grew five-fold from February to March. (Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.)