- Chinese consumers are opting for affordable alternatives across various categories to save money.
- The trend, known as pingti, is driven by economic challenges and is popular among young people.
- Consumers are finding cheaper substitutes for luxury goods, everyday items, and even healthcare.
Chinese consumers are on a budget and they’re not just scrimping on fashion.
It’s now become a trend in China to save on nearly every consumer category, from luxury goods to everyday consumables to travel, with cheaper substitutes.
It’s not an entirely new movement — because who doesn’t love a good bargain? — but its traction appears to have picked up in the last year amid China’s economic gloom. Alibaba’s 1688 wholesale platform is a standout beneficiary of the trend, with searches for “pingti” up nearly 2,000% on-year in January, ahead of Chinese New Year, according to local media.
This trend for pingti, or “affordable alternative,” products is particularly popular with young Chinese, who are trading tips about how to spend their money wisely on social media.
The word pingti covers a range of products, including dupes, counterfeits, and products that come from the same factories as their branded counterparts — as long as the price is more affordable than a much higher-end product.
It’s most obvious in the fashion and beauty sphere, where influencers share tips and savings from dupes.
In one post from Xiaohongshu, China’s answer to Instagram, a content creator showed how using a full face of dupes can save her nearly 1,000 Chinese yuan, or $140.
Products she replaced with dupes that appear similar when applied on her face include a foundation from MAC and a popular eyeshadow from Bobbi Brown — brands from beauty giant Estée Lauder.
“It’s certainly nice to use branded stuff, right? Who doesn’t like that big logo? But when it comes to how the makeup turns out, how big a difference can it really make? You can see it for yourself,” said Yidafu, the content creator.
Pingti substitution has become a “common strategy” across nearly every category, including everyday goods, household items, and even premium or luxury products, MingYii Lai, a strategy consultant at Beijing-based market research firm Daxue Consulting, told Business Insider.
While it’s about cost-effectiveness, it’s not just about budgets on the cheap, either.
These Prada and Bottega Veneta pingtis for the Hermès Lindy bag cost around 23,000 to 24,000 Chinese yuan, or $3,230 to $3,370 — still less than half the price of the Hermes bag.
The prevailing zeitgeist in China is about “aiming to live well while spending less,” Lai said.
As BI reported in August, people in China are buying affordable fashion items on online retail platforms to achieve the old-money aesthetic on the cheap with dupes — which, unlike counterfeits, are cheaper alternatives to the real thing.
The trend comes as China faces a prolonged economic slump following its exit from pandemic lockdowns. The world’s second-largest economy is dealing with an epic property crisis, deflation, a high youth unemployment rate, and geopolitical tensions.
Going straight to the source
But it’s just not luxury products that people in China are replacing with more rational prices. People are seeking lower-cost alternatives for everyday products.
This is particularly pronounced since China is practically the original equipment manufacturer of the world. These OEM factories manufacture parts and products for companies that, in turn, sell them to consumers under their own names.
Consumers buy from the manufacturers in bulk for their value and pricing on Alibaba’s 1688 platform — even for food products.
A search for pingti snacks on Xiaohongshu turns up videos that show more affordable alternatives to popular products, including Lay’s potato chips. Some videos say the alternative substitutes are from the OEM factories of the branded goods.
University teaching assistant and part-time counselor Ruth Jin, 32, told Business Insider that she recently started buying off-brand clothing on e-commerce apps Taobao and Pinduoduo.
She no longer shops at retail outlets for branded dresses.
“Non-branded merchants usually imitate the branded items, like my dresses. I would search the branded item first, then scan online to look to see if there are cheaper, non-branded ones,” she said.
Travel, education, and healthcare dupes
Chinese consumers are also substituting travel, education, and even healthcare experiences.
Travelers “find that some domestic sceneries offer a comparable experience to international ones,” Lai said.
This Xiaohongshu post from a tour company lists locations in mainland China that are pingtis to some international hotspots.
They include Ili city in Xinjiang, where there are lavender fields just like in Provence, France, and Xishuangbanna prefecture — which borders Laos and Myanmar — as an alternative to Bangkok.
In Xishuangbanna, there’s architecture similar to that in Thailand. And the language of the Dai ethnic group living in the prefecture sounds like the Thai language — so “it feels like you’re in Thailand,” according to the post.
Cleo Xie, a 46-year-old senior banking executive in Chengdu, said her family would vacation in Europe or Asia at least twice a year before the pandemic. But since 2020, they’ve only traveled within China on holidays.
She’s been trying a new travel style that’s in vogue among younger people: “citywalk.” The idea is to visit a Chinese city and spend a day strolling its streets and soaking in its atmosphere, instead of taking a full-blown vacation.
The trend has taken off on Xiaohongshu, with over 1.7 billion views for #Citywalk, where young spenders share their favorite local snack shops or recommend walking routes for their peers.
“I enjoy walking around and seeing the life of local people, tasting local food,” Xie told BI, saying she prefers to take the high-speed rail instead of flying.
“The control measures during the pandemic changed everyone’s travel habits,” she added. “Now many people think domestic vacations are convenient and you don’t have to plan to do so much.”
As for education, young people are exploring options at universities that target senior students and attending personal-interest classes at public libraries, where they’re cheaper than at commercial outlets, said Lai.
Meanwhile, people are turning to telemedicine and online pharmacies for non-critical conditions.
China’s economy is in a deflationary mode
The wave to downgrade spending comes as China is still struggling to turn its economy around following the pandemic. Beijing is now trying to turn the economy around with a concerted stimulus blitz that has boosted market sentiment tremendously.
Official data released in September showed China’s Consumer Price Index rising less than what economists had expected. Meanwhile, its Producer Price Index — which measures the price of goods at the factory gate — fell 1.8% from a year ago.
It was the 23rd straight month the PPI was in the negative zone, sparking concerns about a “deflation spiral” in which people could delay their purchases on expectations of further price declines, further dragging the economy.
China’s consumers continue to be frugal in the months ahead. A Bank of America survey of 1,052 adult Chinese consumers showed weakening consumer sentiment, with 30% of respondents planning to spend more — down from 45% in June. Just 21% expected their income to increase over the next six months.
Jin, the part-time counselor, told BI that she still prefers to buy cosmetics and accessories from brands she knows and trusts, like lipstick from Yves Saint Laurent and bags from Charles & Keith.
But she’s grown satisfied with the non-branded clothes she’s found online, especially given their lower prices.
“My family and myself are more cautious with spending,” she said.
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