China's luxury shoppers call in the tidy teams
10 November, 2020
The discovery of a Burberry jacket she does not recall buying proved to Chen Rui that she was right to have brought in experts to control her out-of-control luxury wardrobe.
"How did you find this?" the 32-year-old asked the crack team of "home organisers" who unearthed the jacket from a heap of clothes pulled from her closet in a slick Beijing apartment.
China's breakneck growth in the last four decades has resulted in a surge in conspicuous spending, with the newly moneyed lavishing cash on coveted labels to emboss their status.
A third of most luxury spending globally is by Chinese consumers, according to McKinsey's 2019 China Luxury Report.
So far the pandemic appears never to have dulled their desires but "Single's Day" on Nov 11, the world's biggest shopping day, will be closely watched for a concept about the state of Chinese consumer sentiment.
In the era of the couch-shopper, however, gleam downside to chasing fashion.
Housewife Chen says her walk-in closet, which brims with brands from Louis Vuitton and Chanel to Prada and Gucci, used to cause frequent arguments with her husband.
"I never abandon any of my collection, I simply increase it," the former art teacher admitted, saying she just wants to indulge. "I see no need to restrict myself."
So in desperation, she hired a four-strong team of home organisers to rescue her wardrobe.
In the era of the couch-shopper, there exists a downside to chasing fashion - hoarding consumers assessing where you can put almost all their new acquisitions. (Photo: AFP/NOEL CELIS)
The professionals in smart black uniforms whisk around her high-end apartment, emptying greater than a thousand pieces of clothing and a large number of luxury handbags from her closet.
The team is led by Yu Ziqin, one of a large number of graduates from a home-organising school called Liucundao, which teaches the art of bringing order to the chaos of China's rich shoppers.
School founder Bian Lichun said there have been now more than 3,000 professionals in the emerging industry, which state broadcaster CCTV has projected could reach 100 billion yuan (US$14.9 billion) this season when it comes to market turnover.
ANYTIME, ANYWHERE
Through the pandemic, Bian says business surged by up to 400 % as people spent more time at home scouring the web and assessing where you can put all their new acquisitions.
Home organiser Han Yonggang says his clients - who pay up to US$2,000 each for an activity that can have a couple of days - usually have total annual income exceeding 1 million yuan a year.
"I'm earning a lot more than I did so when I was a graphic designer," Han explains.
But unlike the advice of Japanese guru Marie Kondo - whose world-famous decluttering ethic has inspired millions to tidy up - Bian and her team never persuade clients to throw things away, or keep these things buy less.
Instead, they teach "the best way to retain", Bian says, through storage and canny design - such as for example extra-thin coat hangers.
"There is nothing useless on the globe."
A third of most luxury spending globally is by Chinese consumers, according to McKinsey. (Photo: AFP/NOEL CELIS)
Bian founded her company 10 years ago after seeing a gap in the market for the upwardly mobile classes.
"People used to feel that we are cleaners - however now they respect us quite definitely," Bian says of what is now seen as an important service to some of their clients.
"We even know just how many pairs of underwear they have ... and we've created an excellent life for them."
E-commerce and mobile commerce also have turbocharged spending habits.
The transport ministry says the number of express packages delivered per person in China this season will be almost 60 - about twice the global average.
Liu Wenjing, from the school of economics and management at Tsinghua University, says e-commerce has generated a culture of "online shopping anytime and anywhere".
But Bian argues the problem is not just one of over-consumption or the psychology of spending, but more about the task of finding somewhere to hoard clothes in China's densely populated cities.
"Our aim is to sort out space, not fix people," she said.
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