It’s one of the newest, untapped trading periods for retailers – and the City of Sydney is throwing its full support behind it this month.
City of Sydney’s 2020 Lunar Festival is one of the biggest celebrations of the holiday outside of Asia, launching on January 25 and continuing to February 9.
Sydney will welcome tourists from across the world, as well as Sydney’s multicultural Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, Thai, Indonesian, and Malaysian communities for nights of stalls, concerts, street performances and free activities.
Lord Mayor Clover Moore said this year’s celebrations will feature close to 100 community events across Sydney.
“Over the years we’ve seen this festival grow from a small community festival in Chinatown to one of the largest lunar celebrations in the world,” the Lord Mayor said.
“Each year this festival just gets bigger and better. In 2019 the festival attracted close to 1.5 million people who spent nearly $42 million during the event. It’s a wonderful boost for our local economy, retailers and restaurants.
“We’ve put a lot of work into creating an exciting and diverse program, from our laneway party opening night to community dance performances, the dragon boat races in Darling Harbour and of course, the food, there’s truly something for everyone.
“I can’t wait to again welcome residents and visitors from around the globe to Sydney for this community celebration, starting in Chinatown where it all began more than two decades ago.”
2020 is the Year of the Metal Rat. The Year of the Rat is the first sign of the lunar zodiac and heralds the start of the 12-year lunar calendar cycle.
In designing a 2019 Lunar New Year collection, Saba creative director Elisha Hopkinson said it was an important period for retailers.
“New Year is certainly growing in popularity within Australia, and it will continue to grow in the future.
“This is evident within many sectors, not just retail, with brands and companies celebrating, engaging with and supporting this important cultural event.
“Australia is such a multicultural market, and it’s great to be able to celebrate it.”
Saba worked with fashion influencer Alisha Thornley collaboratively as creative muse and street style model, along with photographer Wesley Tan.
The pair concepted a shoot based on their knowledge and cultural ties to Lunar New Year.
The campaign was supported across visual merchandising displays in freestanding store windows and through a dedicated eDM and online landing page.
Alice McCall is also a long-time supporter of the trading period, with Chinese consumers the second largest demographic in stores and online.
The brand employs Mandarin speaking boutique staff to assist in creating a personalised shopping experience for Chinese customers, including daigou.
“For us, both their average transaction and frequency of spending is higher, so it’s important to deliver the styles they’re shopping for, year round.
"We also like to ensure their shopping experience is one of ease, this is why we accept Chinese payment methods such as Alipay, WeChat Pay and UnionPay in all of our boutiques, and have fluent Mandarin-speaking staff in key stores.”