What is Singles Day?
Singles Day is celebrated on November 11. It is a Chinese commercial holiday that helps single people show their pride in being single. It started as a paean to being single, where solo students at China’s Nanjing University chose November 11 (because 11/11 looks like a group of sticks) to celebrate, rather than lament being partnerless. It quickly grew into a fun, unofficial holiday in which single people across China treat themselves to nice dinners and splurge on goods they wouldn’t otherwise buy for themselves. From those humble roots, Singles Day has become the single most lucrative online shopping holiday in the world, with sales reaching $25 billion in 2017, easily surpassing Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.
History of Singles Day
On 11/11/1993 a group of lonely, yet positive, students at Nanjing University decided that instead of lamenting their lack of a significant other, that they would instead celebrate being single. The reasoning? 11/11 looks like four, single sticks, strung together trying to make the most out of their time.
The anti-Valentine’s Day celebration of singledom caught on and spread across universities throughout China, generally characterized by fun, harmless events. For example, one student reserved every other seat in a movie theater, prohibiting couples from sitting next to each other during a screening of Beijing Love Story, an aptly named romantic film.
That level of mischief is the most that holiday’s celebration extends into anti-couples. For the most part, the holiday is a shopping holiday, thanks in part to Alibaba CEO Daniel Zhang, who created the first Singles Day sale in 2009, sparking a trend that has surpassed Cyber Monday in single-day transactions.
While the holiday may have gone commercial, the celebrations and theme are still in line with its founding – to celebrate who you are, your friends, and your loved ones, regardless of what your relationship status is.
