Royal Mail is expanding the range of premium, high quality, authentic British products available to Chinese consumers, bringing a number of new British brands on board its Tmall Global shop front.

From mid-July, a range of products from quintessentially British satchel and leather goods brand, The Cambridge Satchel Company, will be available for purchase through Royal Mail’s shop front on the Tmall Global online marketplace.  Select products from healthcare brand Linwoods and natural skincare brand Works with Water will also be sold on the shop front from mid-July.  

Launched in March, the Royal Mail shop front on Tmall Global offers a selection of distinctive products for purchase by renowned British brands, with delivery to doorstep.  It also provides British retailers and exporters an accelerated opportunity to access the China market, removing the challenges that many companies would otherwise face in getting their products into the hands of Chinese consumers.

According to iResearch, Tmall.com was the largest brand and retail platform in China in terms of gross merchandise volume in 2013.  Part of the Alibaba Group, Tmall.com has hundreds of millions of visitors to its platform every day.  Launched in 2014, Tmall Global, an extension to Tmall.com, is a business-to-consumer open retail platform enabling brands based outside of China to sell directly to millions of Chinese consumers.  Tmall Global is an innovative business model for overseas brands and retailers and serves as a premier platform in providing quality international goods to Chinese consumers.

Royal Mail’s Director of Sales and Marketing for Parcelforce Worldwide, Helen Wylde, said: “We’re delighted to expand the range of quintessentially British products and brands available on Royal Mail’s Tmall Global shop front, offering the likes of The Cambridge Satchel Company another way to increase the accessibility of their iconic products to Chinese consumers.”

Tmall Head of Europe Janet Wang said: “Alibaba Group is focused on increasing access to the Chinese consumer for businesses of all sizes in the UK and around the world.  We recently launched 11 country pavilions on Tmall Global to allow merchants from countries such as the UK, France and the USA to sell specialty items directly to Chinese consumers and Royal Mail was a key participant, helping to make the British Pavilion one of the top three most visited during the promotion. To us, this demonstrates a real demand from Chinese consumers for authentic British goods. For example, Royal Mail has become one of the top sellers of UK baby milk powder on our platform and receives a very high score from shoppers for customer satisfaction, meaning repeat shoppers for the British brands that are joining the Royal Mail storefront.” 

The Cambridge Satchel Company Chief Marketing Officer Mario Muttenhaler said: “Our Chinese customers really appreciate our made-in-Britain products and brand ethos so we’re excited to be joining other British brands on the Royal Mail’s truly British Tmall Global store. Leveraging Royal Mail’s trusted brand is another way for us to reach Chinese customers with our range of leather satchels, bags and accessories.”

China now has the biggest internet user base in the world – around 620 million users – with almost half of these people shopping online.  Online shopping now accounts for just over 10 per cent of total retail sales of consumer goods in China, with the overwhelming majority of these online purchases being made through online marketplaces like Tmall.

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Source: Royal Mail Group