What consumers can expect from Hong Kong’s summer shopping festivals

The Post unpacks what is up for grabs for bargain hunters.

1. What is the Hong Kong Shopping Festival?

The twofold event will be held from August 1 to 31, and more than 230 Hong Kong brands are expected to take part in the campaign.

It will feature six major product categories: apparel and accessories; personal care and cosmetics; home and living; traditional foods; smart gadgets; and health supplements.

Some of the notable brands are jewellers Chow Tai Fook, Chow Sang Sang and Tse Sui Luen, nutritional supplements and skincare specialists King To Nin Jiom and AUSupreme, bakery chain Kee Wah and the Nest1964 bird’s nest chain.

All consumers at the festival will enjoy a 10 per cent discount, while elderly shoppers will receive tailored recommendations for products.

The first part will be a discount month, where an official campaign website will be created to showcase all participating companies and the special deals offered by their online stores from the mainland.

The council said it would promote the event through various digital marketing channels to alert consumers and boost visits to the participating online shops.

In the campaign’s second phase, which will be held in late August, influencers will be invited to conduct live-streaming sessions on major e-commerce and social media platforms, such as Xiaohongshu, Douyin, Taobao and JD.com, to promote the participating products and brands.

According to the council, notable streamers present include “Lipstick King” Li Jiaqi, who has 28 million followers on Weibo and once sold 15,000 tubes of lipstick in five minutes on Taobao.

2. What is the Hong Kong Brands and Products Shopping Festival?

The four-day Hong Kong Brands and Products Shopping Festival is a summer spin-off of the Hong Kong Brands and Products Expo, the oldest retail fiesta in the city promoting local brands.

There will be more than 250 kiosks across six exhibition areas, with 181 exhibitors participating. The newly introduced Chillax Zone will offer cocktails, beer, wine and paired snacks.

Select products will be available at 90 per cent discount, and lucky draws for consumption vouchers and free round-trip air tickets to Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou will be held.

To celebrate the Chinese Manufacturers’ Association’s 90th anniversary, each day’s first 90 visitors will receive a free surprise lucky dip. Thirty glasses of cocktails will also be distributed at 3pm every day.

On Wednesday, the association’s vice-president Ivan Sze Wing-hang estimated that about 60,000 visitors would attend the shopping festival and generate sales of about HK$60 million (US$7.7 million), with mainland tourists expected to account for about 15 per cent.

Wingco Lo Kam-wing, the association’s president, said his organisation would cooperate with the Hong Kong Tourism Board to distribute free admission tickets to tourists and arrange transport to and from the AsiaWorld-Expo.

3. What are some measures to boost the city’s tourism?

Beijing last month raised the duty-free shopping allowance for mainland tourists visiting Hong Kong and Macau to 12,000 yuan (HK$12,880).

Under the previous rule, visitors from across the border paid a tax of 13 to 50 per cent to the central government for purchases above a threshold of 5,000 yuan per trip, a measure introduced in 1996.

Beijing has also added eight mainland cities to the scheme allowing solo travel to Hong Kong, taking the total to 59.