Visa Survey analyses Top Souvenir Trends in China

The most popular souvenirs for those intending to visit China are Chinese tea, arts and craft and clothing, according to a survey on the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games and travel to China commissioned by Visa International.

Of the 3,140 respondents from across the Asia Pacific region who said they were likely to visit China during or after the Olympic Games, one-third said that Chinese tea would be the souvenir they were most likely to take home. The second most popular purchase was Chinese arts and craft, followed by clothing.

Richard Chang, Executive Vice President and General Manager, Visa Greater China and the Philippines said, “China not only offers interesting attractions to visit, it also promises tourists a one-of-a-kind shopping experience. With all the visitors expected during the upcoming Olympic Games, we may see a shopping spree of Olympic-sized proportions in China this August!”

Among those surveyed, women said they are more likely to buy Chinese silk (26% of women as opposed to 19% of men). Men are more likely to buy electronic products (20% of them as opposed to 15% of women).

The survey also found that younger travelers (those aged between18 to 24 years) are more interested than older travelers in buying both traditional and modern memorabilia of China with purchases of antiques and electronics.

By individual market, the top purchase for those in Hong Kong was local food products (62%), clothing for Australians, New Zealanders and Singaporeans (63%, 60% and 52% respectively), Chinese tea for Japanese and Koreans (36% and 49% respectively), Chinese silk for Malaysians (63%), arts and craft for Taiwanese (46%) and electronic products for Indians (60%).

Those who have visited China before say they are more likely to buy local food products (28% as opposed to 18% who have never visited) and Olympic Games souvenirs (17% as opposed to 11%). First-time visitors to China are more likely than repeat visitors to spend their money on clothing (30% as opposed to 20%), antiques (23% as opposed to 13%) and electronic products (23% as opposed to 6%).

50% of all those who had not yet traveled to China said they expected electronic payment cards to be generally accepted at some but not all merchants in China.

Richard Chang added, “A reliable and international-standard electronic payment infrastructure is a fundamental need to ensure that visitors to China - before, during and after the Games - can purchase their souvenirs from China using the same payment facilities they are used to at home.

“To this end, Visa has been working closely with its partners in China to develop a world-class electronic payment network that is of a gold medal standard and which offers convenience and security for those traveling to China this year and in the future. This includes adding 90,000 ATMs to provide better cash access for those attending the Games, as well as expanding the number of merchants that accept Visa-branded payment cards to a network of 210,000.”

Between 17 March and 9 April 2008, Nielsen conducted 4,556 online and door-to-door interviews on behalf of Visa with people aged 18 years and above from nine markets (Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and India) in an effort to measure interest levels in global sporting events, China as a travel destination and, in particular, the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. For each market, quotas were set by key demographic variables to ensure the sample was representative of the general population.

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