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The original Spectrum brush sets are back! Not only will these cuties add some colour to your collection, they'll change your makeup game for good.

SHOP Millennial

Vegan & Cruelty Free

We're proud to be a cruelty-free and vegan brand, registered with both PETA and the Vegan Society. You can shop in confidence knowing all our products are cruelty free and vegan certified, with no animal products or bi-products used in the materials or manufacture.

Better Beauty for everyone

Better quality in the form of hypoallergenic bristles that are oh so gentle for the most sensitive of skin. Better ingredients, we say no to the nasties; our cosmetics and cleaning products are all paraben free. Our mission for better beauty never ends...

Attainable Sustainable

We are continually striving to be kinder to our planet; be that through our raw materials, packaging or suppliers. As an independent brand our mission for attainable sustainable is ever evolving but wherever possible we opt for options which are biodegradable, recyclable or re-usable.

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The original Spectrum brush sets are back! Not only will these cuties add some colour to your collection, they'll change your makeup game for good. SHOP Millennial Vegan & Cruelty Free We're proud to be a cruelty-free and vegan brand, registered with both PETA and the Vegan Society.

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The Beauty Market is a broad industry which encompasses both body care, hair care, make up, fragrances and cosmetics. In Asia, the beauty industry has long been praised by the media for its ability to create innovative products with exotic ingredients and unique textures, which managed to attract an extremely wide clientele. In addition to their unique creations, Beauty Companies in Asia have also been highly complimented for their ability to capture the needs of consumers and for redefining their product experience with tailor-made marketing strategies and aesthetically appealing packaging. With over 6.4% increased in beauty and personal care products in Asia in 2017, the beauty market has reached over $149 USD bn sales, and represents today one of the most valuable segment of consumer goods worldwide.
The Digital World as a Key Driver
The Asian beauty market is characterized by a rapid launch of new brands, new products and new technologies, all fueled by an adoption of the digital world. Today, the retail market is being completely reshaped by the internet. With over 9.9% of beauty product sales occuring online in Asia, it seems that digital channels have lowered barriers to entry, enabling consumers from all generation to purchase their desired beauty products anywhere.

Although online sales still account for a small part of the beauty market, the digital landscape is exerting an important influence over Asian consumers. In Asia, consumers' interest for beauty brands extend beyond product information and pricing, as Millennials are looking for beauty brands online to understand product usage (with key influencers uploading product videos), to roam through online referrals and admire marketing campaigns. Thus, online vlogs, editorial blogs, tutorials, consumer reviews and social media channels have become an important arena for consumer decision-making - and companies must ensure their online presence remains satisfactory since consumers perceive the internet as a crucial channel for knowledge.
Functional Beauty
South Korea, among the top 10 global beauty markets, representing nearly 2.9% of the global industry, has managed to achieve successful growth in the last decade by approaching the beauty sector with the strategy of functionality rather than brand awareness. In Korea, beauty products are not perceived as "treats", instead, beauty products are considered useful and life-changing.

Daily beauty cream are developed with sunscreen claims, cosmetics have anti-pollution filters, skin care products have elasticity boosting benefits, venom serum or snails skin facials are rejuvenating. It appears that the Korean market has quickly established itself as a market leader for innovation, a platform for companies to test on new ingredients and technologies.

South Korean company Glow Recipe is using aloe vera instead of water for intense nutriton in their " rubber face masks ", an important innovation technique for better nutrient absorption.

In Japan, Shiseido launched its newest range, Waso, a skincare product line with active components of key natural ingredients such as carrot, loquat, honey, tofu and white jelly mushroom mixed in innovative formulas. With a lower price point than competitive brands, this line is specifically designed to appeal to millennial consumers.

Waso the new skin care brand from Shisheido
Emerging Asian Markets
The influence of Asia over the Beauty Industry worldwide is not solely limited to its main market leaders such as Korea and Japan. It appears that Emerging markets such as Indonesia, The Philippines and Vietnam are catching up on key trends and improving their global sales after a period of low growth.

The beauty industry in Indonesia has witnessed strong growth due to rising spending power of the middle class. The strongest trend developed in the beauty sector is the rise of products with "halal" and "herbal" options, which strongly resonates with the Indonesian consumer (as an estimation of over 87.2% of Indonesians identify themselves as Muslims). Therefore, for beauty companies, developing "halal-certified" products has reached an utmost priority in order to tap into new opportunities and improve their yearly performances.

In the Philippines, the desire for skin whitening products continues to gain ground, as having a "dark skin" can lead to discrimination and backlash in younger population. An estimation by Mintel Research group shows that skin whiteners and lighteners recorded the highest retail value projection in 2016 (of about $240 USD), outperforming all other market segments. With a relatively young population average, Filipino Millenials and the iGeneration are investing in social media to discover new products and become more educated on beauty, allowing them to purchase whitening products with relatively " reduced-health risks " claims.

Finally, the Vietnam beauty market should not be underestimated by the business world. Market researchers have projected this industry to grow at a CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of over 8.6% over the 2018-2021 forecast period, placing the country as leader for business expansion, worldwide.
So, what's next?
Amidst their successful business models and pioneering approach to beauty, the Asian beauty market needs to keep an eye for long-term challenges and consumer satisfaction. Today, Asian customers are becoming more knowledgeable and more demanding than ever, as their voices have become increasingly powerful online. Consumers are now extremely receptive to the latest trends, listening to both advocates of beauty brands in retail and online. Therefore, companies should continue to expand through digital channels, to ensure effective targeting.

Experience, Innovation and Functionality appear as the key drivers of growth in Asia. With new ingredients booming in everyday beauty products, the rise of new technologies and the importance of the digital world, the possibilities for innovation are endless. Hopefully, the Asian beauty success story will once be a source of inspiration worldwide.

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The Beauty Market is a broad industry which encompasses both body care, hair care, make up, fragrances and cosmetics. In Asia, the beauty industry has long been praised by the media for its ability to create innovative products with exotic ingredients and unique textures, which managed to attract an extremely wide clientele.

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It has recently been announced that both Hourglass Cosmetics and Urban Decay are opening stores in Hong Kong. This has led to a lot of confusion in the cruelty-free community about what this means for the animal testing stance of brands. Can brands sell in Hong Kong and be cruelty-free? Because Hong Kong is part of China, are the Hong Kong animal testing laws the same as in China?

In an effort to help set the record straight, this post will provide you with some important details about the animal testing laws in Hong Kong and what it means for cruelty-free brands who choose to sell there.

While Hong Kong is technically a part of China, Hong Kong does not have the same testing laws as mainland China. Mainland China currently requires animal testing on the large majority of cosmetic and beauty products. Hong Kong has been able to maintain their own laws about animal testing. The Hong Kong animal testing policies are not the same as those of mainland China. This means that brands can sell in Hong Kong and be cruelty-free.

Where it can be confusing is that Hong Kong is often considered China when it comes to labeling on product packing and websites. Some cruelty-free brands may say that they are available in China or say that they have a store in China, but they sell only in Hong Kong and not in mainland China. If you come across a brand that labels things this way, it's a great idea to let them know that it's confusing and could be costing them customers.

Animal testing is currently not banned in Hong Kong. With the recent positive changes in China to help reduce animal testing, Hong Kong is being encouraged to enact a ban on animal testing in order to help push mainland China further in the right direction.

If you have been concerned about the recent news of large cruelty-free brands expanding into Hong Kong, hopefully this helps to clear things up.

Hi! I created Logical Harmony years ago when I could not find the cruelty-free resources I was looking for. Some of my favorite things are good skin serums, nude nail polish, and popcorn. I live and work with my best friend and our four cats, Penny, Bagheera, Juniper, and Applesauce.

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Can Brands Sell in Hong Kong and be Cruelty-Free? - Logical Harmony

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It has recently been announced that both Hourglass Cosmetics and Urban Decay are opening stores in Hong Kong. This has led to a lot of confusion in the cruelty-free community about what this means for the animal testing stance of brands. Can brands sell in Hong Kong and be cruelty-free?

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Spectrum Collections X Disney Minnie Mouse Store Launch

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From its bargain alleys to its glitzy malls,, Hong Kong has long earned its status as a shopping haven for any budget, just like Singapore.

However, we have much to envy our counterpart.

Besides the fact that there is no tax on its imports (meaning prices are generally lower), Hong Kong boasts a wider range of beauty brands than what we have back home. Apart from international brands like Charlotte Tilbury, Korean cult beauty brands such as The Saem can also be found well-stocked on shelves.

But perhaps the most intriguing is the many local indie makeup and skincare brands such as Coconut Matter! that we can only get our hands on in DimSum-land. The green goddesses out there would also be happy to learn that these local beauty brands rely much on using natural and organic ingredients!
P.S. book your next trip to Hong Kong by looking for the best Hong Kong packages !
1. Charlotte Tilbury

That's right, Charlotte Tilbury has finally arrived in Asia! With stores launched in IFC mall and along Canton Road, the cult makeup brand is packed with goodies that were previously unavailable to us (unless you're willing to pay hefty shipping fees, that is), such as the Feline Flick Eyeliner or the Luxury Eye Palettes. We definitely recommend stocking up on all your favourites!

2. L'Officine Universelle Buly 1803
The two Charlotte Tilbury outlets can be located at:
This French apothecary opened its doors in Hong Kong two years back, and offers a collection of aromatic creams, clays, oils, and powders formulated and bottled in Paris.

They are famous for their water-based perfumes: the Eau Triple range comes in an emulsion that doesn't dry clothes or dry the skin, unlike traditional perfumes that have an oil base.

Don't miss out on the rose-distillate-enriched soothing lotion either: their Eau Superfine is known to calm reddened skin and even out even the worst of complexions!

3. The Saem

One of the highly raved about Korean beauty brands, The SAEMis probably most known for its Pure Natural Snail Mask Sheets. Unfortunately, this brand has not set up official retail stores here in Singapore, but they actually have retail outlets in Hong Kong - how unfair!
L'Officine Universelle Buly 1803 products are available in their flagship store located at 20 Wyndham St, Central, Hong Kong.
We love their Urban Eco Harakeke skincare line, which was created in collaboration with a certified New Zealand natural skincare company, The Saem co-produced beauty products that incorporate the moisturising, anti-microbial and soothing properties of the Harakeke plant, as inspired by the Maori people.

iSquare Mall, Nathan road 63, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong

Sunshine City Plaza, Ma On Shan, Sai Sha Road, Hong Kong

4. H2O+ Beauty
The SAEM has two outlets located at:
As its name implies, H2O+ Beauty goes back to the basics in testing and refining skincare formulas based on pure water to yield the best possible hydrating results. One popular tried-and-tested product is the H2O+ Oasis Hydrating Treatment, which contains sea grass and water lily extracts.H2O+ Beauty research has shown that these ingredients are effective in improving the skin's water retention, leading to supple and smooth skin.

Travelling to Hong Kong? You're going to enjoy these useful articles too - they open in new tabs!

5. Joseristine

Despite having won multiple awards for its skincare and cosmetics line, Joseristine is a Hong Kong beauty brand that still seems to be under the radar of beauty enthusiasts. Calling themselves "beauty scientists"', the team behind Joseristine is committed to using well-researched ingredients and advanced technologies to help optimise your skin health. Their bestsellers comprise of a range of skincare products that target specific needs, such as anti-aging (Apple Stem Cells Anti-aging) and moisturizing (H2O Hydrating).

6. Clara Yeung Skin Care

Although her beauty products are all handmade, Clara Yeung offers an impressive range of products, from cleansing oils to serums and facial masks. Apart from using non-toxic and natural ingredients, this brand strives to use fair trade ingredients where possible as well. A rising favourite among online reviewers like Sassy Hong Kong , Clara Yeung Skincare is still very much an indie brand that can only be found at the Island East Markets (Tong Chong St, Quarry Bay).

Unfortunately, while the brand has a Facebook , much of what they post are in Cantonese. Nonetheless, if you're already in the city, it's certainly worth checking out recommended products such as Clara's Chamomile & Calendula Gentle Cleansing Oil - which reviewers have suggested as a clean alternative to Shu Uemura's cleansing oil.

7. Gourmet Skin Bar

While GSB does not produce its own products, it is a one-stop shop that pools some of the world's best sustainable beauty products into one convenient location. For the savvy beauty junkie, GSB fulfills even the highest of expectations in presenting ethically-produced products that are natural, free from animal testing, employs fair trade practices and absolutely free from toxins.

Independent reviewers recommend the following as their favourite picks for the best results: Beauty Chef Glow inner beauty powder, Mun Anarose rejuvenating rose toner, and Black Tea Pigmented Ultra Lengthening Mascara by 100% Pure. What's also useful is that Gourmet Skin Bar's website offers accompanying advice on how and why consuming natural and/or organic ingredients is essential to achieving flawless skin.

8. Coconut Matter!
Clara Yeung Skin Care is available at Island East Markets. Check out their Facebook page for addresses and further details.
"Ethically sourced, crafted with purpose" is the vision set out by Coconut Matter! - a beauty brand that seeks to inspire a lifestyle of well-being and sustainability. Using an extraction method called Direct Micro Expelling (DME), pure coconut oil is pressed from the fresh fruits of the Solomon islands. Working only with fair trade farmers, Coconut Matter truly allows us to indulge in their skincare products without any of the guilt.

Perhaps the most versatile of all Coconut Matter!'s beauty products is its jar of WILD coconut oil. Not only can it be used to nourish your hair and skin, it triples as a nutritional boost when added to your daily cup of coffee or juice. Other must-try products include their DIY lip balm kit and Fire coconut oil soap.

The Coconut Matter! outlet is located at Wong Chuk Hang, Heung Yip Rd, 4號, E. Tat Factory Building, Room c6, 4th Floor. Alternatively, browse their website here to check out their skincare products.

9. KIKO Milano

Founded in 1997, KIKO Milano is an established Italian cosmetics brand that is dedicated to producing pocket-friendly high quality products. Take it from the experts - even highly-regarded professional makeup artists, Nick Barose and Hung Vanngo, have sung high praises of the brand's innovative products.

Fervent recommendations include KIKO's Water eyeshadows, which have a high payoff and can serve as an alternative to NARS Intensity eye shadows. Beauty bloggers also recommend KIKO's Extra Sculpt Volume Mascara, which has been said to achieve a similar effect as Lancôme's popular mascaras. The KIKO Smart Fusion Lipsticks are another cult favourite among their fans.

Though not as prominent as SASA stores, KIKO Milano outlets can be found in major shopping malls such as Harbour City and Times Square.

10. Jill Stuart

After having achieved huge success as a fashion designer based in New York, Jill Stuart launched her very own premium cosmetics line that can only be found in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Singapore.

While Jill Stuart is finally available in Singapore through Sephora, it certainly doesn't beat checking out a fuller collection of products and at specially designed Jill Stuart counters to really take in the pastel-sweet experience.

11. Native Essentials

Hong Kong's beauty scene has many organic contenders, including Native Essentials, which is a high-performance organic cosmeceutical line that promises an aromatic sensory skincare experience

The existing product range is very wide, and includes everything you need and want in a skincare routine: cleansers, exfoliators, masks, moisturisers and facial oils - all of which use the most potent natural ingredients, and are 100% cruelty-free.

12. Popstar Cosmetics

This makeup brand is actually founded by renowned Singapore-born, Hong Kong-based makeup artist and photographer Donald Chiu.

The best-selling Velvet Matte Liquid Lipsticks are said to be lightweight and waterproof, offering a smooth coverage so that the colour doesn't crack or crease easily.

Popstar Cosmetics even retails on , but surely nothing beats being able to swatch these famous vegan lipsticks for yourself in store!
Popstar Cosmetics products are available on their website , as well as in their physical store at Podium 3, IFC, 8 Finance Street, Central, Hong Kong.

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12 beauty brands to look out for in Hong Kong. The local indie brands are in our next shopping list!

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From its bargain alleys to its glitzy malls,, Hong Kong has long earned its status as a shopping haven for any budget, just like Singapore. However, we have much to envy our counterpart. Besides the fact that there is no tax on its imports (meaning prices are generally lower), Hong Kong boasts a wider range of beauty brands than what we have back home.

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Introduction to the Asian Beauty Market | Clean Beauty Asia

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A comprehensive overview of the Asian beauty market - key markets, growth rates, who is your consumer, what macro trends to consider - check out this overview

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While there may be plenty of renowned makeup brands sitting on the shelves of Sephora, not many of these brands may understand the struggle of keeping your makeup en pointe in Singapore's warm and humid weather.

From velvety liquid lipsticks to fuss-free designer nail wraps, here are 11 affordable local makeup brands developed by Singaporeans for Singaporeans.

You'll notice a common theme across the products from Reflection Organics-they're mostly formulated with ingredients that can be consumed.

They've got mascaras with coffee powder, blushers with rice powder and lip glazes with coconut oil. Even their Sun Protection Powder boasts natural ingredients such as rosemary oil and tapioca starch that hydrates and protects the skin from harmful UVA and UVB rays.

Coat Colour's polishes aren't just vibrant and pretty but also relatively toxin-free. Singapore's first *8-free nail lacquer brand, the brand produces organic nail lacquer that allows oxygen and water vapour to pass through, to prevent nail discoloration.

The brand's polishes are specially tailored for Asian skin tones and they carry an astounding range of colours-the last time we checked, they've got over 40 shades!
*8-free: Toluene-free, Dibutyl Phthalate-free, Formaldehyde-free, Formaldehyde Resin-free, Triphenyl Phosphate-free, Paraben-free, Xylene-free and Camphor-free.
Buy from: website and selected stores

It seems like age is merely a number for Candela Cosmetics founder Erin Jung, who started vlogging on Youtube at 11 years old before launching Candela Cosmetics at 16 years old. The young entrepreneur uses natural derivatives in her formulations such as mango butter, coconut water and soy-rice peptides.

Currently, her website only has brushes and an eyeshadow palette in stock but there'll be a series of new products slated to launch summer 2017, so keep a lookout for them!

Back then, fibre mascara was all the rage but most of them had white fibres. So Faux Fayc co-founder, Eileen, decided to take matters into her own hands and developed a fibre mascara with black fibres that'll complement Asian lashes.

They've since expanded their product offerings to foundation, blushes and even matte liquid lipsticks. If you prefer swatching makeup in a physical store, they have an outlet at Plaza Singapura so you can find the shade that fits your skin tone.

Buy from: website, selected stores, and their flagship store

If you're into fancy nail art but can't be bothered to wait for the manicurist to draw them out stroke by stroke, you'll love Gummi Nails! With most of their designs priced at $5, they're affordable, chic and convenient-just peel and paste their nail wraps and file off the excess.

For something uniquely Singaporean, check out their fun lingo nail art designs in collaboration with Goodstuph.

Buy from: website and selected stores

Developed by Singaporean makeup artist, Marie Soh, INGA Cosmetics tailors their lipstick shades to Asian skin tones.

The cruelty-free matte lipsticks are named "beautiful" in different languages and are available in a range of wearable shades from rose nude to bold red.

Combining their faith and passion for makeup, sisters Amira and Alia came up with their line of Halal cosmetics ranging from eyeshadow palettes to matte liquid lipsticks.

They've also got a series of *5-free, breathable and wudhu-friendly nail polishes so you can have bright and glossy nails without "suffocating" them underneath a layer of chemicals and toxins.
*5-free: Toluene-free, Dibutyl Phthalate-free, Formaldehyde-free, Formaldehyde Resin-free and Camphor-free.
Besides being made with sustainable materials such as highly recyclable aluminium, 13rushes's line of cruelty-free synthetic brushes also use material technology, 'dryklon' (quick-drying and mold-resistant fibre) so their brushes are not just soft and amazing, but also work well with liquids, creams and powders.

Their brushes are also entirely handmade by 26 craftsmen over 12 production stages!

Suiinaturals uses natural/food grade ingredients in their makeup whenever they can.

Besides their travel-sized lip and cheek palettes, another best seller is the BB face powder that works pretty much like a mineral foundation powder-just buff it in, and you're good to go. On top of that, it also contains Titanium Dioxide and Iron Oxides that provides natural sunscreen protection.

Three of Shophouse Sixtyfive's handmade lip and cheek tints are named after Singapore's Kampong girls (bubbly pink), Samsui ladies (poppy red) and colloquial term, ' Chio Bu' (nude rose). They also sell travel-sized lip brushes for germaphobes who refuse to dip their fingers into the product.

Buy from: website and selected stores

Handmade Heroes is no stranger to the local skincare scene. Besides their popular face masks and dry shampoo, the all-natural vegan brand also produces lip tints in two flavours, French Rose (sheer rose colour) and English Rose (sheer pink nude colour) that moisturises your lips and gives a natural hint of colour.

Buy from: website and selected stores

Local Beauty Brands

If your parents chide you for blowing half your allowance on these stellar cosmetic products, at least you can tell them that it's all in the name of #supportinglocal brands.

Elena majored in hospitality but her passion for writing and skincare led her to becoming a writer for Zula. When she's not stalking her favourite artistes on Youtube, she'll be busy annoying the office cats.

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11 Cosmetic Brands Started by Singaporeans-There's Even Kopi Powder Mascara

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While there may be plenty of renowned makeup brands sitting on the shelves of Sephora, not many of these brands may understand the struggle of keeping your makeup en pointe in Singapore's warm and humid weather. From velvety liquid lipsticks to fuss-free designer nail wraps, here are 11 affordable local makeup brands developed by Singaporeans for Singaporeans.

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Hong Kong females average beauty spending 2017

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Hong Kong females average beauty spending 2017

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Learn more about how Statista can support your business.

Nielsen. (June 30, 2017). Female consumers' spending on cosmetics and skin care in Hong Kong in the past year in 2017, by age group [Graph]. In Statista. Retrieved May 23, 2020, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/875505/cosmetics-and-skin-care-average-spending-in-hong-kong-by-age/

Nielsen. "Female consumers' spending on cosmetics and skin care in Hong Kong in the past year in 2017, by age group." Chart. June 30, 2017. Statista. Accessed May 23, 2020. https://www.statista.com/statistics/875505/cosmetics-and-skin-care-average-spending-in-hong-kong-by-age/

Nielsen. (2017). Female consumers' spending on cosmetics and skin care in Hong Kong in the past year in 2017, by age group. Statista. Statista Inc.. Accessed: May 23, 2020. https://www.statista.com/statistics/875505/cosmetics-and-skin-care-average-spending-in-hong-kong-by-age/

Nielsen. "Female Consumers' Spending on Cosmetics and Skin Care in Hong Kong in The past Year in 2017, by Age Group." Statista, Statista Inc., 30 Jun 2017, https://www.statista.com/statistics/875505/cosmetics-and-skin-care-average-spending-in-hong-kong-by-age/

Nielsen, Female consumers' spending on cosmetics and skin care in Hong Kong in the past year in 2017, by age group Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/875505/cosmetics-and-skin-care-average-spending-in-hong-kong-by-age/ (last visited May 23, 2020)

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Hong Kong: cosmetics and skin care annual spending by age 2017 | Statista

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Learn more about how Statista can support your business. Nielsen. (June 30, 2017). Female consumers' spending on cosmetics and skin care in Hong Kong in the past year in 2017, by age group [Graph]. In Statista. Retrieved May 23, 2020, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/875505/cosmetics-and-skin-care-average-spending-in-hong-kong-by-age/ Nielsen.

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Beauty and Personal Care in Hong Kong, China

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Greater accessibility to Mainland Chinese tourists boosts beauty and personal care

Growing demand for natural products and ingredients

Global giants L'Oréal and Estée Lauder maintain lead in 2018

Multitude of new launches characterise 2018

Beauty and personal care set to achieve positive forecast period growth

MARKET DATA

Table 1 Sales of Beauty and Personal Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 2 Sales of Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 3 GBO Company Shares of Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 4 NBO Company Shares of Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 5 LBN Brand Shares of Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 6 Penetration of Private Label in Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value 2013-2018
Table 7 Distribution of Beauty and Personal Care by Format: % Value 2013-2018
Table 8 Distribution of Beauty and Personal Care by Format and Category: % Value 2018
Table 9 Forecast Sales of Beauty and Personal Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 10 Forecast Sales of Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

SOURCES

Baby and Child-Specific Products in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Increasing child population in Hong Kong and China stimulates demand

2-in-1 cleansing gels take baby and child-specific products by storm

Superfoods ingredients emerge as new trend in baby and child-specific skin care

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Johnson & Johnson suffers from strong competition

Up-and-coming brands perform well in online and new distribution channels

Parents place higher trust in European imports for safety reasons

CATEGORY DATA

Table 11 Sales of Baby and Child-specific Products by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 12 Sales of Baby and Child-specific Products by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 13 Sales of Baby and Child-specific Products by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2013-2018
Table 14 NBO Company Shares of Baby and Child-specific Products: % Value 2014-2018
Table 15 LBN Brand Shares of Baby and Child-specific Products: % Value 2015-2018
Table 16 LBN Brand Shares of Baby and Child-specific Skin Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 17 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Baby and Child-specific Products: % Value 2015-2018
Table 18 Forecast Sales of Baby and Child-specific Products by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 19 Forecast Sales of Baby and Child-specific Products by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023
Table 20 Forecast Sales of Baby and Child-specific Products by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2018-2023

Bath and Shower in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Body wash/shower gel leads sales with healthy growth expected

Drugstores/parapharmacies help boost sales of premium products

Popularity of refills grows

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Unilever and Reckitt Benckiser lead sales via premiumisation

International brands remain the most popular

Niche local brands adopt a variety of approaches to attract consumers

CATEGORY DATA

Table 21 Sales of Bath and Shower by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 22 Sales of Bath and Shower by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 23 Sales of Bath and Shower by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2013-2018
Table 24 NBO Company Shares of Bath and Shower: % Value 2014-2018
Table 25 LBN Brand Shares of Bath and Shower: % Value 2015-2018
Table 26 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Bath and Shower: % Value 2015-2018
Table 27 Forecast Sales of Bath and Shower by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 28 Forecast Sales of Bath and Shower by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023
Table 29 Forecast Sales of Bath and Shower by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2018-2023

Colour Cosmetics in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Lip make-up contributes heavily towards growth in colour cosmetics

Luxury beauty brands leverage on Korean facial make-up trends

Make-up products no longer serve a single purpose

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

L'Oréal retains unassailable lead in colour cosmetics

Estée Lauder triumphs via strong premium make-up competition

Consumers extend environmentally-friendly ethos to colour cosmetics

CATEGORY DATA

Table 30 Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 31 Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 32 NBO Company Shares of Colour Cosmetics: % Value 2014-2018
Table 33 LBN Brand Shares of Colour Cosmetics: % Value 2015-2018
Table 34 LBN Brand Shares of Eye Make-up: % Value 2015-2018
Table 35 LBN Brand Shares of Facial Make-up: % Value 2015-2018
Table 36 LBN Brand Shares of Lip Products: % Value 2015-2018
Table 37 LBN Brand Shares of Nail Products: % Value 2015-2018
Table 38 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Colour Cosmetics: % Value 2015-2018
Table 39 Forecast Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 40 Forecast Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Deodorants in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Steady growth in deodorants due to increasing usage occasions

Consumers prefer deodorant sprays over other formats

Skin care infusion becomes the new trend in deodorants products

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Beiersdorf sustains leadership position

Unilever invests in promotion rather than new product development in 2018

Kao heats up competition by moving from skin care to deodorants

CATEGORY DATA

Table 41 Sales of Deodorants by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 42 Sales of Deodorants by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 43 Sales of Deodorants by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2013-2018
Table 44 NBO Company Shares of Deodorants: % Value 2014-2018
Table 45 LBN Brand Shares of Deodorants: % Value 2015-2018
Table 46 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Deodorants: % Value 2015-2018
Table 47 Forecast Sales of Deodorants by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 48 Forecast Sales of Deodorants by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023
Table 49 Forecast Sales of Deodorants by Premium Vs Mass: % Value 2018-2023

Depilatories in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Beauty salons and in-home hair removal devices erode demand for depilatories

Women's razors and blades remains stable while hair removers/bleaches contracts

Preference for Japanese brands

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Poor performance of removal creams and bleaches stimulates a change in focus for Veet

Gillette and Schick brand lines characterise womens' razors and blades

Premiumisation set to elevate this mass category

CATEGORY DATA

Table 50 Sales of Depilatories by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 51 Sales of Depilatories by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 52 Sales of Women's Razors and Blades by Type: % Value Breakdown 2014-2018
Table 53 NBO Company Shares of Depilatories: % Value 2014-2018
Table 54 LBN Brand Shares of Depilatories: % Value 2015-2018
Table 55 Forecast Sales of Depilatories by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 56 Forecast Sales of Depilatories by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Fragrances in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Premium fragrances soar thanks to their symbolic value and suitability for gifting

Flavour notes and scents become more important to local consumers

Wider offline and online distribution channels contribute to overall category growth

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Leadership position of traditional designer houses is challenged

Customers attracted to wide collections and unique fragrances of fragrance specialists

Slow moving performance of mass fragrances negatively affects category leader Body Shop

CATEGORY DATA

Table 57 Sales of Fragrances by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 58 Sales of Fragrances by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 59 NBO Company Shares of Fragrances: % Value 2014-2018
Table 60 LBN Brand Shares of Fragrances: % Value 2015-2018
Table 61 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Men's Fragrances: % Value 2015-2018
Table 62 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Women's Fragrances: % Value 2015-2018
Table 63 Forecast Sales of Fragrances by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 64 Forecast Sales of Fragrances by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Hair Care in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Strong performance of colourants

Further segmentation in conditioners and treatments

Environmental concerns push up demand for healthy protection against hair damage

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Procter & Gamble leads sales, followed by L'Oréal

L'Oréal ranks second through its popular brands

Competition increases with new entrants from niche and non-hair care brands

CATEGORY DATA

Table 65 Sales of Hair Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 66 Sales of Hair Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 67 Sales of Hair Care by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2013-2018
Table 68 NBO Company Shares of Hair Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 69 NBO Company Shares of Salon Professional Hair Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 70 LBN Brand Shares of Hair Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 71 LBN Brand Shares of Colourants: % Value 2015-2018
Table 72 LBN Brand Shares of Salon Professional Hair Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 73 LBN Brand Shares of Styling Agents: % Value 2015-2018
Table 74 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Hair Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 75 Forecast Sales of Hair Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 76 Forecast Sales of Hair Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023
Table 77 Forecast Sales of Hair Care by Premium vs Mass: % Value 2018-2023

Mass Beauty and Personal Care in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Mass sales benefit from necessity status

Mass sales of face masks boosted by affordable prices for high-concentrate solutions

Innovation increasingly important in mass beauty and personal care

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Procter & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson and Unilever lead this highly fragmented category

Mass brands predominate in certain categories

Mass vs masstige

CATEGORY DATA

Table 78 Sales of Mass Beauty and Personal Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 79 Sales of Mass Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 80 NBO Company Shares of Mass Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 81 LBN Brand Shares of Mass Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 82 Forecast Sales of Mass Beauty and Personal Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 83 Forecast Sales of Mass Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Oral Care in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Natural Ingredients stimulate demand among Hong Kong customers

New types of power toothbrushes shift competition in dental floss

Sales of electric toothbrushes set to perform well

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Category leaders compete via product endorsements and time-limited promotions

Private label gains ground in economy segments

Denture care benefits from ageing population

CATEGORY DATA

Table 84 Sales of Oral Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 85 Sales of Oral Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 86 Sales of Toothbrushes by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 87 Sales of Toothbrushes by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 88 Sales of Toothpaste by Type: % Value Breakdown 2014-2018
Table 89 NBO Company Shares of Oral Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 90 LBN Brand Shares of Oral Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 91 LBN Brand Shares of Mouthwashes/Dental Rinses: % Value 2015-2018
Table 92 LBN Brand Shares of Toothpaste: % Value 2015-2018
Table 93 Forecast Sales of Oral Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 94 Forecast Sales of Oral Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023
Table 95 Forecast Sales of Toothbrushes by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 96 Forecast Sales of Toothbrushes by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Premium Beauty and Personal Care in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Consumers seek quality beauty and personal care products

Improved transport links with Mainland China boost sales from incoming visitors

More "affordable" premium products attract a wider audience

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

L'Oréal and Estée Lauder sales grow thanks to strong premium portfolios

Industry players increasingly communicate via social media

Personalisation and novel fragrances in demand

CATEGORY DATA

Table 97 Sales of Premium Beauty and Personal Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 98 Sales of Premium Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 99 NBO Company Shares of Premium Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 100 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Beauty and Personal Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 101 Forecast Sales of Premium Beauty and Personal Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 102 Forecast Sales of Premium Beauty and Personal Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Skin Care in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Sales recover following rebound in Mainland Chinese tourist inflows

Air pollution and daily stress boost high-concentrate solutions and natural care

Strong growth of mass face masks

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

L'Oréal and Estée Lauder lead value sales

Smaller pack sizes are driven by factors other than travel

Glass continues to communicate premium positioning

CATEGORY DATA

Table 103 Sales of Skin Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 104 Sales of Skin Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 105 Sales of Face Masks by Skin Whitening vs Non-Skin Whitening: % Value 2014-2018
Table 106 Sales of Facial Cleansers by Skin Whitening vs Non-Skin Whitening: % Value 2014-2018
Table 107 Sales of Anti-Agers by Skin Whitening vs Non-Skin Whitening: % Value 2014-2018
Table 108 Sales of Toners by Skin Whitening vs Non-Skin Whitening: % Value 2014-2018
Table 109 NBO Company Shares of Skin Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 110 LBN Brand Shares of Skin Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 111 LBN Brand Shares of Facial Moisturisers: % Value 2015-2018
Table 112 LBN Brand Shares of Anti-agers: % Value 2015-2018
Table 113 LBN Brand Shares of Firming/Anti-cellulite Body Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 114 LBN Brand Shares of General Purpose Body Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 115 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Skin Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 116 Forecast Sales of Skin Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 117 Forecast Sales of Skin Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Sun Care in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Rise in outdoor living boosts demand for sun protection

Sun care suffers competition from other beauty and personal care categories

Format, size and coverage remain key trends in 2018

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

L'Oréal and Shiseido in close contention for top spot

Skin care players erode share from traditional sun care players

Innovation to remain key

CATEGORY DATA

Table 118 Sales of Sun Care by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 119 Sales of Sun Care by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 120 NBO Company Shares of Sun Care: % Value 2014-2018
Table 121 LBN Brand Shares of Sun Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 122 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Adult Sun Care: % Value 2015-2018
Table 123 Forecast Sales of Sun Care by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 124 Forecast Sales of Sun Care by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Colour Cosmetics in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Lip make-up contributes heavily towards growth in colour cosmetics

Luxury beauty brands leverage on Korean facial make-up trends

Make-up products no longer serve a single purpose

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

L'Oréal retains unassailable lead in colour cosmetics

Estée Lauder triumphs via strong premium make-up competition

Consumers extend environmentally-friendly ethos to colour cosmetics

CATEGORY DATA

Table 125 Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 126 Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 127 NBO Company Shares of Colour Cosmetics: % Value 2014-2018
Table 128 LBN Brand Shares of Colour Cosmetics: % Value 2015-2018
Table 129 LBN Brand Shares of Eye Make-up: % Value 2015-2018
Table 130 LBN Brand Shares of Facial Make-up: % Value 2015-2018
Table 131 LBN Brand Shares of Lip Products: % Value 2015-2018
Table 132 LBN Brand Shares of Nail Products: % Value 2015-2018
Table 133 LBN Brand Shares of Premium Colour Cosmetics: % Value 2015-2018
Table 134 Forecast Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 135 Forecast Sales of Colour Cosmetics by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

Men's Grooming in Hong Kong, China

HEADLINES

PROSPECTS

Positive outlook for men's grooming in Hong Kong

Strong growth in mass and premium men's skin care

Poor performance of men's post-shave acts as a drag on men's shaving

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Procter & Gamble retains the lead in men's grooming

Sunwa Marketing gains ground in men's skin care and deodorants

International bands continue to characterise the category in 2018

CATEGORY DATA

Table 136 Sales of Men's Grooming by Category: Value 2013-2018
Table 137 Sales of Men's Grooming by Category: % Value Growth 2013-2018
Table 138 Sales of Men's Razors and Blades by Type: % Value Breakdown 2014-2018
Table 139 Sales of Men's Skin Care by Type: % Value Breakdown 2015-2018
Table 140 NBO Company Shares of Men's Grooming: % Value 2014-2018
Table 141 LBN Brand Shares of Men's Grooming: % Value 2015-2018
Table 142 LBN Brand Shares of Men's Razors and Blades: % Value 2015-2018
Table 143 Forecast Sales of Men's Grooming by Category: Value 2018-2023
Table 144 Forecast Sales of Men's Grooming by Category: % Value Growth 2018-2023

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Beauty and Personal Care in Hong Kong, China

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Greater accessibility to Mainland Chinese tourists boosts beauty and personal care Growing demand for natural products and ingredients Global giants L'Oréal and Estée Lauder maintain lead in 2018 Multitude of new launches characterise 2018 Beauty and personal care set to achieve positive forecast period growth MARKET DATA Table

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When, in 1974, employees at the Japanese design company Sanrio created Hello Kitty, the small, rounded cartoon cat with a red bow between her ears and no mouth, they could never have dreamt that she would become the global megastar she is today. Sales of Hello Kitty merchandise now account for half of Saniro's $1bn (£500m) annual turnover and her face adorns 50,000 products, sold in more than 60 countries.

The little half-Japanese, half-English cat has become so globally recognisable that it is, perhaps, inevitable that the Japanese board of tourism has appointed her their official tourism ambassador to China and Hong Kong. This is not the first time the world has looked to Hello Kitty to perform an ambassadorial role; she has been United States children's ambassador for Unicef since 1983.

Dr Sharon Kinsella, a lecturer at Oxford University on Japanese sociology, thinks that Japan's choice of Hello Kitty as their representative is unsurprising.

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"It seems predictable enough to have her adopted as a diplomatic envoy," she says. "That has been the way of the 'Cool Japan' bandwagon for a few years now, and relations with China are no healthier. It seems a bit farcical to select Hello Kitty, however: as if a dumbed-down cultural icon that was cool in her retro boom in the 1990s, and which Chinese teenagers dig, can somehow do something significant to alter the gnarly and difficult state of China-Japan relations."

Hello Kitty's creator started out as the Japanese equivalent of Hallmark cards. Sanrio was founded by Shintaro Tsuji in 1960; Tsuji, a qualified chemist, lost his mother when he was 13 and spent an unhappy childhood with reluctant relatives. He attended a kindergarten run by a Canadian missionary and saw for the first time the custom of birthdays, which were not traditionally celebrated in Japan. He decided he would use his company to foster the culture of gift-giving.

As an experiment in 1971, in the wake of student riots, the company began printing rounded, cutesy images on previously blank writing stationery and in 1974, Hello Kitty was drawn. She was drawn without a mouth, which later made her the perfect cross-cultural representative. She wasn't given a mouth, explains Sanrio, because she "speaks from the heart. She's Sanrio's ambassador to the world and isn't bound to any particular language".

She was made partly English because when she was first drawn, the Japanese rarely travelled abroad; foreign, especially English, associations, were particularly popular. The stationery and diaries were a hit with schoolgirls during the 1980s and the company soon branched out in to other fanshi guzzu (fancy goods).

In the 1990s, Hello Kitty had a second stab at fame as it was was re-marketed as a "retro" brand. Shops, run by the outlet label Vivitix, marketed Hello Kitty to teens and adults, appealing to their sense of nostalgia. As eight year-olds they would have used Hello Kitty pencils and pencil cases in the classroom; in their late teens and early twenties, they reached for Hello Kitty satchels and make-up mirrors.

"Hello Kitty stands for the innocence and sincerity of childhood and the simplicity of the world," says Helen McCarthy, an author and expert on Japanese animation and comics. "Women and girls all over the world are happy to buy in to the image of the trusting, loving childhood in a safe neighbourhood that Hello Kitty represents. They don't want to let go of that image, so as they grow up, they hang onto Hello Kitty out of nostalgic longing - as if by keeping a symbolic object, they can somehow keep hold of a fragment of their childhood self."

And so now, although originally conceived as a character that would appeal to pre-teen girls, Hello Kitty is no longer regarded as being for children only. Along with the likes of Coca-Cola and Nike, she has become a brand phenomenon.

No hype, just the advice and analysis you need

Her wide, white, slightly questioning face first adorned a clear plastic coin purse, which retailed for 240 yen (£1.17). Now you can buy almost anything stamped with the Hello Kitty brand, including towels, pencils, clothing, stationery and mobile phone covers, selling in more than 60 countries. Hello Kitty's popularity with adults is reflected in the changing products available: you can buy Hello Kitty-branded laptops and adult-sized underwear - you can buy more merchandise and charge it to your Hello Kitty credit card, cannily supplied by the Bank of America; really dedicated fans can register for their own @hellokitty.com email address at the website, Sanriotown.com.

Hello Kitty is technically just one character who inhabits an entire, fictional world dreamt up by Sanrio. She lives in cyberspace on the fondant-coloured Sanriotown website. Hello Kitty has her own birthday, 1 November, (which makes her a Scorpio) and, as her English heritage befits, she lives in London with her parents and twin sister, Mimmy. Her many hobbies include travelling, music, reading and "eating yummy cookies her sister Mimmy bakes".

Other characters who share Hello Kitty's world include Dear Daniel (Hello Kitty'son-off boyfriend), Kathy, Tippy and Thomas. Conveniently located to the right of Hello Kitty's biography on the Sanriotown website is a link to the online shop, where you can buy a silver and pearl Hello Kitty necklace for £60, a steering-wheel cover for £14 or a Hello Kitty digital camera for £80.

Sanrio's theme park, Puroland, opened in 1990; it features Sanrio's most popular characters, with Hello Kitty as its star draw, and with yearly figures of 1.5 million visitors, from around the world, it is one of Japan's most popular visitor attractions.

Hello Kitty even became an animated character. She first appeared on the American-animated Hello Kitty's Furry Tale Theatre, which was shown on US television throughout 1987. Another series ran in 1991. This year, Hello Kitty was seen for the first time in 3D in an animation made by Sanrio Digital, called The Adventures of Hello Kitty & Friends. The Hello Kitty craze reached fever pitch in the early to mid-1990s, when celebrity endorsement from fellow megastars such as Mariah Carey, Paris Hilton and Britney Spears were photographed wearing assorted pieces of Hello Kitty branding. The American singer Lisa Loeb is a particular fan, dedicated an entire album to Hello Kitty, entitled Hello Lisa.

When Hello Kitty was first marketed to the US, the cultural differences meant that changes to the Japanese version had to be made. Sanrio's market research showed American consumers responded best to pink and purple kitties and worst to anything blue, yellow or red. The American audience also took against one of Hello Kitty's friends, a little snail, which had to be eliminated from the merchandise.

But Sanrio got it right in the end and now there are no differences in the American and Japanese lines of merchandise. Indeed, when Sanrio tried to customise Hello Kitty for itsTaiwanese and Hong Kong markets, putting her in local dress and in local surroundings, the products did not sell. Her mixed English-Japanese heritage was part of her charm.

Cultural commentators often see the invention of Hello Kitty as part of a wider cultural wave of kawaii (translatable as "cuteness") in Japan. Other popular characters in Japan, such as Pokemon, which adorns the side of Japan Airlines aircraft, are as cosily (or sinisterly, depending on how you see it) cute. The popularity of kawaii can be seen as either an example of Japan's harmonious and peace-loving culture or an example of Japan's culture of non-assertion.

Dr Kinsella describes the ingredients of a kawaii character in her essay Cuties in Japan: "The essential anatomy of a cute cartoon character is small, soft, infantile, mammalian, round, without bodily appendages (arms), without bodily orifices (mouths), non-sexual, mute, insecure, helpless or bewildered."

Hello Kitty's cuteness, says Dr Kinsella, was originally good at selling merchandise to schoolgirls because it lent something of a personality to an otherwise soulless piece of writing paper or a plain desk diary.

"Now, cute has become a new national style," she adds. "It is being used diplomatically and in fine-art circles to promote Japan. It has come a long way from its schoolgirl roots."
Other Sanrio creations BADTZ-MARU
Badtz-Maru is the only Sanrio character aimed at both boys and girls; teenage boys often have tattoos of this bad-attitude penguin in his classic pose: one eye closed and tongue sticking out. He was the official mascot for the 2006 FIBA World Championship of basketball, which was held in Japan.
LITTLE TWIN STARS
Little Twin Stars are a brother and sister called Kiki and Lala; they live on a cloud. Kiki has blue hair and sometimes appears with a star-shaped halo, while Lala has pink hair and carries a wand. Launched by Sanrio in 1975, they became particularly popular in the 1980s.
MY MELODY
My Melody is the first rabbit character released by Sanrio. She was originally marketed as a Little Red Riding Hood character when she first appeared in 1976, hence the red hood. She was popular in the Seventies, but then fell out of fashion.
KEROPPI
Keroppi the frog was released in 1987 and rivalled Hello Kitty in terms of merchandising in the early 1990s, particularly in the UK. The Keroppi line of trinkets was discontinued when sales started to decline.

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Top cat: how 'Hello Kitty' conquered the world

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When, in 1974, employees at the Japanese design company Sanrio created Hello Kitty, the small, rounded cartoon cat with a red bow between her ears and no mouth, they could never have dreamt that she would become the global megastar she is today.

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There is a new café venue coming to town on June 1, 2014. Coffee addicts, character themed restaurant lovers and Hello Kitty fans are you ready for the new Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café?

What can you expect from Hello Kitty Secret Garden ?

Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café is located in one of Hong Kong's lesser-known areas in Tai Hang. The theme of Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café will be held in wooden-themed design. It is very similar to the Hello Kitty Le Petit Café in Hong Kong's SOGO Department Store. It's no surprise if you find out both cafés are actually operated by the same owner.

Since the Hello Kitty Le Petit Café in SOGO is rather small and guest can only enjoy their coffee and cake standing (it is more like a popup-store), it is about time that Hong Kong gets a real Hello Kitty Café where you can sit down, chat with friends and enjoy a good cup of coffee with Hello Kitty atmosphere.

Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café is the first dinning-in Hello Kitty themed Café in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, the location is a little bit inconvenient. But if you really love Hello Kitty, it should not be a difficulty for you.

The soft opening of Hong Kong's Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café took place on June 1, 2014. These kind of café are always very crowded.

For more details and photos about Hello Kitty Secret Garden café, we would recommend you taking a look of Follow Kitty's article and share you some insider experience in this café.

Secrets for You

The Hello Kitty Café has its Macau Store in September 2014. Located at Rua de S. Domingos, the Macau Hello Kitty Café offer Portugal flavors, like Hello Kitty tarts.

Is it worthwhile to visit Hello Kitty Secret Garden ?

We would like to point out: from our previous experience with the Hello Kitty Le Petit Cafe , we were not very happy with their food quality and price.

From their menu you will find,
- the Mango Grapefruit Salad in the Hello Kitty Secret Garden costs HKD 80+,
- a Hello Kitty Rose coffee costs HKD 40+,
- Secret Garden Hello Kitty Hamburg set costs HKD 90+ (with only a Hello Kitty head-shape panfried egg)
If you decide to visit them only because of Hello Kitty, be prepared that they may disappoint you. They sometimes mess up the Hello Kitty look on the food . We do believe there are plenty of space for Secret Garden to improve to be a super cute themed Café like Hello Kitty Sweets in Taipei and the Charlie Brown Café in Hong Kong.

General Info and Details

From June 1, 2014 till present
19 Ormsby Street, Tai Hang, Hong Kong
Mondays: closed
Tuesday - Thursday: 12:00pm - 9:00pm
Friday: 12:00pm - 10:00pm
Saturday: 9:00am - 10:00pm
Sunday: 9:00am - 9:00pm
+(852) 2808 2868
HK$ 150 - 250 /person
http://hellokittychinesecuisine.com.hk/

How to get to Hello Kitty Secret Garden ?

By Subway: The most convenient way is to take the MTR to Tin Hau station and walk about another 15min.

Themed Restaurants in Hong Kong

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Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café | NextStopHongKong Travel Guide

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There is a new café venue coming to town on June 1, 2014. Coffee addicts, character themed restaurant lovers and Hello Kitty fans are you ready for the new Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café? Hello Kitty Secret Garden Café is located in one of Hong Kong's lesser-known areas in Tai Hang.

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K11 Musea [Photo provided to China Daily]

If Chinese millennials and their Gen Z counterparts (those born after 1995) represent the future of Hong Kong's tourism industry, then the city and its luxury brands may need to rethink their staid approaches.

Up to three-quarters of Gen Z-ers polled in studies admit to spending five hours per day online and, unlike their millennial forebears, who have grown to become digitally savvy, Gen Z are the first digital natives - meaning they have no knowledge or experience of a non-digital world. As a result, they value digital influencers as being more relatable than conventional celebrities, and look to them as role models and even educators. In an Ernst & Young report from last year, 85% of Gen Z-ers named YouTube as their favourite site. They're uber-connected - multi-screening and cross-platforming on all manner of devices and social media sites simultaneously.

Into this dizzying new world comes K11 Musea, opening this month on the Tsim Sha Tsui promenade. It represents a new retail concept for millennials and Gen Z-ers who gravitate towards the immersive consumption of art, culture and commerce. After ten years of full-on luxury and fashion marketing by Western brands in China, art has become the most useful and topical muse for luxury marketing on the mainland - witness Chanel's recent Mademoiselle Privé exhibition in Shanghai, through which Chinese artists were asked to reinterpret Coco Chanel's inspirations.

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HK to target art-minded millenials and Gen Z-ers

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If Chinese millennials and their Gen Z counterparts (those born after 1995) represent the future of Hong Kong's tourism industry, then the city and its luxury brands may need to rethink their staid approaches.

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Posted by Lucy Ehren

Like keeping up with the latest trends in beauty and fashion? Get to know Hong Kong's hottest social media influencers!

Covering everything from beauty and fashion to lifestyle and travel, they have it all! Whether you live in Hong Kong or on the other side of the world, these influencers will breathe new life into your Instagram feed:

Geneva Vanderzeil

Founder of the award-winning DIY blog A Pair & A Spare, Geneva Vanderzeil is one busy lady and a definite must-follow. Along with running her blog full of tutorials, recipes, and blogging advice, she stays very active on social media with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube accounts. She has also designed a shoe line and published DIY Fashionista, a best-selling book!

Mayo Wo

JJ. Acuna

Tina Wong

Tina Wong is a YouTuber, stylist, and influencer based in Hong Kong. Her self-titled blog covers her take on fashion, beauty, and lifestyle, while her YouTube channel gives subscribers tutorials on makeup application and how to wear the latest outfit trends. Follow her on Instagram and Facebook to know when new content is available and see what she's up to.

Samantha Wong

Samantha Wong is an Instagram sensation and the editor of Sam is Home, a blog that gives readers a colorful inside look at fashion, food, and lifestyle in Hong Kong. Follow her for everything from styling tips and how to set a holiday table to info and photos of travel destinations you'll want to check out on your next vacation.

Christing C.

Zoe Chan

Faye Tsui

Faye Tsui is a personal stylist that has always followed her own path in fashion. She started her blog, Fayevorite, after noticing a massive gap on social media when it comes to fashion and her sharp eye quickly led to appearances in fashion events, brand press conferences, and fashion magazines. Enjoy her unique sense of style daily by following her on Instagram.

Cara Mcilroy

Cara Mcilroy is an Aussie model, TV presenter, wife, mother, and free-spirited gypsy that's called Hong Kong her home for the past 10 years. On her blog, Catwalks to Cradles, she shares all the things she loves and everything she's grateful for, focusing on fashion, beauty, family, travel, food, and fitness. Follow her on Instagram for a peek at life as a mom in Hong Kong as well as her travels.

Mandy

Vicky Chan

Vicky Chan is a TVM actress and host known for her onscreen vixen roles and voluptuous figure. Her popularity is soaring, partly due to her recent performance as Jenny or Sai Long Tai in Come Home Love: Lo and Behold. Visit her website, Just Another Chan, for a full rundown of her past roles, talents, and accomplishments, and follow her on Facebook and Instagram to see what she's currently up to.

Moanna Shum

Janice Leung Hayes

Janice Leung Hayes is a food and travel writer that "food into words and pictures" on e_ting, her delicious Hong Kong-based food blog. Be the first to know when new content is released by following her on Facebook and Twitter, and enjoy her vivid photography daily on Instagram.

Keith Lee

Keith Lee is lawyer and bodybuilder from Hong Kong with a serious passion for food - and over 64k followers on Instagram. Add him to your Insta feed for fitness and travel inspiration and pics of mouthwatering cuisine.

Daisy Toi

Daisy Toi is an actress, entrepreneur, and winner of Miss Hong Kong 2016. Follow her on Instagram for a peek into her personal and professional life, with daily fashion and beauty updates and a healthy dose of mouthwatering food pics.

Natalie Tinman

Love winning free product? Based in Hong Kong, Natalie Tinman is a fashion and beauty Instagrammer that hosts frequent giveaways and documents her life for her growing fan base. Follow her on Instagram so you don't miss a thing!

Carmina Lo

Vincci Yang

Vincci Yang is a stylist, columnist, and blogger that has her finger on the pulse of fashion. Check out her YouTube channel for weekly vlogs, lifestyle videos, and fashion collection previews. Follow her on Instagram for her inspiring daily looks.

Who are your favorite influencers from Hong Kong?

If we missed any of your favorites, we would love to hear from you! Let us know on Facebook or Instagram who should be added to the list.

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18 Hong Kong Influencers You'll Want To Follow in 2019

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Posted by Lucy Ehren Like keeping up with the latest trends in beauty and fashion? Get to know Hong Kong's hottest social media influencers! Covering everything from beauty and fashion to lifestyle and travel, they have it all!

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Welcome back to Instagram. Sign in to check out what your friends, family & interests have been capturing & sharing around the world.

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Tina Wong | Hong Kong You' ll see my fashion styles, beauty tips and lifestyle here. Business Inquiries | info@tinawzq.com

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Foodgasm! Our favourite weekend brunch spots

Have you heard of any of these quirky Chinese superstitions? Perform these acts and be prepared for misfortune, bad luck, unhappy relationships and more

While Hong Kong is renowned for being one of the top markets for finance, it also has a history deep-rooted in tradition and Chinese superstition, and there are times when there seems to be a combative dynamic between modern lifestyle and contemporary culture and heritage. Behind the beautiful Chinese temples, there are ancient stories and the markets in Kowloon are surrounded by many fortune tellers. Find out quirky Hong Kong superstitions that don't seem to make much modern sense but have withstood the test of time.

Hong Kong Superstitions

1. Number Four

The number four is considered an unlucky number, because it sounds the same as death in both Cantonese and Mandarin. To this day, in some apartment buildings, you won't able to find the fourth floor because of this exact reason. This is probably one of the most well-known Hong Kong superstitions, and for good reason.

2. Leftover rice

A popular one for adults trying to get children to eat, make sure you finish everything in your bowl down to the last grain of rice. Each grain of rice left behind will indicate how many acne scars and spots your future spouse will have.

3. Chopsticks in your bowl

Make sure you never stick chopsticks upright in your food, especially rice, as it resembles incense sticks that are used to burn and pay respects for the dead. Not only will it bring you bad luck but will make you appear to have terrible table manners.

4. Cutting your birthday cake

When you cut into your birthday cake, make sure not to cut to the very bottom of the cake, because if you do, you won't get married.

5. The gift of a pair of shoes

Don't ever purchase shoes as a present. Firstly, because shoes in Cantonese sounds like a sigh, so thereby gifting them implies to the person you're giving the gift, that they are a burden. Secondly, the practical use for shoes is to walk or run in them, so giving your giftee a pair of shoes means they will leave you. Lastly, shoes are stepped on, and can be used to step on others, symbolising poor relationships and bad luck.

6. Clocks as presents

Gifting a clock is incredibly bad luck, as in Chinese the word sounds similar to attending and paying respects at a funeral. Presenting your giftee a clock especially on their day of birth is considered inauspicious and a bad omen.

7. Never bring home a stranger's umbrella or open it indoors
Want to explore more culture in Hong Kong? Take a tour around these Hong Kong museums and art galleries, or explore the islands around Hong Kong.
Umbrellas are known to carry ghosts, because spirits tend to be attracted to shadows. So, avoid opening an umbrella indoors, as the shadow from the umbrella acts as an entrance for ghosts to enter your doors and don't ever pick up a stranger's umbrella and bring it home.

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Hong Kong superstitions: Quirky beliefs that bring bad luck | Honeycombers

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Foodgasm! Our favourite weekend brunch spots Have you heard of any of these quirky Chinese superstitions? Perform these acts and be prepared for misfortune, bad luck, unhappy relationships and more While Hong Kong is renowned for being one of the top markets for finance, it also has a history deep-rooted in tradition and Chinese superstition, and there are times when there seems to be a combative dynamic between modern lifestyle and contemporary culture and heritage.

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WeChat and Weixin ( Chinese: 微信; pinyin: ; 'micro-message') are a Chinese instant messaging, social media, and mobile payment app developed by Tencent. First released in 2011, it became the world's largest standalone mobile app in 2018 with over 1 billion monthly active users. WeChat has been described as China's "app for everything" and a super-app because of its wide range of functions. WeChat provides text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video conferencing, video games, mobile payment, sharing of photographs and videos and location sharing.

Accounts registered using Chinese phone numbers are managed under the Weixin brand, and their data is stored in mainland China and subject to Weixin's terms of service and privacy policy, which forbids content which "endanger[s] national security, divulge[s] state secrets, subvert[s] state power and undermine[s] national unity". Non-Chinese numbers are registered under WeChat, and WeChat users are subject to a different, less strict terms of service and stricter privacy policy, and their data is stored in the Netherlands for users in the European Union, and in Singapore for other users. User activity on Weixin, the Chinese version of the app, is analyzed, tracked and shared with Chinese authorities upon request as part of the mass surveillance network in China. Chinese-registered Weixin accounts censor politically sensitive topics. Any interactions between Weixin users and Wechat users are subjected to term of service and privacy policy of both versions of software.

In response to a border dispute between India and China, WeChat was banned in India in June 2020 along with several other Chinese apps, including TikTok. U.S. President Donald Trump sought to ban U.S. "transactions" with WeChat through an executive order but was blocked by a preliminary injunction issued in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in September 2020. Joe Biden officially dropped Trump's efforts to ban WeChat in the U.S. in June 2021.

WeChat began as a project at Tencent Guangzhou Research and Project center in October 2010. The original version of the app was created by Allen Zhang, named "Weixin" () by Pony Ma, and launched in 2011. The term User adoption of WeChat was initially very slow, with users wondering why key features were missing; however, after the release of the Walkie-talkie-like voice messaging feature in May of that year, growth surged. By 2012, when the number of users reached 100 million, Weixin was re-branded "WeChat" by President Martin Lau for the international market.

During a period of government support of e-commerce development-for example in the 12th five-year plan (2011-2015)-WeChat also saw new features enabling payments and commerce in 2013, which saw massive adoption after their virtual Red envelope promotion for Chinese New Year 2014.

WeChat had over 889 million monthly active users by 2016, and as of 2019 WeChat's monthly active users had risen to an estimate of one billion. As of January 2022, it was reported that WeChat has more than 1.2 billion users. After the launch of WeChat payment in 2013, its users reached 400 million the next year, 90 percent of whom were in China. By comparison, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp had about one billion monthly active users in 2016 but did not offer most of the other services available on WeChat. For example, in Q2 2017, WeChat's revenues from social media advertising were about US$0.9 billion (RMB6 billion) compared with Facebook's total revenues of US$9.3 billion, 98% of which were from social media advertising. WeChat's revenues from its value-added services were US$5.5 billion.

In response to a border dispute between India and China, WeChat was banned in India in June 2020 along with several other Chinese apps. U.S. President Donald Trump sought to ban U.S. "transactions" with WeChat through an executive order but was blocked by a preliminary injunction issued in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in September 2020.

WeChat provides a variety of features including text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video calls and conferencing, video games, photograph and video sharing, as well as location sharing. WeChat also allows users to exchange contacts with people nearby via Bluetooth, as well as providing various features for contacting people at random if desired (if people are open to it). It can also integrate with other social networking services such as Facebook and Tencent QQ. Photographs may also be embellished with filters and captions, and automatic translation service is available and could also translate the conversation during messaging.

WeChat also provides a message recall feature to allow users to recall and withdraw information (e.g. Images, documents) that are sent within 2 minutes in a conversation. To use this feature, users can select the message or file to be recalled by long pressing. In the menu that appears select 'recall' and 'ok' to complete the withdrawal process. Eventually, the selected messages or files will be removed from the WeChat chatting box on both the sender's and recipient's phones.

Distance sensor is also added to WeChat. It is the feature that had the ability to activate the receivers' hold-to-talk function when the phone was brought in close proximity to the ear. After the receiver was held at a certain distance from the ear, the sensor would then proceed to automatically disable the phone speakers. This feature eliminates the risk of the user's voice messages being inadvertently broadcast to the general public.

WeChat users can register as a public account (), which enables them to push feeds to subscribers, interact with subscribers and provide them with services. Users can also create an official account, which fall under service, subscription, or enterprise accounts. Once users as individuals or organizations set up a type of account, they cannot change it to another type. By the end of 2014, the number of WeChat official accounts had reached 8 million. Official accounts of organizations can apply to be verified (cost 300 RMB or about US$45). Official accounts can be used as a platform for services such as hospital pre-registrations, visa renewal or credit card service. To create an official account, the applicant must register with Chinese authorities, which discourages "foreign companies". In April 2022, WeChat announced that it will start displaying the location of users in China everytime they post on a public account. Meanwhile, overseas users on public accounts will also display the country based on their IP address. In the official version of iOS WeChat 8.0.27, which was released in 23/08/2022. The new feature shows that when browsing the official account article in the new version of WeChat or opening a webpage in WeChat, there will be an option "Save the whole page as a picture" in the lower right corner after the screenshot. Once users clicked, the system automatically takes a screenshot of the entire page, which provides a convenient option for users who like to bookmark their account posts.

"Moments" () is WeChat's brand name for its social feed of friends' updates. "Moments" is an interactive platform that allows users to post images, text, and short videos taken by users. It also allows users to share articles and music (associated with QQ Music or other web-based music services). Friends in the contact list can give thumbs up to the content and leave comments. Moments can be linked to Facebook and Twitter accounts, and can automatically post Moments content directly on these two platforms.

In 2017 WeChat had a policy of a maximum of two advertisements per day per Moments user.

Privacy in WeChat works by groups of friends: only the friends from the user's contact are able to view their Moments' contents and comments. The friends of the user will only be able to see the likes and comments from other users only if they are in a mutual friend group. For example, friends from high school are not able to see the comments and likes from friends from a university. When users post their moments, they can separate their friends into a few groups, and they can decide whether this Moment can be seen by particular groups of people. Contents posted can be set to "Private", and then only the user can view it. Unlike Sina Weibo or Instagram, these are only shared to the user's friends. These are unlikely to go viral.

Recently, WeChat launched a new foundation that users can choose to top their posts in their own Moments. No matter how long the posts can be viewed set by users, the posts topped by them can be seen all the time. This foundation enable people to mark some important posts that it will be easy to find them. Besides, users can permanently display some posts while ensuring overall privacy.

Users who have provided bank account information may use the app to pay bills, order goods and services, transfer money to other users, and pay in stores if the stores have a Weixin payment option. Vetted third parties, known as "official accounts", offer these services by developing lightweight "apps within the app". Users can link their Chinese bank accounts, as well as Visa, MasterCard and JCB.

WeChat Pay, officially referred to as Weixin Pay (), is a digital wallet service incorporated into Weixin, which allows users to perform mobile payments and send money between contacts.

Weixin Pay's main competitor in China and the market leader in online payments is Alibaba Group's Alipay. Alibaba company founder Jack Ma considered Weixin's red envelope feature to be a " Pearl Harbor moment", as it began to erode Alipay's historic dominance in the online payments industry in China, especially in peer-to-peer money transfer. The success prompted Alibaba to launch its own version of virtual red envelopes in its competing Laiwang service. Other competitors, Baidu Wallet and Sina Weibo, also launched similar features.

In 2019 it was reported that Weixin had overtaken Alibaba with 800 million active Weixin mobile payment users versus 520 million for Alibaba's Alipay. However Alibaba had a 54 per cent share of the Chinese mobile online payments market in 2017 compared to Weixin's 37 per cent share. In the same year, Tencent introduced "WeChat Pay HK", a payment service for users in Hong Kong. Transactions are carried out with the Hong Kong dollar. In 2019 it was reported that Chinese users can use WeChat Pay in 25 countries outside China, including, Italy, South Africa and the UK.

For work purposes, companies and business communication, a special version of WeChat called Enterprise WeChat (or Qiye Weixin) was launched in 2016. The app was meant to help employees separate work from private life. In addition to the usual chat features, the program let companies and their employees keep track of annual leave days and expenses that need to be reimbursed, employees could ask for time off or clock in to show they were at work.

In 2017, WeChat launched a feature called "Mini Programs" (). A mini program is an app within an app. Business owners can create mini apps in the WeChat system, implemented using JavaScript plus a proprietary API. Users may install these inside the WeChat app. In January 2018, WeChat announced a record of 580,000 mini programs. With one Mini Program, consumers could scan the Quick Response code using their mobile phone at a supermarket counter and pay the bill through the user's WeChat mobile wallet. WeChat Games have received huge popularity, with its "Jump Jump" game attracting 400 million players in less than 3 days and attaining 100 million daily active users in just two weeks after its launch, as of January 2018. Ever since WeChat Mini Program's Launch, daily active user (DAU) of WeChat Mini Programs are increasing dramatically. In 2017, there was only 160 million DAU, however, the number reached 450 million at 2021.

In 2020, WeChat Channels was launched, which is a short video platform within WeChat that allows users to create and share short video clips and photos to their own WeChat Channel. Users of Channels can also discover content posted to other Channels by others via the in-built feed. Each post can include hashtags, a location tag, a short description, and a link to an WeChat official account article. In September 2021, it was reported that WeChat Channels began allowing users to upload hour-long videos, twice of the duration limit previously imposed on all WeChat Channels videos. Comparisons are often drawn between WeChat Channels and TikTok (or Douyin) for their similarity in features.

In January 2022, there were reports that WeChat is set to diversify further and place more emphasis on new products and services like WeChat Channels, amid new regulatory restrictions imposed in China.

Guardian Mode is a function in WeChat for protecting users under 14 years old. It was introduced to promote safety and provide security environment for WeChat users. After operating the Guardian Mode, the functions of "people nearby", "games", "search" will be directly disappeared in the interface. The channels function in WeChat, a video mini program, would only show contents suitable for adolescents. Besides, WeChat users who turn on the Guardian Mode could only be adding friends through QR codes and group chats. Moreover, WeChat users would only be able to view 10 latest Moments posts and would not be able to view the 10 latest Moments posts of non-friend users under the privacy setting of Guardian Mode.

In January 2016, Tencent launched WeChat Out, a VOIP service allowing users to call mobile phones and landlines around the world. The feature allowed purchasing credit within the app using a credit card. WeChat Out was originally only available in the United States, India, and Hong Kong, but later coverage was expanded to Thailand, Macau, Laos, and Italy.

In March 2017, Tencent released WeChat Index. By inserting a search term in the WeChat Index page, users could check the popularity of this term in the past 7, 30, or 90 days. The data was mined from data in official WeChat accounts and metrics such as social sharing, likes and reads were used in the evaluation.

In May 2017, Tencent started news feed and search functions for its WeChat app. The Financial Times reported this was a "direct challenge to Chinese search engine Baidu".

In 2017, WeChat was reported to be developing an augmented reality (AR) platform as part of its service offering. Its artificial intelligence team was working on a 3D rendering engine to create a realistic appearance of detailed objects in smartphone-based AR apps. They were also developing a simultaneous localization and mapping technology, which would help calculate the position of virtual objects relative to their environment, enabling AR interactions without the need for markers, such as Quick Response codes or special images.

On 17 June 2020, WeChat released a new add-on called "WeChat Nudge". The feature was first introduced in MSN Messenger 7.0, in 2005. The feature was called Buzz in Yahoo! Messenger and the feature had interoperability with MSN Messenger's Nudge. Similar to Messenger and Yahoo, users can access WeChat Nudge by double-clicking on other users' profiles in the chat. This virtually shakes user's profile photo and sends a vibration notification. Both users must have the latest Wechat update(7.0.13). If a user does not have the latest update they can't nudge another user but can still receive nudges. A user can only nudge another user if they have previous conversations. Newly added friends without previous messages cannot nudge each other.

On January 16, 2022, a new version of WeChat has added seven major functions for the iOS 8.0.17, Android 8.0.18 or newer version users. In the function of Personal Information Authority, users can check the number of times personal information has been edited in the past year through the personal information collection list, including head portrait, name, mobile number, gender, region, personalized signature, and address.

On March 30, 2022, according to the relevant laws and regulations of China, in order to prevent the risk of publicity stunts in virtual currency transactions, the Wechat public platform standardized the official account and mini program of secondary sales of digital collections.

WeChat Business () is one of the latest mobile social network business model after e-commerce, which utilizes business relationships and friendships to maintain a customer relationship. Comparing with the traditional E-business like JD.com and Alibaba, WeChat Business has a large range of influence and profits with less input and lower threshold, which attracts lots of people to join in WeChat business.

This is the main profit mode of WeChat Business. The first one is to launch advertisements and provide services through the WeChat Official Account, which is a B2C mode. This mode has been used by many hospitals, banks, fashion brands, internet companies and personal blogs because the Official Account can access online payment, location sharing, voice messages, and mini-games. It is like a 'mini app', so the company has to hire specific staff to manage the account. By 2015, there were more than 100 million WeChat Official Accounts on this platform.

As more and more people have joined WeChat Business, it has brought many problems. For example, some sellers have begun to sell counterfeit luxury goods such as bags, clothes and watches. Some sellers have disguised themselves as international flight attendants or overseas students to post fake stylish photos on WeChat Moments. They then claim that they can provide overseas purchasing services but sell counterfeit luxury goods at the same price as the authentic ones. Other popular products selling on WeChat are facial masks. The marketing mode is like that of Amway but most goods are unbranded products which come from illegal factories making excess hormones which could have serious effects on customers' health. However, it is difficult for customers to defend their rights because a large number of sellers' identities are uncertified. Additionally, the lack of any supervision mechanism in WeChat business also provides opportunities for criminals to continue this illegal behavior. In early 2022, WeChat suspended more than a dozen NFT (non-fungible token) public accounts to clean up crypto speculation and scalping. The crackdown on NFT-related content comes from domestic digital collectibles, which cannot be resold for profit.

In a 2016 campaign, users could upload a paid photo on "Moments" and other users could pay to see the photo and comment on it. The photos were taken down each night.

In 2014, Burberry partnered with WeChat to create its own WeChat apps around its fall 2014 runway show, giving users live streams from the shows. Another brand, Michael Kors used WeChat to give live updates from their runway show, and later to run a photo contest "Chic Together WeChat campaign".

In 2016, L'Oréal China cooperated with Papi Jiang to promote their products. Over one million people watched her first video promoting L'Oreal's beauty brand MG.

In 2020 Burberry and WeChat collaborated to design a shop in Shenzhen where Burberry has a flagship store, as well as an app allowing shoppers to interact with the shop digitally.

WeChat's mobile phone app is available only to Android and iOS. BlackBerry, Windows Phone, and Symbian phones were supported before. However, as of 22 September 2017, WeChat was no longer working on Windows Phones. The company ceased the development of the app for Windows Phones before the end of 2017. Although Web-based OS X and Windows clients exist, this requires the user to have the app installed on a supported mobile phone for authentication, and neither message roaming nor 'Moments' are provided. Thus, without the app on a supported phone, it is not possible to use the web-based WeChat clients on the computer.

WeChat opens up video calls for multiple people not only for a one-person call.

WeChat operates from China under Chinese law, which includes strong censorship provisions and interception protocols. Its parent company is obliged to share data with the Chinese government under the China Internet Security Law and National Intelligence Law. WeChat can access and expose the text messages, contact books, and location histories of its users. Due to WeChat's popularity, the Chinese government uses WeChat as a data source to conduct mass surveillance in China.

Some states and regions such as India, Australia the United States, and Taiwan fear that the app poses a threat to national or regional security for various reasons. In June 2013, the Indian Intelligence Bureau flagged WeChat for security concerns. India has debated whether or not they should ban WeChat for the possibility that too much personal information and data could be collected from its users. In Taiwan, legislators were concerned that the potential exposure of private communications was a threat to regional security.

In 2016, Tencent was awarded a score of zero out of 100 in an Amnesty International report ranking technology companies on the way they implement encryption to protect the human rights of their users. The report placed Tencent last out of a total of 11 companies, including Facebook, Apple, and Google, for the lack of privacy protections built into WeChat and QQ. The report found that Tencent did not make use of end-to-end encryption, which is a system that allows only the communicating users to read the messages. It also found that Tencent did not recognize online threats to human rights, did not disclose government requests for data, and did not publish specific data about its use of encryption.

1. To comply with an applicable law or regulations.

2. To comply with a court order, subpoena, or other legal process.

3. In response to a request by a government authority, law enforcement agency, or similar body.

In May 2020, Citizen Lab published a study which claimed that WeChat monitors foreign chats to hone its censorship algorithms.

Users inside and outside of China also have expressed concern about the privacy issues of the app. Human rights activist Hu Jia was jailed for three years for sedition. He speculated that the officials of the Internal Security Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security listened to his voicemail messages that were directed to his friends, repeating the words displayed within the voice mail messages to Hu. Chinese authorities have further accused the WeChat app of threatening individual safety. China Central Television (CCTV), a state-run broadcaster, featured a piece in which WeChat was described as an app that helped criminals due to its location-reporting features. CCTV gave an example of such accusations through reporting the murder of a single woman who, after he attempted to rob her, was murdered by a man she met on WeChat. The location-reporting feature, according to reports, was the reason for the man knowing the victim's whereabouts. Authorities within China have linked WeChat to numerous crimes. The city of Hangzhou, for example, reported over twenty crimes related to WeChat in the span of three months.

In 2015, Apple published a list of the top 25 most popular apps infected with the XcodeGhost malware, confirming earlier reports that version 6.2.5 of WeChat for iOS was infected with it. The malware originated in a counterfeit version of Xcode (dubbed "XcodeGhost"), Apple's software development tools, and made its way into the compiled app through a modified framework. Despite Apple's review process, WeChat and other infected apps were approved and distributed through the App Store. Even though the cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks claims that the malware was capable of prompting the user for their account credentials, opening URLs and reading the device's clipboard, Apple responded that the malware was not capable of doing "anything malicious" or transmitting any personally identifiable information beyond "apps and general system information" and that it had no information that suggested that this had happened. In 2015 internet security company Malwarebytes considered this to be the largest security breach in the App Store's history.

In June 2020, the Government of India banned WeChat along with 58 other Chinese apps citing data and privacy issues, in response to a border clash between India and China earlier in the year. The banned Chinese apps were "stealing and surreptitiously transmitting users' data in an unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India," and was "hostile to national security and defense of India", claimed India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.

On 6 May 2017, Russia blocked access to WeChat for failing to give its contact details to the Russian communications watchdog. The ban was swiftly lifted on 11 May 2017 after Tencent provided "relevant information" for registration to the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor).

In March 2023, Russia banned government officials from using messaging apps operated by foreign companies, including WeChat.

On August 6, 2020, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order, invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, seeking to ban WeChat in the U.S. in 45 days, due to its connections with the Chinese-owned Tencent. This was signed alongside a similar executive order targeting TikTok and its Chinese-owned ByteDance.

The Department of Commerce issued orders on September 18, 2020, to enact the ban on WeChat and TikTok by the end of September 20, 2020, citing national security and data privacy concerns. The measures ban the transferring of funds or processing through WeChat in the U.S. and bar any company from offering hosting, content delivery networks or internet transit to WeChat.

Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California issued a preliminary injunction blocking the Department of Commerce order on both TikTok and WeChat on September 20, 2020, based on respective lawsuits filed by TikTok and US WeChat Users Alliance, citing the merits of the plaintiffs' First Amendment claims. The Justice Department had previously asked Beeler to not block the order to ban the apps saying it would undermine the presidents ability to deal with threats to national security. In her ruling, Beeler said that while the government had established that Chinese government activities raised significant national security concerns, it showed little evidence that the WeChat ban would address those concerns.

On June 9, 2021, U.S. President Joe Biden signed an executive order revoking the ban on WeChat and TikTok. Instead, he directed the commerce secretary to investigate foreign influence enacted through the apps.

Montana banned the installation of WeChat on government devices since June 1, 2023.

In 2022, the Office of the United States Trade Representative added WeChat's ecommerce ecosystem to its list of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy.

Starting in 2013, reports arose that Chinese-language searches even outside China were being keyword filtered and then blocked. This occurred on incoming traffic to China from foreign countries but also exclusively between foreign parties (the service had already censored its communications within China). In the international example of blocking, a message was displayed on users' screens: "The message "" your message contains restricted words. Please check it again." These are the Chinese characters for a Guangzhou-based paper called Southern Weekly (or, alternatively, Southern Weekend). The next day Tencent released a statement addressing the issue saying "A small number of WeChat international users were not able to send certain messages due to a technical glitch this Thursday. Immediate actions have been taken to rectify it. We apologize for any inconvenience it has caused to our users. We will continue to improve the product features and technological support to provide a better user experience." WeChat planned to build two different platforms to avoid this problem in the future; one for the Chinese mainland and one for the rest of the world. The problem existed because WeChat's servers were all located in China and thus subjected to its censorship rules.

Following the overwhelming victory of pro-democracy candidates in the 2019 Hong Kong local elections WeChat censored messages related to the election and disabled the accounts of posters in other countries such as U.S. and Canada. Many of those targeted were of Chinese ancestry.

In 2020, WeChat started censoring messages concerning the COVID-19 pandemic.

1. Keyword filtering was only enabled for users who registered via phone numbers from mainland China;

2. Users did not get notices anymore when messages are blocked;

3. Filtering was more strict on group chat;

4. Keywords were not static. Some newfound censored keywords were in response to current news events;

5. The Internal browser in WeChat blocked Chinese accounts from accessing some websites such as gambling, Falun Gong and critical reports on China. International users were not blocked except for accessing some gambling and pornography websites.

Restricting sharing websites in "Moments"

In September 2013, WeChat was blocked in Iran. The Iranian authorities cited WeChat Nearby (Friend Radar) and the spread of pornographic content as the reason of censorship.

Because WeChat collects phone data and monitors member activity and because app developers are outside of the country and not cooperating, this software has been blocked, so you can use domestic applications for cheap voice calls, video calls and messaging.

On 4 January 2018, WeChat was unblocked in Iran.

On July 6, 2021, several WeChat accounts associated with China's university campuses LGBTQ movement were blocked and then deleted without warning, the official media said they had no knowledge of this. Some of the accounts, which consisted of a mix of registered student clubs and unofficial grassroots groups had operated for years as safe spaces for China's LGBTQ youth, with tens of thousands of followers. Many of the closed WeChat accounts display messages saying that they had "violated" Internet regulations, without giving further details, with account names being deleted and replaced with "unnamed", with a notice claiming that all content was blocked and accounts were suspended after receiving relevant complaints. The U.S. State Department expressed concern that the accounts were deleted when they were merely expressing their views, exercising their right to freedom of expression and freedom of speech. Several groups that had their accounts deleted spoke out against the ban with one stating "[W]e hope to use this opportunity to start again with a continued focus on gender and society, and to embrace courage and love".

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WeChat and Weixin ( Chinese: 微信; pinyin: ; 'micro-message') are a Chinese instant messaging, social media, and mobile payment app developed by Tencent. First released in 2011, it became the world's largest standalone mobile app in 2018 with over 1 billion monthly active users.

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Gamification is the process of taking something that already exists - a website, an enterprise application, an online community - and integrating game mechanics into it to motivate participation, engagement, and loyalty. Gamification takes the data-driven techniques that game designers use to engage players, and applies them to non-game experiences to motivate actions that add value to your business. To learn more about real-world applications of gamification, see the wide range of gamified Success Stories from Bunchball customers.

When people hear gamification, they envision games created for a business purpose. But gamification is not about creating something new. It is about amplifying the effect of an existing, core experience by applying the motivational techniques that make games so engaging. When you gamify high-value interactions with customers, employees, and partners, you drive more sales, stronger collaboration, better ROI, deeper loyalty, higher customer satisfaction and more. Learn more about how Bunchball provides a gamification platform for your business.

Gamification is built upon 10 primary game mechanics, proven to motivate and engage users, and may use any combination of these techniques to accomplish business goals. Learn more about game mechanics.

Gamification is transforming business models by creating new ways to extend relationships, craft longer-term engagement, and drive customer and employee loyalty. It works because it leverages the motivations and desires that exist in all of us for community, feedback, achievement and reward. When combined with the latest research on motivation and the big data generated by user interactions, gamification empowers businesses to create true loyalty. Learn more about true loyalty in the book by Bunchball Founder Rajat Paharia: Loyalty 3.0

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Gamification is the process of taking something that already exists - a website, an enterprise application, an online community - and integrating game mechanics into it to motivate participation, engagement, and loyalty. Gamification takes the data-driven techniques that game designers use to engage players, and applies them to non-game experiences to motivate actions that add value to your business.

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It's no secret that playing games is fun, but that's not the only reason we keep coming back for more. After all, games are designed with the human brain in mind. Every time you roll the right combination of dice, build a new settlement, or knock out an opponent, your brain's reward center lights up.

And that's why gamification is so powerful. By translating elements like points, levels, and progress bars into non-game contexts, you can recreate the gaming experience.

Whether your phone is filled with apps to help you stay fit, learn a new language, or even guide you through a meditation, chances are there's an element of gamification at play right at your fingertips.

From Super Mario Bros. to Monopoly, the games we play can have a real impact on our brains and the way we learn. But why is that? For a closer look, let's dive into the science behind gamification and why it's such a powerful learning tool.

Get ready, because we're about to go full Bill Nye. Games work because of dopamine, a neurotransmitter in your brain that's activated whenever you achieve something positive. In essence, it's the drug that makes you feel good. There's also a specific part of your brain that helps you decide if what you just did was good or bad, and if it's good, you get a little boost of dopamine.

This reward pathway in your brain plays an integral role in how we actually learn through reinforcement. As the Nestler Lab at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine puts it, "activation of the pathway tells the individual to repeat what it just did to get that reward."

When it comes down to it, this is a big part of what learning is all about: Do something well > your brain gets a reward > you want to do it again!

"Do something well > your brain gets a reward > you want to do it again!"

Yes, people tend to feel good when they learn. But it can also be challenging to stay motivated all the time. Thankfully, gamification helps give you those little boosts of motivation along the way.

Missandei is arguably the most impressive character on Game of Thrones. Sure, Daenerys can give birth to dragons, but Missandei can speak 19 languages fluently. We know who we'd rather have on our team for trivia night at the local pub.

Learning a second language is on most people's wish lists, but doing so is difficult. For one, it requires a high degree of motivation, especially when you're starting off. This is where gamification can help you stay on top of building and maintaining your learning game.

Duolingo, a language-learning tool built around gamification, has helped more than 200 million people learn a new language by taking gaming concepts and applying them to language courses.

To see what this actually looks like for end users, let's examine a language that's equal parts tricky and fictitious -  High Valyrian from Game of Thrones.

The Duolingo learning system is divided into 3 sections:

Lessons. At the start of each lesson, users are introduced to some small component of the language. In the example below, High Valyrian learners are first taught the words for different people.

Skills. These act as themes for all of your lessons. First, users start with the basics. Then later, you'll move on to constructing phrases with those foundational language building blocks. As you continue, the themes become more and more sophisticated.

Levels. Finally, once you've mastered each skill, you can advance to different levels within the language. In this case, High Valyrian has only 1 level, but languages like Spanish or Chinese have multiple.

The lessons-skills-levels format performs 2 vital jobs for the gamification of language learning. First, it codifies the process. When you play a game, you rarely beat it in on the first try. Going through the lessons and skills is the language equivalent of Mario running through a level, reaching the castle, and hoisting the flag.

Second, it induces goal-oriented behavior right from the start. You want to complete each lesson and level because it gives you a greater sense of achievement (and hence a bigger rush of dopamine).

Like most language learning apps, Duolingo lets you learn a little bit at a time, starting with basic sentence constructions.

As you can see, 2 new game concepts are introduced here to keep your motivation going. The first is the progress bar. After each correct answer, the bar fills up so that users have a visual representation of where they currently stand and how much further they have to go.

The second gaming concept is the points system. In the app, you can attain what are called XP, or eXperience Points, for every lesson you complete (10XP, in the example below).

But now what? Just like that insatiable Veruca Salt, you can't help but want more points, now. Your gaming brain is telling you to get to the next level, unlock those XP points, and fill up the rest of that progress bar ASAP.

Even in the best games, monotony has a tendency to kick in. To combat this, game creators often incorporate special challenges that trick players into striving for yet another goal. Check out how Duolingo incorporates a betting-like structure into this challenge to get users to continue learning. You can wager 5 lingots (Duolingo's form of virtual currency) and end up doubling your bet if you continue to use the app.

Duolingo sets challenges for its users because they know the main factor in learning a language effectively is continued practice. If they can keep you learning, chances are you're going to keep coming back to the app on a daily basis.

Still, there's more to gamification than learning a new language or getting to the next level of your favorite video game. Here are 2 examples of businesses taking advantage of gamification tactics to incentivize folks in entirely different ways.

Khan Academy is an online learning community that lets users learn advanced math, science, humanities, and economics, all for free. When Shantanu Sinha, the president of Khan Academy, first built the community, gaming mechanisms were some of the first learning tactics he introduced:

"Most games give you a sense of immediate success and progress. Instead of waiting for the end of the year to get your grade, imagine if you accumulated a sense of progress with every action you did every single day. Progress shouldn't be measured by cramming the night before and passing the final; it should be measured by your actions and good work habits every single day, and how well you retain and apply your knowledge."

For Sinha, it was obvious that games should be incorporated into learning. AP Calculus? Sounds pretty boring. But that's where gamification comes to the rescue to help take the edge off. At Khan Academy, putting gamification into practice means students can win prizes, badges, and even level up.

Notice how similar this layout is to the levels and challenges Duolingo employs in their app. Both give you a clear idea of your progress, as well as goals to push toward. And because games are user-specific, every path users take is a unique one - you're on your own personal learning journey.

"Because games are user-specific, every path users take is a unique one - you're on your own personal learning journey."

So far, we've only talked about the competitive nature of games in terms of personal competition (competing against yourself to do better). But games foster competition among groups of people, as well.

This element of gaming is especially apparent in the business world. Zoho Gamescope brings gaming to life for sales teams. It's no secret that sales environments can sometimes get a little competitive, with reps striving to hit their monthly goals (Glengarry Glen Ross, anyone?), so incorporating a little bit of healthy competition makes perfect sense.

With Gamescope, sales reps can see who was able to close the most deals or convert the most leads, helping to give clarity to a number of key stakeholders at a company.

The reps. Since compensation is often based on achieving goals, sales reps have a more tangible method of understanding and visualizing their progress toward their quotas.

The managers. As reps become more motivated through the game, managers will likely have to push them less to achieve their goals.

The company. Motivated reps = more deals!

Of course, we'd be remiss not to mention the potential downfalls of gamification. For instance, reps could close bad deals just to become the month's Deal Champ. Or worse, the competitive atmosphere could turn a little ugly ( just ask Jack Lemmon). As with most things in life, moderation is key.

Whether you're designing a new user onboarding system for your website, or just looking to tie in some of the fun of gaming mechanisms into your work process, the science behind gamification has applications for a host of contexts in the marketing and design worlds. And who knows? Before long, you might be having full-blown conversations in High Valyrian with the Mother of Dragons herself.

Draw inspiration from these popular types of business videos - product videos, onboarding videos, testimonials, and more!

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The Science Behind Gamification: Why It Works

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It's no secret that playing games is fun, but that's not the only reason we keep coming back for more. After all, games are designed with the human brain in mind. Every time you roll the right combination of dice, build a new settlement, or knock out an opponent, your brain's reward center lights up.