In recent decades, a new pattern has emerged in the luxury retail world: At the end of December, many of the world’s most valuable brands will unveil exclusive brands covered with Chinese cultural symbols, one of a dozen animal signs, the color red or all of the above.
Marketing for this lunar new year, which falls on Friday, is no different.
Nike, for example, has combined its high-top sneakers with graphic banging fireworks and artificial Chinese buttons. Apple has offered limited edition AirPods pros with ox emojis stamped on the cases. The Swiss boutique Vacheron Constantin has meanwhile dropped $ 130,000 watches with high-relief engravings of the animal.
Compared to those of recent holiday periods, the Year of the Ox capsule collection has not yet drawn as much ridicule or as many boycotts from Asian consumers. But the commercialization of the Moon New Year still raises long questions within the Asian diaspora about the co-opting and whitewashing of ethnic traditions – and whether the recognition of mainstream can bring about meaningful social change.
The commodification of lunar new year – also known as Chinese New Year or Spring Festival – by Western brands began in the early 1990s, when China grew into an economic powerhouse with an emerging middle class that viewed luxury as a status symbol, Min Zhou said. director of the Asia Pacific Center at UCLA.
“It is part of broader trends of consumerism, commercialization and globalization” that unfolded at the time that were not ‘unique to the Chinese or Chinese New Year,’ “she said, noting that the transformation of other major cultural holidays, such as Christmas and Thanksgiving, in shopping bonanzas.
Today, China is the main market for Western retailers. In 2018, Chinese shopping bought one – third of the world’s luxury goods, and the country is on track to become the world’s largest clothing market by the end of the decade. According to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, consumers spent $ 149 billion during the week-long break in 2019. In the U.S. and the United Kingdom, luxury New Year’s releases in 2019 rose 75 percent from 2019 to 2020, according to retail market intelligence platform Edited.
The aggressive courtship of Chinese buyers by American retailers could distort how non-Asians view Asian Americans by reinforcing the model minority myth, says Chiou-Ling Yeh, author of “Making an American Festival: Chinese New Year in San Francisco’s Chinatown.”
The luxury brands’ marketing and advertising blitz “regularly brings Chinese buyers together with Chinese Americans and Asian Americans,” she said, adding that it also reinforces the stereotype that all Asians are successful, rich and materialistic.
Yeh said that the purchasing power of the Chinese middle class does not accurately reflect the financial status of Asians abroad. And the China-centered aesthetics of Lunar New Year collections – headband animals as the main design motif, Chinese celebrities as leading advertisements – look out over the numerous other ethnic groups celebrating the holiday in both Asia and the US, including Singapore, Vietnamese and Koreans.
According to her, the misconceptions can be especially damaging if anti-Asian hate crimes skyrocket and Asian Americans experience the biggest job losses among all racial groups.
When big brands make money with ethnic traditions, they run the risk of misinterpreting or flattening the cultural practices that distinguish events and emotionally resonate, said historian Jack Tchen, a co-founder of the Museum of Chinese in America, said. While the exchange of gifts is a cherished lunar New Year ritual, an ever-growing pool of luxury capsule collections can undermine the purpose of the holiday – which has little to do with acquiring sought-after garments and jewelry.
“The tragedy would be if the goods became the substitute for the real experience of what the new lunar year is about, that is, family and friends coming together, eating together, taking the ancestors into account,” he said. “It’s a time when people can really relax, no matter how much they work or how little money they have.”
If commercial culture were to catch up with these ‘deep traditions’, he would have said, the Asian festival might look like Christmas: a holiday so thoroughly commodified that the original religious significance is now largely lost to the masses.
In the last few decades, government agencies have made more effort to honor the event in culturally sensitive ways. Since 1992, the U.S. Postal Service has launched three 12-year-old New Year’s stamp series, featuring artwork by Asian-American illustrators. The new year of the ox seal pays homage to the whimsical masks used in traditional dragon and lion dances.
But as awareness of the event grows among non-Asians, it has become ironic in some ways that Asian Americans are taking certain traditions into account. Moon New Year, unlike Thanksgiving or Christmas, is not a federal holiday, making it difficult for many families to get together and celebrate. (Recently, a handful of public school districts in the U.S. agreed to give students the day.)
In addition, Zhou said, the intense pressure to unite in American culture has caused younger Asian Americans to lose touch with centuries-old customs, such as worshiping the Kitchen Gods and composing the Spring Festival couplets.
“Family relationships are often disrupted by immigration, and the second generation is gradually forgetting about these traditional holidays in their parents’ homelands,” she said. “The rituals they pick up, such as red envelopes, lantern festivals and lion dances, are therefore more symbolic.”
But there are also concerns about the commodification of the new lunar year, Zhou said. It has strengthened the mainstream of Asian representation and the general awareness of Asian culture, while encouraging businesses to re-examine their prejudices. Online setbacks against racist and insensitive lunar New Year collections, for example, have forced some companies to withdraw campaigns. On the other hand, advertisements that emphasize storytelling about product promotion – such as Nike’s widely acclaimed 2020 advertisement depicting the red envelope tug of war between family members – can enrich the public’s understanding of years of traditions.
Since protests against races last summer, companies benefiting from ethnic cultures have faced increasing pressure to invest more proactively in these communities by sponsoring local groups, sponsoring cultural events and hiring more diverse staff.
As the coronavirus pandemic forces Asian American communities to cancel parades, dances and large family gatherings for a second consecutive year, grassroots groups across the country have devised thoughtful merchandise and virtual opportunities to raise awareness about lunar New Year rituals and struggling to support.
The Asian American Arts Alliance has created a series of interactive digital projects to explore New Year customs and mythology, including a red envelope exchange program and a recipe for tikoy, a steamed rice cake made during Chinese Philippine celebrations. Pearl River Mart, a Chinese American specialty emporium founded in 1971, has compiled gift boxes with a variety of items such as sounders to ward off evil spirits and almanacs with household tips and health remedies.
Joanne Kwong, president of Pearl River Mart, said she welcomed the attention that Western brands drew on the New Year as it promoted Asian American representation in advertising and pop culture. But according to her, it is up to businesses and organizations owned in Asia to teach the community about the essence and history behind the holiday.
“For second- or third-generation Asian children, it’s becoming more vague what the traditions are and how to celebrate what it all means,” she said. “We consider it our job to keep these traditions alive.”