Last year's Hong Kong Shopping Festival, organised by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC), helped Hong Kong SMEs expand and increase their brand visibility in the vast Mainland China market.

Among them, Pinewood Store Limited under Pinewood Group, a Nordic Food wholesaler, saw a boost in sales of its Pasta Toscana brand thanks to the Festival.

Founded in 2020, the brand has continued to grow its wine business and develop a diversified product portfolio locally, yet with an eye on the mainland market.

Instead of creating their own online store on a Mainland China e-commerce platform, Pinewood Group reached out to the HKTDC’s Design Gallery (DG) for support, given DG’s comprehensive services and e-commerce initiatives to help Hong Kong SMEs access and develop in the mainland market.

Last June, DG provided Pinewood wide-ranging advisory, market research and brand promotion support, which led to the SME’s Pasta Toscana brand being sold on DG’s JD.com International online store to kickstart its mainland expansion.

Thanks to the Shopping Festival last August, Pinewood achieved record sales of its Pasta Toscana, which ranked among the top products in the food category. DG’s marketing support, including social media outreach and dissemination of short product videos, significantly increased the brand’s visibility and customer reach.

Last November, Pinewood Wine Limited under Pinewood Group saw their Mainland China growth plans come to fruition, when they participated in DG’s e-commerce initiative that introduced the brand’s fine wines to the mainland for the first time.

Health Guardian International Ltd, a distributor and wholesaler of baby items, F&B and health-related products founded in 2010, also benefitted from last year’s Festival.

Despite the initial challenges of entering the Mainland China market due to resource constraints, the brand's popularity among mainland consumers led to many orders being placed via WeChat, demonstrating the market's potential.

To expand its mainland presence, the SME tried to join Tmall International, a leading e-commerce platform in the mainland, but high operating costs led it to shelve that plan.

However, in April 2023, with the support of DG’s cross-border e-commerce initiatives, the brand successfully joined JD.com International, as part of its transformation.

This move not only increased the brand's market coverage, but also provided mainland consumers with a more convenient platform to purchase Health Guardian’s products.

To enhance brand awareness and market reach, Health Guardian joined last year’s Hong Kong Shopping Festival, achieving a month-on-month sales growth of 167%.

DG’s WeChat outreach, short product video promotions and comprehensive marketing resulted in a more than 83% increase year-on-year in the brand’s conversion rate.

Given their success at last year’s Shopping Festival, Pinewood and Health Guardian will participate in the event’s second edition come August.

The second edition of the Hong Kong Shopping Festival will take place once again throughout August to showcase local consumer products and brands on mainland e-commerce platforms, to help them realise their mainland expansion plans.

Leading up to the second edition, diverse seminars are being held to help SMEs learn more about the country’s e-commerce market and latest opportunities.

The next seminar in June will highlight the challenges and opportunities in live-streaming e-commerce, introduce a variety of online marketing strategies and explore how to best collaborate with KOLs to enhance brand awareness and drive sales.