Mid-Autumn Festival is approaching, and the prices of mooncake boxes each year also partly reflect the economic situation in China. According to Son Dong's Ban Dao Do Thi Bao, mooncake businesses said that this year, products priced over 200 CNY (about 770,000 VND) have become difficult to sell.
A distributor of La mooncakes said that products priced under 100 CNY (about 380,000 VND) sell best this year, while mooncakes over 200 CNY are selling quite slowly.
Some mooncake brands have also disappeared from the market. Many businesses cannot maintain their production capacity as before, forcing them to switch business directions or close down. This year's mooncake sales are forecast to decrease by more than 20% compared to last year.
Meanwhile, the Shenzhen Daily recently surveyed the reality at Rainbow Space supermarket in Sa Ha area, Shenzhen and recorded some promotional Mid-Autumn cake boxes priced at 69 CNY or 99 CNY. However, most products are concentrated in price levels of 168, 188, 198, 208, 248, 268, 288, 319 and 328 CNY. Even some boxes are sold at 498 CNY, but none of the products exceed 500 CNY (about 1.9 million VND).
According to Shenzhen Daily, 500 CNY has become a relatively clear price tag in the Chinese mooncake market in recent years. When searching for the keyword "mooncake" on JD. com, products are priced at about 59.9-373 CNY, of which the group of products priced over 100 CNY accounts for the largest number. Almost no longer have mooncakes priced over 500 CNY.
Previously, China witnessed a period of sky-high prices for mooncakes. The period around 2003-2012 is considered the period when mooncake prices increased the most. At that time, many businesses used luxurious packaging or sold other products to push the price of mooncake boxes to an unbelievable level.
For example, in 2004, Tianjin once appeared a cake box named "Thuần kim chí tôn Trung Hoa viên nguyệt" with a listed price of 99,999 CNY (about 386 million VND). In the middle of the box is a "lunar cake" made from 500 grams of pure titanium, making this food product almost a metal decoration.
Also in that year, a business in Zhengzhou launched "precious stone Mid-Autumn cake" priced at 8,000 CNY (about 30 million VND), with a gift box advertised to be studded with many types of gemstones.
By the mid and late 2000s, boxes of mooncakes worth thousands of CNY had become a familiar image in the Chinese market. Products worth tens of thousands of CNY were also not uncommon.
Even, in Kunming, a box of mooncakes priced at 310,000 CNY (about 1.19 billion VND) appeared, accompanied by a house over 100m2. At that time, mooncakes almost became "gifts" in real estate marketing campaigns.
However, this situation gradually changed after China tightened management of high-end mooncakes. In June 2022, the National Development and Reform Commission of China, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Commerce and the General Administration of Market Management of China issued a notice on curbing "sky-high priced mooncakes" and promoting healthy industry development.
According to regulations, boxes of mooncakes with unit prices over 500 CNY are subject to increased supervision. Businesses are also prohibited from using precious materials such as precious metals and rosewood to make mooncake packaging, and are not allowed to sell mooncakes with other products in any form.
After these regulations, mooncake boxes priced over 500 CNY gradually disappeared from the Chinese market.
