About the Chinese Business Club

About the Chinese Business Club 

I worked for eight years in Telecom, including four years at Bouygues, then I wanted to change sectors and six years ago I created my company Harold Parisot Conseils specializing in off-market real estate transactions for wealthy people. clients wishing to sell their assets discreetly. However, following repeated requests from very wealthy Chinese clients to meet opinion leaders in France, I had the idea of ​​going further and in 2012, I founded the Chinese Business Club which is experiencing a very strong growth for two years.

https://twitter.com/cbcfrancechine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n48MsW1kYRw&t=11s

About sixty companies are members of the club. What is the share of those that cover the field of tourism?

Already, it should be noted that we are positioning ourselves on the very high end, the great captains of industry, politicians, diplomats, ambassadors, etc. We have as regulars personalities like Michèle Alliot-Marie, Frédéric Mitterrand, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, etc. The club therefore wants to be very closed, premium, frequented by several Chinese billionaires. Regarding tourism, our main members are Club Med, Shanghri-La, Peninsula; Air China, China Eastern, but also high-end travel agencies like Chic Travel or Aiguemarine.

 Today, there seems to be a frenzy of Chinese businessmen to invest in French tourism (Club Med, Compagnie des Alpes, Ovalys, AccorHotels), is your club harboring future deals to come or has- Did he play a role in some of these takeovers…?

Yes it is certain. But if the negotiations can start during one of our lunches, they inevitably end between four walls, far from indiscreet ears. And so, it can happen that I am warned... and in the past that I learn about the agreements in the press. In any case, it should be noted that 100% of our members renew their membership, a real guarantee of satisfaction.

On the French side, in tourism, what would be the Chinese acquisitions of renown in recent years?

I admit that I am more interested in the business of Chinese people going to France than the reverse, but on the other hand, I am very interested in Chinese students in France, and I also invite French businessmen to go regularly to China, to travel there, to meet their suppliers, to get an idea for themselves. Today, small French companies often lack ideas, for example, I regret that there are so few e-commerce sites in Chinese, when it would be so easy and so interesting for everyone.

Since the attacks, do you feel a wait-and-see attitude or a greater reluctance on the part of Chinese tourists?

Absolutely, tourism experienced a decline of 30% in 2016, while in 2015, France had welcomed nearly one and a half million Chinese tourists. However, I strongly believe in the 2020 objective, which is to reach 5 million Chinese tourists in France. And in this sense, it should be noted that Henri Giscard d'Estaing, president of Club Med, has already twice been the guest of honor at our lunches.

To come back to the Club, what are the conditions for joining it and is it also open to smaller companies?

The Club includes large groups but also SMEs and start-ups. Membership costs €7,500 excluding VAT and in return, the Club undertakes to organize six to seven events each year, including business-oriented business lunches, as well as high-level contacts with Chinese investors.

https://www.voyageons-autrement.com/rencontre-avec-harold-parisot-fondateur-du-chinese-business-club

 Ecology, sustainable tourism, important values ​​for your club and yourself?

Yes, sustainable tourism interests me. Brittany is part of the top 100 of the most committed destinations. Soon, Sébastien Bazin CEO of AccorHotels who is very active in this regard will be one of our guests of honor. You should also know that Hôtel Fouquet’s Barrière, another of our members, has also taken in-depth action on this theme of sustainable development. Also, I think China needs sustainability and given the stakes and the pollution that exists there, they will surely be quicker than us to react.

 How do you see the development of the Club?

Today, sixty-four companies are already members of the club, my objective is to reach a hundred and limit the number to 100, to always remain in the very high end. We also aim to open Clubs internationally, for example in London, which is only 2h30 from Paris, and which has a larger population of wealthy Chinese than in France. We are also organizing a gala dinner in Beijing next April, a special edition dedicated to women

New CEO and Strategy for Tmall (Alibaba)

 

Hu Xiaolai is the new CEO of Tmall, China’s largest online shopping mall. Hu joined Tmall from its largest rival JD.com in 2017, where he built a technology and operations team to support the company’s growth in China  source http://businesskos.com/tmall-new-ceo-whats-his-strategy/

Alibaba new e-Commerce strategy 

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd has announced that it will revamp its international and domestic e-commerce businesses and replace its chief financial officer - changes that come as the tech giant grapples with an onslaught from competition, a slowdown in economy and regulatory repression.

He will form two new units – International Digital Commerce and China Digital Commerce which he says are part of efforts to become more agile and accelerate growth.

It will be led by Jiang Fan, who was in charge of its core Chinese retail markets, and the change is in line with Alibaba's goal of making "globalization" a key focus area in addition to cloud computing and national consumer spending.

Marketplace & Tmall

The digital commerce unit in China will include Alibaba's two main marketplaces, Tmall http://tmall.com/  for established brands and Taobao which welcomes all kinds of merchants. It will be led by Trudy Dai, who previously oversaw a number of Alibaba platforms.

The new national e-commerce structure puts Dai in charge of all retail marketplaces in China, including Taocaicai – its community-based e-commerce service, Taobao Deals as well as Lingshoutong, a retail management platform for mom and pop stores. pop, said the 86research.com analyst. Xiaoyan Wang.

“This could potentially unlock more synergies through cross-selling and supply chain integration,” she said.

Alibaba also announced that deputy chief financial officer Toby Xu will succeed Maggie Wu as chief financial officer from April, outlining his appointment as part of the company's leadership succession plan. Xu joined Alibaba from PWC three years ago.

Hong Kong-listed shares of the e-commerce giant fell 6% in early morning trading, following Friday's declines in the United States.

U.S.-listed shares of Chinese companies tumbled on concerns over tighter regulatory scrutiny in the country following plans by Didi Global Inc to delist from the New York Stock Exchange.

Hit by weaker economic growth and fierce competition from a plethora of rivals, Alibaba last month slashed its forecast for annual revenue growth to its slowest pace since its stock market debut in 2014. It also saw sales at its banner event, Singles Day online shopping festival, grow at their slowest pace.

New Regulation

Chinese regulators have also cracked down on tech and other sectors, particularly over antitrust issues which have seen Alibaba drop a policy requiring merchants to locate exclusively on its platforms. The company was fined a record 18 billion yuan ($2.8 billion) in April for abusing its dominant market position.

Star KOL are not a good Marketing tool in China anymore

 China's traffic stars may be losing popularity. A recent report from Shiqu Engine shows that celebrity marketing events fell by 50.9 per cent in March 2022 compared to the same time last year. However, co-branded marketing rose 91.3 percent and 55.7 percent respectively while new product marketing increased 6.6 times.

Star KOL 

The Traffic stars, a Chinese term that refers to KOLs who drive high-quality digital traffic, have helped brands achieve rapid growth for new products. While the continuing pandemic could partially explain the decline in celebrity events, with Shanghai still under lockdown and Shenzhen just beginning to recover, it also points to shifting tides within China's entertainment sector. Brands that fail to respond to ambassadors' poor behavior quickly are also being caught in the crossfire. This includes Kris Wu's sexual assault case last year, and the recent tax evasion cases livestreamer Viya as well as actor Deng Lun.source 

A new study shows that China's current crackdown on celebrity "idolatry has had a significant impact on marketing practices featuring these figures.

Marketing Agencies Tips 

According to marketing agencies, the use of traffic stars (or music and film celebrities that generate huge consumer traffic online) in marketing campaigns dropped 50.9% between March 2021 and March 2019. According to the report, this was despite an increase in product launches and events.

Scandals

China has been the victim of a slew of scandals involving celebrities in recent years. These range from tax fraud to sexual assault allegations. The government has made strenuous efforts to curb the use of celebrities in product marketing as the scandals mount.

There are many scandals, but the most notable is the disappearance Zhao Wei. This actress has been compared to Angelina Jolie in China. The 46-year old billionaire disappeared last August. All of her television series and films were removed from the internet and her -like Weibo page, which had 86,000,000 followers, was closed. Zhao and her husband were banned from the Shanghai Stock Exchange in 2008 for their unsuccessful takeover of a company. According to the bourse, they "disrupted the market order."

Actors problems in CHina

Zheng Shuang was another A-list actress and was removed from the Chinese entertainment industry. She had been reported to have two children in America through surrogacy in China.

Zheng is one of many celebrities who have been charged with tax evasion. This skyrocketed when China set a limit on the amount that stars can be paid for blockbuster movies.

#meToo

Last summer, the scandals reached their height when Kris Wu, a Chinese-Canadian pop singer, was arrested for rape allegations. China's #MeToo movement reached a fever pitch after the incident. Big-name foreign and domestic brands immediately removed Wu, including LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton MC+0.37% 

Apologies 

It has not been heard from, KOL made an apology for the surrogacy, Wu denied the rape allegations before he was taken into custody.

Analysts said that in addition to direct Beijing intervention, the chilling effect caused companies to reconsider engagements with celebrities.

Brands in China

"Many brands are scared and looking for less risky alternatives than celebrities who can disappear overnight, bringing negative associations with the brands they endorse, and swallowing large amounts of marketing budgets that could be spent elsewhere," Philip Chen (managing director of Gentlemen Marketing agency China) 

China has been using media and official channels to create a wave disapproval for allegedly "unwholesome", public figures and an increase in public standards. This is a key component of President Xi Jinping’s "common prosperity” campaign. It seeks to reduce income inequality and curb wealth and excess. It is a good times for small KOL - Models in China ?