Luxurious Consumption in Contemporary China Name: Institution: Date: Luxury consumption has its roots in the European front, where most of the luxurious companies have set-foot on well established markets in Europe and America. The recent recession has sent some of these companies such as the Hermes and Swatch to seek out new markets. Asia and specifically China is one the markets that these companies have sort refuge given the increasing buying power, associated with economic boom in the country. Luxury trends have been on the rise, with the affluent Chinese going for the best the market has to offer. In the past year alone, the Chinese consumption was at a record high of about 46 billion on luxuries, in U.S dollars. 27 of these billions were spent abroad, while the rest 19 billion were spent at home in the Chinese market (Dirlik & Meisner, pg. 366, 1989). The Chinese market was not hard hit by the recession, as such; the luxury spending is set to push the economic recovery much higher and faster than any other markets. With more companies going to set up shop in China due to the lucrative market and the cheap labour, this growth is even expected to go beyond 30 billion at the local market. Unlike in the Japanese market which is dominated by some specific brands, the Chinese market is not. This is partly due to the fact that the market is still under development. To the investors, the market provides one of the best opportunities in business growth and expansion, as the consumer market is quite large compared to the rest of the neighbours. At the moment the Chinese luxury market consumes more than 15% of all the goods and services in the luxury segment, if the current double digit growth in the economy does not falter, there is going to be an even high boom in this segment of the consumers. At the helm of the success in this segment are factors such as travel, internet and marketing, where the companies maximize the effects that these factors have on the market penetration and retention (Phillips, pg. 156, 2012). What is most astounding is the fact that China is ranked at number 105 in the world and boasts an average per capita of about $3,800 US dollars, yet it can manage to be the world second, and pretty soon first, biggest luxurious commodities market. Looking into the history of the country, the luxurious consumption is...