Mooncake dealers in Vietnam offer discounts on COVID-caused bleak sales

Almost a week to go to the 2020 Mid-Autumn Festival, Vietnam’s mooncake market has not heated up, thus, mooncake dealers are offering discounts to stimulate consumption, Kinh Te & Do Thi reported.

As one of the biggest festives in Vietnam, this time of the year is usually a busy season of moon-cake business. However, unlike previous years, sales of mooncake are stagnant.

To encourage consumers to buy their products, well-known mooncake makers, including Huu Nghi, Hanoi, Kinh Do, have offered 10-15% discounts over the normal prices.

Supermarkets are also implementing promotions and discounts. The Vinmart supermarket chain is running the promotional program "Happy Mid-Autumn Festival with Vinmart" and reducing its prices from VND30,000-50,000 (US$1.29-2.14) on all Vinmart-brank mooncakes.

A representative of Dong Khanh mooncake shop on Nguyen Thai Hoc street said that the brand is offering a discount program of up to 50% for large purchases.

E-commerce channels such as Hotdeal.vn, Tiki, Sendo, Lazada are flooded with ads for moon cakes branded Kinh Do, Dong Khanh, Huu Nghi, Hanoi, Thu Huong with discounts from 10-30%.

Explaining why moon cake prices are falling, although the Mid-Autumn Festival is approaching, all traders pointed to one culprit: the COVID-19 pandemic. People's incomes have declined, so they only buy essentials and refrain from buying non-essential foods like mooncakes.

Thuy Ta JSC Director Hoang Minh Tho said companies present mooncakes to employees every year at the mid-autumn festival, but this year, things are not going well for many companies, so they cut the expense on mooncake.

“Last year, a company could order more than 200 boxes of mooncakes, but this year they have ordered a dozen to give to their customers and business partners. The number of customers has decreased while mooncakes are perishable, so traders have to cut prices to incentivize consumption," said Tho.