As sales grew, Alibaba became a trove of somewhat puzzling statistics: Within the first hour, enough brassieres were sold to “form a pile taller, and arguably more alluring, than three Mt. Everests” (presumably stacked one on top of the other); the two million pieces of underwear sold in the first hour would stretch for 1,864 miles “if laid end to end.”

The percentage of single people of “marriageable age” has risen sharply in China in recent years, and while bra sales were high, the number of singles is disproportionately skewed towards men, thanks to the a historical preference for male babies. Today’s shopping holiday is also called “Guanggun Jie,”  or bare branches, a term for the estimated 50 to 60 million unmarried, “excess men” in China who may never find mates.

Maybe it’s not surprising that the best-selling items were those that guaranteed they’d be a little less lonely.

By midday in China on Double 11, fast-growing phone manufacturer Xiaomi’s online store was the top-selling retailer, Alibaba said, and the top four products sold were all made by Xiaomi. In just the opening three minutes of the Nov. 11 sale, Xiaomi sold 110,000 of its new Mi 3 phones and another 330,000 of its Hongmi phone, for a transaction value of about 178 million yuan ($2.9 million).

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