Associates, customers and members in China welcome a new year.
When Hongtao Li joined Walmart more than six years ago, he kicked off a Lunar New Year tradition for associates and customers at Store 2499 in Honghe, Yunnan Province, China. His idea was to share his calligraphy skills to foster more connection with the community. Next thing he knew, it turned into an annual ritual.
“Every year as the Lunar New Year approaches, customers gather around Hongtao’s writing table in the store, waiting for his calligraphy work,” says Irene Lee, senior communications manager. “Over the years, he has gifted customers around 300 sets of Spring Festival couplets.”
The poetic verses are placed in homes to bring good luck and prosperity for Spring Festival, also called Lunar New Year or Chinese New Year. It’s one of many ways associates and customers are ushering in a new year in China.
新年快樂 – Happy New Year!
Lunar New Year marks the beginning of a year on the lunar calendar and is the most important festival in China. It’s steeped in many ancient traditions like feasting with family, exchanging gifts and decorating homes with spring couplets like Hongtao’s.
Traditional gifts range from snacks — assorted nuts, dried seafood and mushrooms — to red envelopes with money for children to bring luck and blessings. Walmart and Sam’s Club associates in China have worked to add new spins on traditional gifts, like puzzles with Spring Festival designs, pet toys in gift boxes decorated with blessings of prosperity and health, and “gold bars” in red packets for kids.
One of the most prominent traditions of Lunar New Year is the reunion dinner. This gathering brings families together to close out the previous year and welcome the new one while enjoying a feast featuring dishes that symbolize prosperity and unity.
It’s a tradition associates also share with their Walmart and Sam’s Club families. On the eve of the 2024 Lunar New Year, Deputy General Managers Bing Xiao and Kai Chen, and HR Manager Mei Pan of Store 2355 in Honghe, cooked an elaborate feast for over 40 associates, including boiled shrimp, stir fried vegetables, sautéed sliced pork with garlic sprouts and traditional fish and dumplings.
Traditional treats
Chinese cuisine is quite diverse, but poultry, meat and fish are festival staples.
Fotiaoqiang, for example, is an elaborate soup made with ingredients like abalone, sea cucumber, fish maw, dried mushrooms and scallops, chicken, ginseng and more. There are many variations of this dish with some recipes calling for up to 30 ingredients. But the effort is worth it. This soup is said to be so deliciously tempting that even a (famously vegetarian) Buddhist monk would hop over a monastery wall to try it, earning it another name: Buddha Jumps Over the Wall Soup.
Sweet rice balls — a hot dessert that comes in various flavors like black sesame and peanut — are also a Lantern Festival must as they symbolize the reunion of families and the hope for a bright future.
New year, new flavors
Western and less-traditional flavors are also showing up on Lunar New Year menus, and associates at Walmart China are helping customers celebrate with tastes from around the globe.
New selections like USDA Choice beef steak, lobster stew, Mediterranean-style baked cod, 90+ points Bordeaux wines and more have hit shelves across China this year. Associates have also worked to create a one-stop-shop solution where all the necessary sides, sauces and seasonings are included for family feasts, saving time and money, so that customers and members can focus on the joy of the holiday and spend less time having to shop for it.
Until next year
The Lantern Festival takes place on the 15th day of the first lunar month and marks the close of Lunar New Year festivities. Celebrants will light paper lanterns and solve the riddles written on them. See if you can guess the answers to some of these lantern riddles:
So, whether you’re keeping the festive spirit alive in the community like Hongtao or planning a reunion dinner with family and friends, we wish all associates near and far a prosperous and happy New Year!
