India wins. China is now overtaken as the second-largest market for Samsonite in the most recent year.

 Samsonite, the world’s biggest luggage maker, said India has outpaced China as its second-largest market in the last calendar year, helped by a travel and wedding boom while the neighbouring country’s business declined due to restrictions.

Many countries across the world eased their travel restrictions more than a year ago, fuelling a rapid recovery. However, after three years of lockdowns, closed borders and mandatory quarantine, China eased its zero-Covid policy just two weeks ago.

“As a country, we have managed Covid better and in our case, travel habits have changed drastically unlike other markets. Most people in the middle to high income group have more than doubled their holidays in a year, helping our brands,” said Jai Krishnan, CEO, Samsonite India.”We have expanded more than 40% compared with 2019, which was our best year, indicating the kind of growth we have seen last year. We are now bigger than China and will continue to be even in 2023.”