Forbes.com China Tracker Blog has a blog post on the growing Luxury Market in China. According to the post, China is currently the fastest-growing and second-largest luxury goods market in the world, second only to Japan. It is expected to reach the number one spot by as early as 2015. In 2009 Chinese consumers purchased 27.5% of the world’s luxury goods at a total of 9.4 billion USD, in comparison to 2004 when their total was only 2 billion USD. Some great insights from the article:

On average Chinese Luxury Consumers are roughly 20 years younger than their counterparts in the U.S., Japan and other developed nations.

Not all luxury consumers in China actually have the salary to support such purchases

In general foreign luxury goods are preferred, with top purchases being automobiles, clothing, cosmetics, purses and watches.