UPDATE: Double 11 spending this year hit a record-breaking $10 billion just 14 hours into the one-day shopping bonanza, according to the BBC. It only took 8 minutes for spending to cross the $1 billion mark, Alibaba, the e-commerce giant behind the promotion, reported. This story was originally published on November 10, 2015.Lizzy Zheng is making a list and checking it twice. She's been waiting for this big sale a whole year.The 30-year-old oil-trading employee hopes to score a microwave oven, facial toner, and — if she is really lucky — a set of plane tickets to Japan, all on the cheap.Zheng isn't prepping for Black Friday or Cyber Monday, the season's two major shopping days in North America. Thousands of miles away, in China, a similar retail hurricane sweeps that nation at an even mightier force, weeks before the pre-shopping-blitz turkeys hit tables across the U.S. And it happens almost entirely online."Two years ago, I'd stay up past 1 a.m. in hopes of snatching great deals, since the sites always crash when the clock strikes midnight," Zheng said. "Thankfully, many e-retailers are offering pre-order options now."Commonly known as "Double 11," this gargantuan online shopping event falls on November 11 each year. Revenue in 2013 reached $8 billion — more than Black Friday and Cyber Monday in the U.S. combined, according to Boston Consulting Group figures quoted by CNN Money.

Unlike Black Friday, which has been a post-Thanksgiving tradition for U.S. shoppers for decades, China's massive shopping holiday has been around for only six years. And its origins might surprise you."It's gotten so overwhelming," said Angela Sun, who works with Zheng. "As an unmarried woman, I've completely forgotten that this whole spectacle was created for single people in the first place."