sam's club's own products are "on the list" and purchasing by e-commerce platform member stores has become an industry chain
2024-09-13
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original title: sam's own products "top the list" of e-commerce platforms (lead)
purchasing on behalf of members’ stores has become an industry chain (theme)
beijing daily reporter yuan lu
pay 260 yuan a year for membership at sam's club, only to find the same product on an e-commerce platform? recently, there has been a "sam's club fever" on pinduoduo, with many buyers joining in group buying. some star products have entered the best-selling list and are even sold at a lower price.
where do these sam's products come from? the reporter found that not only pinduoduo, but also taobao and xiaohongshu had popular sam's products for sale before.
on the one hand, there is the extremely restrained online layout of membership stores, and on the other hand, there is the strong consumption demand of young people. between the two ends, purchasing agents have formed a mature industrial chain, and many risks have also emerged.
sam's club products top the e-commerce best-seller list
"i drove half an hour to sam's club to buy soda crackers, but pinduoduo not only has the same ones, but they are even cheaper!" looking at the price displayed on her phone, ms. hu was surprised and a little annoyed: "i just paid 260 yuan for membership fees to buy these snacks. isn't it a waste of money?"
on september 11, the reporter searched for "sam's club" on pinduoduo and saw a black-background page for a special brand zone. the page showed 121 related products with a total sales volume of 3.17 million pieces. many of them are sam's star products, such as roasted nuts, selected pecan kernels, black truffle ham soda crackers, etc. users can place orders directly with free shipping. two of sam's wines even made it to the top ten of the platform's "original bottle imported wine bestseller list".
the reporter found that on the e-commerce platform, the prices of as many as 27 products were lower than the membership price of sam's club stores. for example, the store membership price of 250 grams of donkey-hide gelatin is 298 yuan, while the platform price is 259 yuan, which is 13% cheaper; the store membership price of 750 ml of marlborough sauvignon blanc dry white wine is 66.9 yuan, while the platform price is 57.9 yuan, which is 13.4% cheaper.
in addition to pinduoduo, sam's own products have also become hot-selling products on taobao. on the evening of the 11th, the reporter saw on taobao that many sam's products were labeled as "hot-selling products". 1.5 kg sea salt soda crackers showed that they were hot-selling on the entire network, and 1 kg cheese sandwich crackers showed that they were hot-selling on the entire network, and more than 100,000 pieces. the same sam's products are also sold on platforms such as douyin and xiaohongshu.
most e-commerce products are purchased on behalf of others and resold
where do these sam's club products, which are often cheaper than the store membership price, come from? on the pinduoduo platform, the reporter contacted the customer service of various sam's club products. some of them were redirected to the platform's "brand goods" customer service, who said that these products were all genuine and purchased in a formal manner; the other part was redirected to different food specialty stores, such as a black gold cheese cracker from the "jiayue food specialty store", where the customer service said that all products in the store were directly purchased by sam's club.
it is worth noting that the presence of sam's club products in pinduoduo's "brand goods" column does not necessarily mean that the two have official cooperation. an industry insider told reporters that the platform has launched a "brand goods" special area for some branded products. merchants can be selected into the special area after strict screening by the platform, and the products have brand protection.
the reporter learned that at present, sam's e-commerce business covers multiple channels, including the "extreme speed delivery" of the fastest one hour, city-wide delivery and national delivery on the sam's app and sam's mini program. members can also place orders through the jd sam's club official flagship store and jd daojia sam's club. the customer service of sam's club told the reporter that other channels are unofficial platforms, and users are advised to place orders from the app. the customer service also only provides after-sales service for products purchased from the official platform.
"at present, these sam's products that are popular on major e-commerce platforms are actually not officially operated by sam's club. they are resold by sam's purchasing agents." several industry insiders revealed to reporters that the main target groups of sam's purchasing agents are consumers in third- and fourth-tier cities. "there are no sam's offline stores in the local area, but young people have a strong demand for purchasing, so purchasing agents came into being."
purchasing on behalf of others to earn the difference has become an industry chain
during the investigation, the reporter found that compared with the individual sporadic purchasing and unpacking and selling in the early years, the current sam's purchasing has formed a complete industrial chain. professional merchants take advantage of the price differences of sam's own products in different regions, the asymmetric commodity information and the consumers' "internet celebrity" shopping needs to open up a diversified cash-out path.
"making a profit from the price difference" is the most basic way for member stores to make money. take taobao as an example. a 1kg beef-filled crispy biscuit, which has an offline store member price of 59.9 yuan, is sold by many purchasing agents at around 65 yuan, and some even sell it for 155.9 yuan.
compared with "raising prices", the more popular thing now is the purchasing agent who is cheaper than the offline store membership price. why are merchants willing to "lose money to gain publicity"? an industry insider told reporters that sam's club's excellent members can enjoy a 2% rebate on points, which can be exchanged for coupons. "some 'big purchasing agent' teams have dozens of membership cards on hand. if the monthly shopping amount is 1 million yuan, after opening the cards, the rebate coupons will be 50,000 yuan. in addition, they regularly grab special products at 40% to 50% off and sell them at the original price. these profits are enough to subsidize the price of some products."
it is very tempting for consumers to buy membership products without buying membership cards, but disputes often arise from the merchant's credit, product quality, after-sales returns, etc. the reporter noticed that the purchasing agents on major e-commerce platforms are mixed, and consumers are complaining about the goods not being what they said and the authenticity being questionable.
"from the current transaction process of purchasing agents, the legal relationship is relatively complicated." chen yinjiang, deputy secretary-general of the consumer rights protection law research institute of the chinese law society, said that this is not a contractual relationship between consumers and merchants to purchase, but a consumer contract relationship between purchasing agents and merchants. once a problem occurs, consumer rights protection will increase the procedural trouble. he suggested that consumers should be cautious about products with excessive discounts, unless consumers are fully confident about the merchant placing the order and the quality of the product they are purchasing.
source: beijing daily
