after pinduoduo covered the logistics transfer fees in remote areas, a young man in tibet hoped that hainan coconuts would be delivered to his home for free
2024-09-24
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tuiwa village in langkazi county, shannan city, tibet, is 5,070 meters above sea level, bordering bhutan. the oxygen content is about half of that at sea level, making it the highest village in the world. it has the most beautiful public toilet in the world, but the villagers have very little contact with the outside world and could only make a living by animal husbandry in the past.
after graduating from tibet university, wangdui returned to his hometown, tuiwa village. he was determined to change the source of income for his fellow villagers, opened the first homestay in the village, and welcomed the first batch of guests from outside. in order to promote his hometown, he also went to lhasa to post flyers. now, it is tourists from all over the world that have made this high-altitude mountain village popular. under wangdui's leadership, many people in the village opened homestays and even restaurants to earn more money.
however, tuiwa village is at a high altitude, and the summer nights during the peak tourist season can also make people feel cold. in the easily overlooked corners, electric blankets, kettles, and even military coats are prepared to bring warmth to tourists, as well as decorations in the homestay, all of which are carefully selected by wangdui on pinduoduo. he said that only pinduoduo can mail to the towns and villages of langkazi county, with affordable prices and guaranteed quality.
on september 9, pinduoduo announced the "10 billion yuan reduction" plan, which means that all logistics transfer fees incurred by merchants when delivering goods in remote areas such as xinjiang, tibet, gansu, ningxia, and inner mongolia will be borne by the platform. this is the first time in the industry that it aims to further dilute the logistics costs of goods going to the countryside and villages, and promote more high-quality goods to be directly connected to remote areas.
after seeing this news, wangdui realized that the platform's guarantee for logistics transfer fees means that the cost of shipping to remote areas will be reduced. in the future, more businesses will relax restrictions on free shipping to remote areas such as tibet, and he can choose more good things to buy for his homestay and provide tourists with a more comfortable living environment.
it's not just wangdui. there are people like wangdui who live in remote areas. they are scattered all over the country. after placing an order on pinduoduo, they begin to look forward to the joy of receiving the package that has traveled thousands of miles. the express delivery trucks running on the gobi desert, grasslands, and across mountains and rivers carry the yearning of people in remote areas for a refined life, and are constantly narrowing the gap with the life experience in inland cities.
tuiwa village is the highest village in the world. pinduoduo's new logistics policy has given villagers new hope for their "vegetable basket". photo by cheng yihui
"xiyouji" one yuan express delivery fee will become a reality
in order to deliver "more benefits" and "better services" to remote areas such as xinjiang, tibet, gansu, ningxia, and inner mongolia, e-commerce platforms represented by pinduoduo seized the pain point of "expensive travel fees" and launched a series of measures to help businesses and benefit the people. in 2022, pinduoduo pioneered the transit and collection mode of free shipping, guiding merchants to send packages from xinjiang consumers to the transit and collection warehouse in xi'an, and the platform then uniformly shipped them to xinjiang through third-party logistics service operators. this transit and collection mode can significantly reduce logistics costs and was soon replicated in tibet and other regions.
for example, in the past, merchants had to negotiate prices with express delivery companies under the direct delivery method. the current first-weight cost generally starts at 15 yuan, and if it is cold chain air transportation, the first-weight cost is as high as 20-30 yuan. however, under the consolidated transportation model, merchants usually only need to bear the freight from the place of shipment to the consolidated transportation warehouse and the second-stage freight of 3-5 yuan per order.
recently, pinduoduo has once again reduced fees and burdens for merchants. on september 9, pinduoduo once again announced that it would cover the logistics transit fees in remote areas and exempt merchants from the second shipment fee from the transit warehouse to the destination. in other words, merchants only need to bear the express delivery fee from the place of shipment to the collection warehouse. some merchants said that the express delivery fee to remote areas may soon be only 1 yuan.
pinduoduo has implemented a policy that all logistics transfer fees in remote areas are borne by the platform, which has solved the problem that e-commerce has been difficult to promote in remote rural areas in the central and western regions due to high costs for many years. "a senior logistics expert analyzed that the platform promotes the extension of downstream express logistics in remote areas through subsidy coordination, and promotes remote rural areas to better integrate into the domestic consumption cycle. "subsidies are not just money subsidies, but by reducing logistics costs, a sustainable industry chain win-win ecology including e-commerce merchants, express logistics and consumers has been built, which has played a leading and exemplary role in the entire industry and is worth learning from and promoting."
the number of express parcels sent to xinjiang has increased rapidly in recent years. photo by liu zhou
make hainan coconut water more accessible to remote areas
thanks to pinduoduo's guarantee of logistics transit fees, consumer tashi dondrub and his family in lhasa, tibet, are enjoying a better life.
tashi dondrub is 33 years old and comes from a small village in shannan city, tibet. he now lives in lhasa with his wife and has two lovely sons. after the logistics transit fee reduction, tashi dondrub can also shop at pinduoduo as he pleases.
his wife likes exquisite and beautiful kitchenware, especially those porcelains with beautiful patterns and transparent glass products. porcelain and glass are very fragile, so his wife bought a lot of them on pinduoduo. she bought different styles of bowls and plates, glass containers and various tea cups. after a long journey, they arrived in lhasa intact. these kitchenware really satisfied a young wife's imagination of a beautiful family life.
tashi donzhu also buys various toys for his children and places orders on pinduoduo. they even ordered a small home ktv speaker so that they can sing karaoke with their family in their spare time. when a friend is getting married, tashi donzhu buys wedding candies for his friend on pinduoduo as souvenirs.
after the reduction of transit fees, some fruit merchants have been considering the feasibility of opening up markets in remote areas, first of all, those fruits with hard skin and easier storage. tibet is at a high altitude, which is not suitable for fruit growth and the price is relatively high. tashi donzhu also tried to buy fruits on pinduoduo, such as soft-seeded pomegranates from huili, sichuan. now, he can also taste the taste of coconuts picked from hainan, the southernmost part of the motherland.
in addition to reducing the express transit fees, pinduoduo has made a lot of efforts to help remote areas deliver express delivery to villages. take xinjiang as an example. urumqi is 1,775 kilometers away from the farthest county, which is farther than the distance from beijing to shanghai. due to the scattered layout of villages and high delivery costs, express parcels were always stuck in counties and towns in the past, and the "last leg" often took the longest time.
in 2022, pinduoduo realized free shipping in xinjiang. in july 2023, pinduoduo, together with a third-party logistics service operator, took the lead in piloting express delivery services in villages in shache county, kashgar prefecture, shortening the distance between the terminal distribution outlets and consumers from dozens of kilometers to a few kilometers, and shortening the signing time from a few days to within 24 hours. two months later, this service went beyond shache county and was promoted throughout xinjiang; as of mid-october last year, it had achieved coverage of 60 counties in xinjiang.
data released by the state post bureau showed that in 2023, xinjiang's express delivery business volume (excluding postal parcel business) totaled 305 million pieces, and the total express delivery business revenue reached 6.2 billion yuan, an increase of 88.1% and 77.9% year-on-year respectively. both growth rates ranked first in the country.
the enthusiasm for online shopping in remote areas has become a great attraction for merchants on the pinduoduo platform. chu orange is one of them. chu orange is produced in ailao mountain in yuxi city, yunnan province. in the past, due to high tolls and cost issues, chu orange did not include remote areas in the market. after seeing that pinduoduo covered the transit fee, the person in charge of pinduoduo chu orange flagship store said: "we are considering opening up remote areas. since it is fresh fruit and it is winter, it may be open to provincial capitals or autonomous region capitals in remote areas." in another month, it will be the harvest season for chu orange. by then, people in tibet and xinjiang will also be able to eat such sweet fruits from yunnan province.
the participation of these innovative forces is exactly what e-commerce platforms hope to see. "in the past nine years, we have allowed more and more agricultural products from remote mountainous areas to go nationwide, and we have also been committed to allowing consumers in remote areas to easily obtain a wide range of product choices like urban users, and share the dividends of high-quality development of e-commerce platforms." a relevant person in charge of pinduoduo said, "whether going out of the mountains or into the villages, high logistics costs have always been a pain point in the industry, and addressing this pain point directly is to leverage more merchants in the ecosystem to join the market and consumption revitalization in remote areas, increase commodity circulation, and stimulate market vitality."
