In recent years, with the continuous increase of young people's personalized consumption demand, the tide play blind box has become a new favorite of consumption. As the "first stock of the blind box" successfully listed Bubble Mart, it can be said that it has sat on the "top seat" in the current domestic tide play blind box market. However, with the rising popularity of the tide play blind box, this kind of goods with uncertainty in opening the box has also ushered in after-sales problems. Recently, a number of consumers said that it is not an easy task to want to bubble mart after-sales.
△ Tide play blind box is becoming a new consumer favorite of young people.
High after-sales threshold
"If you want to be successful after-sales, you have to shoot an unboxing video at the time of receipt, which is now an 'iron law'." Beijing consumer Xiao Shuang mentioned that after the sale of Bubble Mart, there is an endless "bitter water". "To be honest, I have to shoot the unbox video before I buy all the goods now, and I turn on the mobile phone recording function first when I receive the courier, which is a habit that Bubble Mart has developed for me."
China Business Daily reporter found the "details of after-sales rules" in the Bubble Mart WeChat Mini Program, which clearly mentioned in the fifth special commodity defect problem after-sales specification, "maintenance acceptance standard: the repaired goods are not artificially damaged, and need to provide an unpacking video, and the return of the goods must be accompanied by a note (indicating the details of the items sent back, name, address, purchase route, date of delivery, description of the defective parts)".
Although as of press time, Bubble Mart has not responded, Xiao Shuang told reporters that in fact, she can understand this rule of Bubble Mart, because of the special attributes of blind box goods, usually non-quality problems after opening the box are not returned or replaced. If you buy it online, it is difficult to confirm whether the blind box was sent by the package without an unboxing video, and there will be a case of replacing it with another model. "Someone put a lot of wool before this rule came out, exchanged some 'thunder models' for 'hot models', and sold them on the second-hand market to make money."
This has to mention why blind boxes are special commodities. Blind boxes usually refer to toy boxes that consumers cannot know in advance about the specific product style, with random attributes. Generally speaking, it is possible to select a specific style in an IP blind box series. Bubble Mart's "SKULLPANDA Night City" series, for example, has a total of 12 usual styles and a hidden model. When opening a new box, the probability of winning the regular "Enforcer" is 1/12, and the official probability of winning the hidden "Guardian of the Night" is 1/144. According to the official instructions of Bubble Mart, blind box goods are packed in a box of confidential packaging, and no one knows the style in the box before unpacking. But this is only an ideal probability, because the store will continue to add new bulk blind boxes to ensure that a series of large boxes on the countertop is always full, as well as loose boxes sold online, in fact, consumers often pay more energy and money in order to draw a certain favorite style.
△ Bubble Mart stores usually have a full box on the countertop of each series.
What's more, although the official price of all blind boxes in the same series is the same, the difference between different styles in the second-hand market is very obvious due to different player preferences. Taking the "SKULLPANDA Night City" series as an example, the official blind box is priced at 69 yuan, but on a second-hand idle commodity platform, the less popular "scroll transporter" is only sold for 28 yuan, while the popular "enforcer" needs 77 yuan. The series sells more than 20,000 units a month in the Tmall flagship store of Bubble Mart.
This special property also makes bubble mart's after-sales rules quite detailed. The reporter saw in the "details of after-sales rules" that in addition to the need to shoot a video of opening the box, Bubble Mart also listed detailed identification criteria for defects, such as "slight functional defects (part breakage / unstable standing)", "must be "standing but shaking, and the gap is ≥ 1mm", "appearance defects (scratches or scratches / surface dirt or oil stains)" must be "scratches / dirty oil stains that can be seen on the front≥ 1, scratch scratches that can be seen on the front≥ 3 or 2 dirty oil stains ≥" and so on.
△ Bubble Mart official after-sales rules. The picture is from the screenshot of the Bubble Mart WeChat Mini Program.
"Such a complex after-sales rule, if it is not a break or a special hard flaw like less accessories, I will not go after-sales." Xiao Shuang has become "Buddhist", "almost on the line".
It's not easy to exchange
However, even if it meets the various after-sales rules, it is not an easy task to exchange goods in Bubble Mart, and no stock has become a major reason why many consumers are refused to exchange goods.
On a social platform, many consumers have told their own experience of failing to exchange goods. Some consumers said that a certain blind box product purchased in the store on January 4 was defective, the accessories were broken, and they contacted the store to return to the factory for replacement at the scene, but they were told that they could not return to the factory in the store, and could only take the small program. Subsequently, he was told by customer service that there was no spare part to change to another style, but the other style that the consumer wanted did not have a spare product. "The store box machine has been on the goods, but there is no spare to replace the defective baby." The consumer said it was very incomprehensible.
After searching, the reporter found that the styles drawn by consumers who were refused to exchange goods with unprepared items were mostly popular styles or hidden models. Most consumers said that although they were refused to exchange goods on the grounds of lack of spares, often offline stores or online mini programs were still selling the series to which these styles belonged. "If there is really no stock, why is the same series still being sold normally?" Some consumers have posted questions on social platforms.
If the consumer can't wait for the stock, Bubble Mart customer service will usually indicate that it can provide a refund or the corresponding coupon. However, this after-sales policy, which is very common for conventional goods, is unacceptable to the consumers of Bubble Mart. The reason is that on the one hand, there is a difference between popular or hidden models in the second-hand market, and on the other hand, the emotion and money paid by consumers for the style they like.
"I don't accept it, I just want to smoke my own baby." Little Red Book user "Jam" in the bubble Mart online box pumping machine to the "Tiger Leap New Year Series" of the "Yingchun Nafu" style, but due to lack of stock delays in delivery. The customer service told her that she would not arrive again, asked her to refund or replace the other designated money, saying that "she can compensate her for a 69 yuan coupon" and "jam" said it was unacceptable. "I didn't just draw one and get it, so why let me refund it?" As long as the hot model is not available for refund, then you simply do not sell blind boxes. She wrote in the Little Red Book.
The "Yingchun Nafu" style mentioned in "Jam" belongs to the popular style in the "Tiger Leap New Year Series", which is priced at up to 188 yuan on a second-hand idle commodity platform, but the official price of the blind box of the series is only 69 yuan. In addition, "Jam" also smoked a lot of blind boxes of the same series in order to draw this style, so it was emotionally and financially unacceptable to this treatment result.
For the problem of no stock, Bubble Mart responded that the spare part is a spare product, and it is certainly not the same as the official sale. "This may not be well understood by everyone, because the official sales are blind boxes, do not know what it is, and the spare parts are clear which one." Its relevant staff said.
However, the reporter also noticed on the social platform that the same as the tide play blind box brand, consumers are more satisfied with the after-sales process of 52TOYS, some consumers said that after finding that the quality of the blind box doll had problems contacting customer service, they sent her a new doll on the same day, neither to open the box video, nor to break the doll.
In addition, many consumers said that the compensation scheme provided by the bubble Mart customer service does not have a unified standard, there are compensation 10 yuan coupons, there are also compensation 30 yuan coupons, and even for the same problem, the conventional customer service and customer service specialists provide the program is not consistent.
With the tide of playing blind boxes, various after-sales problems in the special form of blind box sales have also followed. On the black cat complaint platform, there are a total of 7516 complaints searching for "Bubble Mart", including but not limited to quality problems, courier problems, mechanism problems, etc. And this is not the problem of Bubble Mart's company. On the black cat complaint platform, there were more than 9,000 complaints with "blind box" as the keyword in 2021, involving multiple industries. How to sell blind box products after sale? Regulation remains to keep up.
Source | China Business Daily
Responsible Editor | Hong Yu