Tech Planet (WeChat ID: tech618)
Wen | Xi Rui
Cover source | Visual China
"As long as you resist pre-sales, we're friends."
Zhang Xin, a post-90s girl, quickly switched back and forth between Weibo, Xiaohongshu, and Douyin, copying this sentence in major comment areas. She firmly believes that as long as more people resist pre-sales, they can win.
From spot, to pre-sale for 7 days, to pre-sale for 15 days, Zhang Xin feels that as a consumer, he is spending money to find guilt, rather than "God". Finally, after encountering a 30-day or even 45-day super long pre-sale, Zhang Xin broke out. On the Little Red Book, there are millions of people who have the same idea as her, and everyone is suffering from pre-sales.
In order to buy off-the-shelf clothes, young people are no longer silent. They spontaneously formed a boycott, hoping to change the pre-sale routine and no longer be a "scapegoat" for merchants to pass on risks. #Super Long Pre-sale # Related content has been read over 100 million hot searches on Weibo, and 5 million reads on the Little Red Book, and this year's young people are trying to express their dissatisfaction.
However, in the face of consumer criticism, some merchants do not feel that they are big shop bullies, but weak people in the clothing industry chain. "Now who dares to enter the spot, one set after another." Merchants also want to sell spot, and the pre-sale return rate is extremely high," a clothing anchor told Tech Planet.
In their eyes, pre-sales are the safest way to resist the risks of the industry's general environment. Since the epidemic, the entire apparel industry has faced great uncertainty. To survive, merchants have to adopt an asset-light operation model.
In this way, the contradiction between merchants' risk resistance and consumers' pursuit of experience seems to be indelible. However, the choice to open the pre-sale is ultimately in the hands of the merchants, and the merchants who choose the ultra-long pre-sale must not pass on the inventory backlog risk in order to maximize their own interests?
"Rise up against" the pre-sale of consumers
The arrival of spring did not make Zhang Xin feel happy, but fell into anxiety. Arrange a spring trip early, but the spring clothes you bought haven't arrived yet. The number of times she opened Taobao and Douyin increased significantly, in order to see if the clothes she bought last month had not been shipped, and 30 days had not been shipped.
Zhang Xin, who was suffocating, opened the Little Red Book and planned to send notes as fast as he could. At this time, she found that the discussion topic of "hating pre-sale" on the Little Red Book has been viewed by more than five million views. She is not the only one, it turns out that everyone is plagued by the long pre-sale mechanism of clothing.
There is no initiator, no fuse, but a counterattack against the "super long pre-sale" has quietly broken out on major social platforms.
Zhang Xin liked all the notes on the Little Red Book that resisted pre-sale, increasing the heat of the topic. "I just want everyone to pay attention to this matter, and the platform can come out to rectify it," Zhang Xin told Tech Planet.
In March, bloggers with millions and tens of millions of fans became the main force in the wave of boycotts, and beauty blogger Wen Xianniang on Douyin, Ran Gaoming, who is famous for "Strange Story", has spoken out for pre-sales. "Finally there are big bloggers to speak out, our feedback is not as useful as yours", the addition of KOLs has given ordinary consumers hope.
On March 14, the day before "315", Xinhua News Agency released a video on Weibo and other platforms to "reveal the super long pre-sale of internet celebrity clothing stores". Seeing the addition of the "national team", Zhang Xin felt that the previous brush screen was not in vain, and consumers were no longer alone.
It has also been proven that their efforts have been echoed. On Pinduoduo, pre-sales exceed 7 days, and products are not displayed on the platform first. Previously, Douyin and Taobao also had temporary rules, and pre-sold goods were not displayed first.
In fact, the pre-sale system has always existed. Previously, it was more used in niche clothing such as JK uniforms and Hanfu, or categories that require special fabrics such as cashmere coats, or high-end custom clothing.
Zhang Yuan, the owner of the clothing factory, told Tech Planet that the pre-sale itself is no problem, and the problem is that it is abused by some merchants. "Before, pre-sales were done to create gimmicks, and some were for test versions, which were all possible."
Consumers are also averse to pre-sales because they have become the norm. "None of the current online celebrity stores are not pre-sold," Zhang Xin told Tech Planet. On Douyin, even a solid color sweatshirt that is not more than 100 yuan needs a pre-sale period, and having a spot has become a luxury.
But in the face of those exquisite seller show pictures, consumers have chosen to accept the change from spot to pre-sale, in exchange for a longer and longer pre-sale period.
"Merchants pre-sell a few days, I can wait", Zhang Xin told Tech Planet, but in the spit video on Douyin, "7 days, 15 days I can accept", has also become a common line of everyone, and the pre-sale period of some Internet celebrity stores has become a month or even 45 days.
Finally, consumers stopped acquiescing to the so-called rules and "rose up against it."
Merchants who are afraid of backlogging inventory
In addition to generating voice, customer service has become a channel for consumers to express their dissatisfaction and talk to merchants. "Pre-sold clothes, fans can urge several times a day", Douyin anchor Li Han helplessly told Tech Planet, "fans have no channels, can only find customer service feedback complaints." ”
The reassurance of customer service does not solve the problem, and after the complaint is fruitless, consumers often rely on returns to express their position. Li Han told Tech Planet that the return rate of pre-sale clothing is much higher than that of spot, and the return rate of clothes with a pre-sale period of more than 15 days can even reach 90%.
But even if the return rate remains high and the customer service workload doubles, merchants will still choose pre-sale. Compared with the complaints of consumers, merchants are more afraid of the risk of really dragging down their inventory backlog.
Clothing has become a big category in live e-commerce, especially on Douyin and Kuaishou. Both factories and merchants believe that live streaming is a natural channel for selling clothing.
But with the intensification of competition, as well as the characteristics of live broadcasting itself, merchants need to rely on rapid new and daily broadcasting to attract fans and maintain traffic. This means that merchants have to put on at least dozens of new styles every week, each of which has at least three sizes. If you continue to use the spot form, the inventory pressure of merchants is much greater than in the traditional e-commerce era.
In the clothing market, it only takes 15 days or less for a piece of clothing to go on the market to become a tail cargo. Li Han told Tech Planet that a piece of clothing that costs about 150 yuan is only worth 30 to 40 yuan when it becomes a tail cargo clearance. In a live broadcast for several hours, neither the merchant nor the anchor can accurately estimate sales. Under great uncertainty, pre-sale has become the safest choice for merchants.
Zhang Yuan, the owner of a garment factory in Tongxiang, Zhejiang Province, told Tech Planet that whether it is with the head or the middle and tail merchants, they all take the form of partial spot + pre-sale.
Zhang Yuan explained that the general big anchors reserve 30% of the spot before the new, and then let the factory reserve 30% of the raw materials, and the other 40% need to maneuver the production cycle. "The head anchor can sell tens of thousands of orders in a live broadcast, in fact, it exceeds the supply capacity of many factories, disrupting the entire supply cycle, and the production really takes a month."
For small and medium-sized anchors without strength, the cooperation of factories will also decline. In the case of a small number of orders, they also need to respond quickly through the form of pre-sale.
In Zhang Yuan's view, from the perspective of the production end, the pre-sale period of 7-15 days is a healthy state, but more than 15 days is indeed an abuse of the pre-sale system. Li Han also said that the essence of the ultra-long pre-sale is still a problem of funds, "there is no strength, and I do not want to invest too much in the early stage, and the platform's payment cycle is in 45 days." ”
In addition, merchants with a pre-sale period of more than 15 days are also in order to further reduce the return rate and transfer the risk.
Li Han told Tech Planet that the average return rate in the apparel industry has reached 50%. "Many consumers will buy back a dress of color and different sizes, and finally only leave one piece, other returns", and for the sake of store rating, even if the goods are received for more than 7 days, the merchant will refund without reason.
After setting up a long pre-sale, merchants can not only control the amount of orders according to the data, but also use the time window to return the goods for secondary sales, minimizing inventory.
Not only businesses, but also garment factories have become cautious after the epidemic. "The economy has not been good in the past two years, many factories will not have so much stock, and suppliers cannot supply only one brand, especially some good goods." Zhang Yuan told Tech Planet, "So we will take the initiative to tell the anchor to directly put 15 days of pre-sale." ”
"In fact, it is good to sell as much as you have in the spot," Zhang Yuan said. But in the face of the opportunity that live broadcasting may bring about overnight wealth, no one wants to miss it.
Factories are forcing themselves to move towards a "fast fashion" model
In the view of some merchants, pre-sales have no loss to consumers. "Now there is freight insurance, and there is no reason to return it." The pre-sale is also informed in advance, and you can not buy it if you are not willing to wait. We bear the impact of returns. ”
In their eyes, pre-sales are just a way to fight against the platform, but they ignore the shopping experience of the most important consumers, and also attract young people to eat it back.
Now, in order to overtake the traditional e-commerce platform in the corner, Douyin and Kuaishou have become more stringent in their review of merchants, hoping to improve the consumer experience. They will deduct points for merchants who do not ship on time within 48 hours.
"Sometimes even if there is a spot, it will be pre-sold", some merchants told Tech Planet without any obscurity, "because there may be problems at any time now, you ship in advance, and consumers are still surprised." ”
But consumers have no tolerance for long pre-sales. More and more people are beginning to call for a return to offline, hoping to rely on consumption choices to regain the right to speak and resist e-commerce merchants.
However, for merchants, consumer resistance is still painless. They also don't worry about the loss of users.
"Online and offline are now actually two different groups of people," Zhang Yuan said. Offline physical stores now carry more experience and quality, while online is iterative and cost-effective. "The premium of offline clothing is at least 3-4 times," Li Han also told Tech Planet, "merchants and consumers are actually two-way screening." ”
Clothing is already a "seasonal throw" for young women, and although offline needs to wait, other conditions can be met. "If the pre-sale time can be controlled within 15 days, it is still acceptable," Zhang Xin told Tech Planet.
Now, "hate super long pre-sale" has become an "absolute" correctness, and even becomes a new traffic password on Douyin. Some influencers began to rub traffic rather than participate in and improve the consumer experience. When new topics emerge, the topic of ultra-long pre-sales will also be drowned out.
But in the form of live broadcasting, the pre-sale may always exist for a short time. For the production side, the new form of live broadcasting will make the supply chain have to start to fight for rapid response capabilities.
"It turns out that people say that the fast-fashion two-week fast counter-cycle of Zara can now be shortened to 3-7 days," Zhang Yuan told Tech Planet, "similar to the currency of T-shirts, more than 500 pieces can be delivered in three days." ”
In Hangzhou, Guangzhou and other areas where the garment industry belt is concentrated, there are more and more factories that are trained by live broadcasting. In the live broadcast room, the entire clothing chain entered a "fast cycle" that had never been done before: the live broadcast room was constantly new every day, consumers impulsively placed orders, the factory rushed to work, and the next quarter continued to chase new models.
In a fast-paced environment, cost-effectiveness becomes the first choice, and quality is not the first priority. Zhang Yuan also admitted that in the fast return mode, the quality inspection requirements of clothes will also be relatively lower. "Everyone fights for speed and pursues speed, and clothes will definitely be different from physical stores."
In order to keep up with the changing pace of the entire sales channel today, factories have also had to adapt and make themselves more powerful. "If you want to cooperate with big anchors, you need stable financial capabilities," Zhang Yuan told Tech Planet.
Even if Zhang Yuan's factory already has strong research and development capabilities and stable cooperation with the head anchor, he is not optimistic that the factory has now entered the stage of rapid response, "the speed brings the ultimate compression, only suitable for currency, complex, high-grade clothes are impossible to produce in this mode."
In his view, the supply chain needs to have a process of precipitation, coupled with gradual compliance, the entire clothing chain can enter a virtuous circle. At that time, the ultra-long pre-sale will naturally not appear.
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