Image source @ Visual China
Wen | Yuan Guobao
To find out how important e-commerce logistics really is, ask Shanghainese who are stuck at home and can't move.
Recently, a screenshot of the income of riders in SF city showed that on April 9 alone, its income reached 10,067.75 yuan. After the surprise, the reason is also understandable: the rider completed 60 same-city orders, and his income included a basic commission of 434 yuan, various special rewards of about 1678 yuan, and a user tip of about 7856 yuan.
The high income is unimaginably the reason for the envy of the riders in the same city, but behind them, it is the decline in profits brought about by the industry's internal rolls and the poor business advancement.
Not long ago, major Internet companies released financial reports, of which the collective loss of their distribution business became the most significant feature. The e-commerce logistics track, like a high-speed racing car that loses its brakes, will have nothing to jump out of, and anyone involved in it can only pray: they are the lucky ones who hit the line first.
E-commerce has entered a zero-sum game, and logistics giants also have traffic anxiety
As we all know, e-commerce and logistics have always been a companion relationship.
From the perspective of time, since 2007, when e-commerce entered the golden age, the road traveled by e-commerce logistics is roughly divided into three stages.
From 2007 to 2012, the demand side of the industry developed rapidly, the business volume CAGR reached 36% in 2007-12, and the proportion of e-commerce parts in 2012 exceeded 50%, and the track players began to tap the market, and the industry pattern began to appear. From 2013 to 2018, the great leap forward of e-commerce, the continuous entry of small and medium-sized enterprises in the logistics track, intensified competition, industry investment and financing abound, and the Tongda Department backed by e-commerce giants has completed listing during this period. Since 2019, a bloody price war has been set off in the track, the number of cases of players with insufficient strength being integrated has increased significantly, the Internet dividend has peaked, and the logistics industry is facing new formats.
It can be said that e-commerce and logistics have always been in a relationship of mutual achievement. According to statistics, the scale of online retail in the mainland has broken through the 10 trillion mark from less than 0.5 trillion yuan in 2010 to 2020, accompanied by a blowout in the express delivery business.
In 2010, the express delivery business volume was only 2.3 billion pieces, and in the decade that e-commerce subsequently penetrated people's lives, the express delivery business volume increased at an average annual rate of more than 30%.
Moreover, the proportion of e-commerce parts in the express delivery business has increased year by year, and after entering 2020, the proportion has reached 80%. That is to say, with the continuous expansion of the proportion of the e-commerce logistics market, any track player who does not have enough say in this field may face the danger of kicking out.
Based on the different degrees of dependence of e-commerce logistics on traffic, the playing style of track players is actually different.
According to the data, the total market share of Tee Yida and SF in the past five years has risen from 57.58% to 72.81%, while SF's market share of e-commerce parts in the past two years is less than 10%.
From this point of view, we may be able to understand why giants like SF began to plan self-built e-commerce as early as ten years ago, and from the platform to group purchase to unmanned retail, as long as it is a traffic outlet, SF is almost absent, has its own brand, but helplessly, after spending a lot of manpower and financial resources and time, there are only a few influential brands.
In 2021, Pinduoduo Express parcels generated 19.7 billion orders, and in the same year, Jitu Express Southeast Asia received and dispatched about 700 million parcels, which is only equivalent to 3.55% of Pinduoduo's parcel volume. After cooperating with Pinduoduo and others, the number of daily tickets of Jitu Express has increased by leaps and bounds, according to the statistics of relevant domestic media, in late September 2021, the total number of daily tickets of Jitu Express has reached 10 million.
Comparing the two, it can be seen that when the Internet enters the stock market, the vibration generated after the traffic anxiety is transmitted to the logistics giants in the downstream links is equally violent.
So, in this situation of lips and teeth, in what way will the head players of the track meet the new market pattern?
Price war bloody rain, big but not down to become the consensus of e-commerce logistics?
From the perspective of the development of e-commerce express delivery, customer price sensitivity has always been a very significant feature of the industry. And the players in the track are also making a big fuss about this angle, but the price fluctuates in the rational range, the giants still have a surplus, and once they sacrifice seven wounded fists for the purpose of market share grabs, then the price war of the vitality is not avoided.
For a long time, low-price customer acquisition is the most common market competition method in the express delivery industry, and for a long time, it has also formed a pattern of major power players who can tolerate each other's existence.
However, this balanced pattern has spiraled out of control with the latest round of market competition among giants. In May 2019, SF launched a new product of "special offer" for the e-commerce market and customers, which directly reduced the price of a single ticket from the previous range of 15 yuan to 20 yuan to 4-5 yuan.
Relying on the price exploration offensive launched first, SF's performance that year was gratifying: from January to April 2019, the company's business volume fell to a growth rate of 7%, and after the launch of special products, the growth rate of the month rose to 10%, the growth rate reached 33% in August, the growth rate in October was 45%, and from January to May of the following year, the cumulative growth rate of SF was as high as 80.7%.
In the face of SF's aggressive momentum in the field of e-commerce parts, it is logical that the Tongda Department will fight in order to defend the basic disk.
However, the price of a single ticket is the industry's low level of access to the market, can only continue to choose to cut meat.
According to a Tongda department outlet owner, a few years ago, the highest basic dispatch fee reached 2.2 yuan per ticket, but since the beginning of the price war, it has directly dropped to 1.05 yuan per ticket, and then given 7 cents to the salesman, and the months when the cost is not enough are everywhere, and more importantly, the courier cannot be recruited.
For the Tongda department, the situation of losing money and not making money is happening, not only because a big guy like SF is blocking in front, but also facing the dilemma of chasing soldiers in the back, such as the extreme rabbit that is eyeing the tiger.
In Yiwu, where China's e-commerce is most concentrated, wherever Jitu goes, it is inevitable that the connection to the Dashi system will not be overwhelmed. In order to quickly conquer the market with ultra-low prices, Jitu headquarters has given freight subsidies to many Yiwu Pinduoduo merchants, more than 10,000 pieces of large single small pieces can be shipped for 1 yuan, light express delivery can be at least 8 mao, in Yiwu outside the bulk, Jitu also continues to seize the market at a price lower than 2 yuan of the Tongda system.
Although the price war is a necessary stage in the process of the giant circle occupying the market, from 2019 to the present, the protracted irrational price war has plunged the entire industry into a state of physical and mental exhaustion.
It can be said that in addition to achieving the goal of brutally occupying the market, a single price war has little improvement of the business model, and at the expense of the industry's prospects, it is inevitable that there is a suspicion of exhaustion and fishing, which is really not what the giants should eat.
So, what is the attraction of the e-commerce parts market, which is originally a premium low-lying area, so that all parties have repeatedly sold for it? Looking at the shared travel and takeaway wars in the past, you may have the answer.
As far as the industry is concerned, the reserve price state of e-commerce parts will definitely not be long-lasting, once the market integration enters the final stage, after a large number of small and medium-sized brands have withdrawn, the remaining market share has once again been pocketed by the giants, and the price increase is bound to become a consensus. All the concessions today will become the reasons for tomorrow's harvest, and the back hand of capital will only shine when the customer is most paralyzed.
From this point of view, occupying more than 80% of the market share of low-cost e-commerce parts can be said to be the logistics giants must keep the basic disk, with it, the volume will be large to a point where it is easier to resist risks, brand spillover, marginal cost, manpower scale are the basic experience elements that a logistics giant must pursue.
However, under the such efforts of the giants, is there really no more logistics rich in addition to the e-commerce parts market?
Instant delivery, a new direction under the Song of Ice and Fire
Just as the news mentioned that the daily income of 10,000 yuan of delivery brother is eye-catching, instant delivery as an emerging market derived from e-commerce logistics under the consumption upgrade, is also being highly valued by all parties.
According to Ai Coal data, in 2021, the order scale of the instant delivery service industry will be 27.90 billion, and in the future 2026, the order scale of the instant delivery service industry will be close to the order scale of 100 billion, reaching 95.78 billion, which means that the compound annual growth rate of the instant delivery market in 2021-2026 will be as high as 28.0%. Therefore, for industry giants, based on the judgment of market potential, running entry is the most important choice at present.
Of course, the rapid start of the network is the effect that the giants are looking forward to, but specific to the operation, each family still has its own differences. Taking Ali as an example, on the basis of the information that it owns a capacity allocation platform such as Hummingbird, from 2017 to 2018, it has successively acquired the transportation capacity of Ele.me, Dian I Da, Baidu Knight and so on through mergers and acquisitions, thus forming the immediate combat strength of Ali's instant delivery.
For JD.com, the flexible and self-built instant delivery idea is also vividly reflected. As early as 2015, Jingdong Dajia was established, involving services mainly fresh and supermarket distribution, the main product point is 2 hours to home, a time in the market set off a lot of waves. In 2016, while expanding the cooperation between B-end and Wal-Mart, JD.com completed the improvement of online and offline supply chains on the one hand, and merged JD.com with Dada on the other hand, thus forming an instant delivery system under JD.com's self-built and crowdsourcing model.
Looking at the most powerful player of instant delivery, Meituan, according to the timeline to analyze, Meituan's instant delivery can be traced back to 2013 Meituan takeaway online, in the "Hundred Regiments War" period, Meituan in order to win market share, as early as 2015 introduced crowdsourcing distribution and regional agency mechanism, became the earliest to improve the construction of instant delivery channels of the Internet giant, and with the increase in local life penetration, Meituan has been online in the same city running errands, Meituan flash sale are born from the huge market demand for instant delivery.
However, even if the market potential is huge, the major logistics giants are still unable to escape the fate of losing money and making money in the current stage of capital rush. According to the financial report, among the distribution army, Dada Express delivery has a revenue of 3.44 billion yuan and a net loss of 1.27 billion yuan in 2020; Dingdong Buy Vegetables has a revenue of 11.34 billion yuan and a net loss of 3.18 billion yuan in 2020; and SF Tongcheng has a revenue of 4.84 billion yuan and a net loss of 760 million yuan in 2020.
On the one hand, it is necessary to run a horse fence, and on the other hand, the single ticket price is tempting. It is the different demands that have created the ice and fire situation between individual practitioners and the industry. However, can the previous experience of capital first in express delivery and even e-commerce logistics really be transplanted to instant delivery?
First of all, instant delivery shows more occasional characteristics than traditional delivery. Whether from the product category, distribution area, order time and other dimensions, instant delivery behavior is not as predictable as traditional delivery, from this point of view, once the instant delivery into a single, whether to provide better service, to a large extent depends on the speed of information processing of the distributor and the ability to allocate the appropriate transport capacity.
Instant delivery then has a service that makes it easier for customers to perceive. According to the data, as many as 78% of customers in the mainland online shopping crowd believe that a faster receiving process can greatly improve their shopping experience. This magnified service feature is even more important in instant delivery, after all, most people who use instant delivery services pay more attention to the pursuit of timeliness. However, compared with traditional e-commerce shopping, even if the platform can pull into the physical distance with customers through self-built warehousing, pre-products, etc., in the last kilometer of performance, personnel quality and service standards will become an important consideration for evaluating delivery orders.
Finally, the new retail wave has spawned more specialized instant delivery services. As we all know, new retail is redefining our lives. From food to service, from digital to entertainment, countless brands with novel gameplay attract many consumers and their wallets. For instant delivery, how to ensure the fresh food of dishes, how to transport newly baked cakes, how to help customers verify the authenticity and function of the products sent, are all added value options derived from instant delivery, who cares more, who can of course win more markets.
At present, the planning of the national unified large market is put on the agenda, on the one hand, to make the market more dynamic, on the other hand, to let more consumers appreciate the charm of really good things. For good products, whether it is a first-tier city or a bottom-line city, the mood of wanting to get it as soon as possible is the same.
That is to say, all the instant delivery experience that has been verified in the first-line market can be reused in the sinking market, which is undoubtedly more directional to the entire e-commerce logistics industry.