When Ali JD Logistics' "wall demolition" was carried out: some merchants quickly changed their express delivery, and the end courier was worried about the decline in income

Source of this article: Times Finance Author: Lin Xinlin

This year's "Double 11", the situation of the two major e-commerce platforms and logistics providers going their separate ways will officially end.

Image source: Picture Worm Creative

On October 16th, Jingdong Logistics and Taotian Group officially reached a cooperation, Jingdong Logistics will be fully connected to Taobao Tmall platform, platform merchants will be able to choose Jingdong Logistics as a service provider, at present, the docking system between the two sides has been basically completed, consumers can also query Jingdong logistics track in Taobao and Tmall APP.

This means that Taobao and JD.com, a pair of e-commerce competitors, have personally broken down the logistics barriers they have built in the past few years, and have moved from fierce fighting to competition and cooperation. In addition, from October 8th to 9th, Taobao and Tmall also announced that they would launch the "SF Express with a higher price" service, where consumers can see the relevant logos on the product page and choose to pay additional postage to request SF delivery.

Under the "tear down the wall" campaign, many changes are already quietly taking place. "Great, I heard the news two months ago, and I couldn't believe it at the time." Some e-commerce merchants sighed.

From confrontation to wall tearing

Taobao and JD.com, who have been fighting openly and secretly for a long time, chose to shake hands and make peace.

Over the past 20 years, the domestic Internet industry has experienced fierce competition and confrontation, and e-commerce platforms have established their own barriers in the fields of payment and logistics. Among them, as a key part of the core competitiveness of the platform, logistics is one of the most solid walls in China's e-commerce defensive war.

As early as 2007, JD.com officially began to build its own logistics, and gradually established its own warehousing and distribution facilities, which became the "killer feature" of JD.com's e-commerce platform. Ali, on the other hand, has formed its own logistics barriers by investing in a number of express delivery companies and taking the lead in forming a rookie network. Up to now, the cooperation between Alibaba, Cainiao and Tongda is still very close, not only holding shares of Santong Yida, but also being a shareholder of Cainiao.

As a result, in the express delivery industry, several express delivery companies have been divided into several major schools, "Ali system" (including Tongda Express), "Jingdong Department" and "SF Department". For a long time in the past, the camps resisted each other, and Ali Express could not access Jingdong Mall, and vice versa.

The actions of the two sides to fix the wall have also caused a lot of friction. Liu Qiangdong said in 2016 when evaluating rookies, "The essence of the rookie network is to build a data system on top of several express companies, although the efficiency of these express companies has been improved, most of the profits of the last few express companies will be sucked away by rookie logistics." ”

In 2017, JD.com also suspended Best Express and Tiantian Express on the grounds of "violation and poor service", and the latter two have a lot of ties with Alibaba.

The war without gunpowder is not only between JD.com and Taobao. In recent years, the emerging e-commerce platform Pinduoduo has risen rapidly, and J&T Express, which undertook a large number of orders from Pinduoduo in the early days, has not been opened to it by Ali and JD.com for a long time.

At the end of 2021, J&T Express officially accessed the Tao system, and this came from the leverage of a transaction - in October of that year, J&T Express acquired Best Express, which is known as "Ali's own son", for 6.8 billion yuan, thus obtaining the admission ticket to the Tao system.

The situation of Taobao and JD.com fighting separately has not been loosened until recent years.

In March 2023, Liu Qiangdong said that other external express delivery will be allowed to access Jingdong Mall, so that merchants can choose third-party logistics, "If they want to use J&T or Tongda express delivery, let them use it." At that time, Alibaba's Cainiao Express was not on the release list. At that time, it coincided with Liu Qiangdong's return, and vigorously promoted JD.com's low-price strategy to regain the minds of users.

After a year, the last opening was also torn open, and Cainiao Express and the post station were connected to Jingdong Mall; Jingdong Logistics also officially embraced Taobao and Tmall, opening the door to the Tao system. JD Logistics said that at present, JD Logistics has provided services including different links of supply chain logistics for all mainstream e-commerce platforms in China.

In response to the impact of this round of e-commerce wall demolition on major express delivery platforms, Times Finance contacted and interviewed SF Express and Cainiao Express, but has not replied as of press time.

Merchants: No longer trapped by "vests".

The mutual liberalization of the two giants is not only a trend of interconnection driven by regulatory policies, but also driven by fierce competition in the e-commerce market. At present, domestic e-commerce has passed the period of incremental market, and at the same time, the rise of emerging forces such as Pinduoduo, Douyin, and Kuaishou is undoubtedly a pressure on traditional e-commerce giants.

"Using the advantages of competitors to make up for their own shortcomings, while also giving consumers more choices and avoiding loss, is beneficial to the two major platforms of JD and Taobao." Gong Fuzhao, general manager of Double One Consulting Company, pointed out to Times Finance that taking Jingdong as an example, under the trend of low prices, the profitability of many commodities is no longer enough to support the use of relatively high-end logistics, and the introduction of low-cost socialized logistics and terminal resources will help Jingdong reduce its own operating and logistics costs and attract merchants to settle in.

And for the two logistics platforms, how much effect can the wall removal action bring?

Wang Yuhao, the owner of Taobao store Haohao Department Store, told Times Finance that it currently mainly uses Tongda Express, considering the guarantee of the commodity transportation process and door-to-door delivery service, if the Tao Department can access JD Express, it will adjust some orders to JD delivery.

"If we can connect with each other, it will be much more convenient for our business to operate." Wang Yuhao told Times Finance that it has opened stores in Taobao, Jingdong, Douyin, etc., but due to mutual interception between various platforms, it faced the problem of "separate management of one inventory" in the past.

Wang Yuhao has three daily chemical paper stores on Taobao, and at the request of buyers, he occasionally uses JD Express to deliver goods. However, due to the fact that the Taobao background system does not support the direct use of JD delivery, Wang Yuhao can generally only choose "merchant delivery and delivery", and manually enter the virtual order number to upload the goods information, "and then tell consumers the real JD logistics order number." ”

Some Taobao merchants and express delivery practitioners also revealed to Times Finance that in order to pass the platform review, some Taobao merchants have always "set vests", that is, upload express vest numbers such as "Ping An Da Tengfei" and "Jingguang Express", but in fact, the shipping carrier is Jingdong Express, but even so, there will still be information such as logistics trajectory is not synchronized, which also reduces the frequency of some merchants using Jingdong Express.

After the access of JD Logistics, this part of the demand may be stimulated, "I will consider using JD Express, mainly considering the stability of logistics." A Taobao merchant who specializes in overseas shopping products said. Jingdong Logistics revealed that many Taobao and Tmall merchants have chosen Jingdong Logistics as a service provider.

The industry believes that Jingdong Mall's access to rookies is more important to the latter's end resources.

Gong Fuzhao said that the opening will bring certain benefits to the rookie station, and also reduce the cost pressure of JD Logistics' home delivery, giving users more choices. Some consumers said that in the past, when it was inconvenient to receive express delivery, Jingdong Express could only be placed in the express cabinet, which may cause overtime payment, and if it could be placed in the post station, it would be more friendly to people who often work overtime and travel on business.

The impact of logistics wall demolition may spread to the entire e-commerce system, and may cause ripples on e-commerce platforms, express delivery companies, merchants, outlets, post stations and couriers.

An Anhui Jingdong courier said that in the past few days, the Jingdong Express in its area has been directly put into storage and put on the shelves of the rookie station. However, it mentioned that if the rookie post station is released, the accrual fee for a single express delivery will decrease, and it is worried that it will face a decrease in total income.

SF Express is "embarrassed", Tongda Rabbit "watches the battle"

There are also some participants who do not think that this opening will cause much of a ripple effect.

At present, express delivery companies have been divided into franchise economic express delivery and self-operated high-end express delivery. Considering the unit price, timeliness and service demand of goods, most merchants will have a clear choice of express delivery type, which will not change easily. An unnamed express delivery industry insider said that at present, the lower price of the Tao e-commerce express delivery system accounts for nearly eighty percent of the share.

The above-mentioned overseas shopping merchants said that the current store uses Zhongtong Express, whether it will switch to Jingdong Express, or consider the logistics cost, "at least the same price as Zhongtong, not to achieve such a low price as others." Chen Kaiqiang, co-founder of the beauty brand Kebeiyan, said that the current overall trend is to reduce costs and will not consider switching to JD.com. Similarly, Wang Yuhao, a Jingdong merchant, does not have too strong trust and cognition of Cainiao Express.

Franchise express delivery is more likely to be in a state of "spectatorship". "Our franchise system is not the same track as JD.com and rookie, and there is not much conflict." A person from a franchise express delivery company told Times Finance that there was no internal discussion on this round of e-commerce logistics breaking the wall, and it is expected to have little impact on it.

At the same time, the person believes that although the ports are open to each other, "(the platform) should be able to card a single volume". It also mentioned that the franchise enterprise was connected to the third-party logistics when Jingdong Mall opened in March last year, but the actual increase in the number of orders was not much, because Jingdong is still mainly self-operated.

However, Gong Fuzhao also pointed out that if JD.com's warehousing services are opened to the Tao system, it may be attractive to some Tmall merchants. Chen Kaiqiang said that compared with JD Logistics, it pays more attention to whether JD Cloud Warehouse can be opened, and if it is opened, it can control inventory more flexibly.

"Breaking the wall is not without barriers, and both sides may still have some of their core competencies in their hands." The above-mentioned industry insiders said. On October 16, JD Logistics responded that its integrated supply chain solutions, JD Express, JD Express and many other businesses will serve Taobao Tmall merchants, involving the whole process of the supply chain such as warehousing, express delivery, and express delivery.

Compared with the two protagonists of JD Logistics and Cainiao, SF Express is a little "embarrassed" in this wall-breaking operation. In the past, due to the confrontation between the two major platforms of JD.com and Taobao, as an express delivery company independent of various e-commerce platforms, SF Express has enjoyed a lot of dividends with its e-commerce timeliness, especially in the field of high-end express delivery in the Tao system. Today, JD Logistics is connected to the Tao platform, or forms a head-on confrontation with SF.

Merchant Wang Haoyu mentioned that in his opinion, the cost and service of JD Express are in the "middle ground", and if SF Express is used locally to deliver goods in batches, it will be 2-3 yuan more expensive than JD.com.

In the past year, the major express delivery companies have increased the timeliness of parts, which has also squeezed SF's space, including the "fresh food parity delivery" and "campus delivery" launched by Cainiao Express this year, which are SF's traditional advantageous businesses. In the first half of 2024, SF's time-sensitive express business achieved operating income of 59.19 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.6%, and the growth rate slowed down.

Just after the news of Jingdong and Taobao logistics breaking the wall, from October 8th to 9th, Taobao and Tmall successively announced that they would launch the "SF Express with a higher price" service, consumers can see the relevant logos on the product page, and choose to pay additional postage to request SF delivery, and the new functions and related rules will officially take effect on October 16. The markup fee is 5 yuan by default, and the merchant can modify the specific markup amount according to different regions.

For this new feature, several surveyed consumers said that they would use the markup function if they needed it urgently, "The default markup fee is much cheaper than when the merchant was asked to send SF Express." ”

However, on the merchant side, some Amoy merchants with a high customer unit price have already used SF Express to deliver goods and provide free shipping services, while users and merchants may not consider increasing the price of ordinary goods with low customer unit price to send SF Express. A pet supply store merchant said that it will not be opened in the short term, and he is worried that SF Express will have a high interception fee when returning goods, which will increase logistics costs.

Gong Fuzhao predicts that this round of wall demolition may only have a role after the big promotion. However, it pointed out that the current pattern and ranking of China's express delivery market has formed a balance, and the price has also reached the bottom in the game, so the role of this round of logistics wall reshuffle on the express market remains to be seen.