During the withdrawal of cross-border purchasing, some people's income shrank by 80%, and some people transformed to do live broadcasting
be unable to go out
In 2020, COVID-19 spread around the world, and purchasing abroad was forced to suspend. Goods can only be sent by international direct mail, while freight rates have increased continuously, the mailing cycle is too long, and customers are gradually losing. Their income has dropped sharply in the past two years.
be unable to come back
Lost customers went to the live studio - "experiential shopping is more attractive." The development of live e-commerce leads to the narrowing of the price advantage of purchasing cosmetics, and the endorsement of anchor and brand is also squeezing the living space of purchasing cosmetics.
Strong supervision
In January 2019, the e-commerce law of the people's Republic of China was implemented, which stipulates that online sellers, including wechat merchants and purchasing agents, need to register and pay taxes normally, and clearly bring new forms of online transactions such as wechat merchants and purchasing agents into supervision. The grey era of purchasing agent is over.
Before the epidemic
Fly if you want
A purchasing agent frequently flies from Beijing to Seoul and Jeju Island, flying twice a month on average.
Is the purchasing agent in your circle of friends still there?
Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020, cross-border buyers have had to "stop". Anyi (a pseudonym), who has been "Han Dai" for nine years, told the Red Star capital bureau that after the epidemic, purchasing agents are facing the dilemma of reduced income and loss of customers, and a large number of peers are changing careers.
Li Wen, who has been a cosmetics purchasing agent for four years, said that the customers in the purchasing agent's hands gradually flow to the live broadcasting room. Now, Li Wen, who is blocked in purchasing business, has also begun to transform to live e-commerce. When interviewed by the Red Star capital Bureau, he was attending a live e-commerce training course of an institution to learn how to bring goods live.
In addition to live broadcasting, e-commerce outlets are booming, and domestic cosmetics brands springing up are also stealing the market from purchasing agents. Anyi told the Red Star capital bureau that some peers have transformed into distributors of domestic brands. "Russian generation" Wang Nuan (a pseudonym) also said that while doing purchasing on behalf of others, he also took the agency of two domestic small brands.
With the tightening of supervision, the outbreak, the live broadcast outlet and the rise of domestic products, cross-border purchasing agents are slowly withdrawing from the historical stage.
Cross border purchasing agent who can't get out
The annual income is less than 500000 yuan, and a large number of purchasing agents are transferred to banks
In the ninth year of Anyi as a purchasing agent, he obviously felt some changes. "With the decrease of income and the change of peers, customers slowly lost."
Anyi, who lives in Beijing, entered the purchasing industry because of a trip to South Korea during the University. "When I visited Korea in 2013, my classmate's mother, who worked in the snow show, a brand of amore, gave me half a box of cosmetics. I actually sold more than 2000 yuan back to China. I think it's very profitable."
Since then, Anyi has frequently flown to Seoul and Jeju Island, South Korea. After counting, it has flown twice a month on average, becoming a professional "Han Dai" and running through the cosmetics counters of major duty-free stores in South Korea. He showed the route map in the mobile app to the Red Star capital Bureau. Because he flew too many times, the route from Beijing to Seoul and Jeju Island changed from blue to purple.
Those like Anyi who go abroad to buy on behalf of others in person are called "human flesh purchasing on behalf of others". The profits come from the pricing differences of commodities, exchange rate differences and rebates and discounts of local duty-free stores. The cost of one-time purchasing includes visa fees, air tickets, meals and hotel expenses. 2016 and 2017 are the best years for Anyi's business. According to him, excluding costs, Anyi can earn about 600000 a year.
Turning around in 2020, COVID-19 spread around the world, and the overseas purchasing business of Anyi was also suspended. The front page of Anyi's circle of friends reads: "the flight has been grounded due to the epidemic, and now we can only send it back by international direct mail."
In the past two years, Anyi's income has plummeted.
"Now I send 5 to 10 packages a day. In the past, I could send 100 packages a day every time I came back from abroad." Anyi said that the decrease in orders led to an 80% decline in his income. "Now he makes almost 100000 a year, which is far less than before."
Over the past two years, the professional "Han Dai" around Anyi changed careers one after another. "Some people went to buy Women's clothes, and others took the examination of public institutions". Anyi counted, and now there are few friends who still insist on buying clothes.
Also feeling the change is Liu Si (a pseudonym), who lives in Shenzhen. She is a full-time purchasing agent.
Before the epidemic, Liu Si's purchasing footprint spread over many countries and regions, including Seoul, Tokyo, Bangkok, Dubai, etc. the frequency of purchasing abroad was 2-3 times a month, mainly purchasing cosmetics. After the epidemic, Liu Si, who could not go abroad, could only try international mail, but the order volume was far lower than before. "Not only have orders become less, but the single piece profit is also decreasing," Liu said.
Wang Nuan, who has been purchasing cosmetics in Russia for five years, told the Red Star capital bureau that he could not go to Russia after the epidemic, so he sent the goods back by international mail, but factors such as rising freight rates and too long mailing cycle affected his business. "International freight has increased more than three times. I try to stock up when there is a discount in Russia, and then compress some profits to stabilize the price. I replenish when it is almost sold out. Sometimes I wait a long time." Wang Nuan said.
Now, the purchasing business of Liu Si and Wang Nuan is also turning to China, such as duty-free stores in Macao and Sanya. However, due to the repeated epidemic situation and the change of isolation policy, the purchasing business is becoming more and more difficult, "fewer people still insist on purchasing." Liu Si said that the customers accumulated by purchasing agents are also gradually losing.
Customer churn, price advantage no longer
Purchasing agent began to learn live delivery
Where have the lost customers gone—— "Live studio".
Li Wen, who has been purchasing cosmetics for four years, gave the answer to the Red Star capital Bureau: "it's not all because of the epidemic. Customers now go to the live broadcasting room to buy things, and experiential shopping is more attractive."
Four years ago, Li Wen, who worked in Shenzhen, started purchasing on behalf of others. Now, due to the impact of the epidemic, Li Wen can no longer "buy human flesh on behalf of others" as before. If he chooses the way of overseas direct mail, the freight cost is high and he has to bear some risks. Li Wen feels that his purchasing business has reached the bottleneck period.
When the business of contemporary buyers stagnated, another industry ushered in explosive growth.
In 2020, the epidemic situation pressed the fast forward button for the development of live broadcasting and delivery. Taking Taobao platform as an example, by the end of 2020, Taobao live broadcast has provided more than 100000 live content, users can watch more than 500000 hours a day, and nearly 100 million goods have been put on the shelves in Taobao live broadcast room; The number of live broadcast anchors with goods also increased significantly, an increase of 661% year-on-year in 2019. The data show that in 2020, the average daily active users of Taobao live broadcast increased significantly, with a year-on-year increase of 100%.
Among them, the live delivery data of beauty and skin care products are very bright. According to the data from ECdataway, Wei and live broadcast, in 2020, the total sales of cosmetics, perfumes and cosmetics tools in Taobao were over 9 billion 430 million yuan.
He Mei (a pseudonym), a beauty loving consumer, told the Red Star capital bureau that after the epidemic, the purchasing agents in the circle of friends gradually "disappeared", but they were used to buying cosmetics in the live broadcasting room. He Mei said: "now there are many brand official flagship stores are also broadcast live, which is more reassuring and cheaper than purchasing on behalf of others."
It can be seen that the development of live e-commerce leads to the narrowing of the price advantage of purchasing cosmetics, and the endorsement of anchor and brand is also squeezing the living space of purchasing cosmetics.
Liu Si told the Red Star capital Bureau: "now many cosmetics are sold live, the price is very low, and we have no profit." Li Wen also realized this: "now there are many shopping channels and prices are chaotic."
Now, Li Wen, who is blocked in purchasing business, has begun to transform to live e-commerce. In an interview with the Red Star capital Bureau, Li asked that he was participating in an organization's live e-commerce training course to learn how to bring goods live. He sent a picture of the live classroom to the Red Star capital Bureau. Each student is equipped with a self photographing tripod in front of him. Some students are demonstrating the live scene on the podium, and the live video of the students is playing on the big screen behind.
Talking about the reasons for the transformation, Li asked, "if you do purchasing on behalf of others, there is too little private domain traffic, but the live audience is wider, the market can be wider, and you can make more money." In addition, Li Wen felt that his previous purchasing experience was also helpful to his transformation, such as channel control, product knowledge professionalism, use feedback collection, how to select products correctly, etc.
According to Li Wen, there are many purchasing agents around to do live broadcasting, but few people can stick to it. "Live broadcasting is an emerging industry with a very low threshold. Everyone can do it, but it is also an industry with a very high threshold, because the elimination rate is more than 90%. It's not too early to switch to live broadcasting at this time. I didn't catch up with the first wave of tuyere, but it's still an opportunity. Whether it's correct or not may need time to be verified." Li asked.
Domestic cosmetics brands springing up are also stealing the market from purchasing agents. CICC research report pointed out that a number of excellent domestic product pioneers such as perfect diary, colorkey and huaxizi have emerged in domestic beauty makeup; In the field of efficacy skin care, domestic brands represented by Winona, Yuze and runbaiyan also continue to lead the growth rate.
After the "Korean makeup" in hand was difficult to sell, Anyi told the Red Star capital bureau that some peers had transformed into distributors of domestic brands. "Russian generation" Wang Nuan also said that while he was doing purchasing on behalf of others, he took the agency of two domestic small brands.
After the epidemic
a deserted house
70% of the sales of duty-free stores at Incheon Airport in South Korea came from Chinese tourists. After the outbreak of the epidemic, Lotte and Xinluo withdrew from the main terminal of Incheon Airport.
In the "gray area"
Smuggling, sentencing
Purchasing agency is withdrawing from the historical stage
In January 2019, the e-commerce law of the people's Republic of China was implemented, which stipulates that online sellers, including wechat merchants and purchasing agents, need to register and pay taxes normally, and clearly bring new forms of online transactions such as wechat merchants and purchasing agents into supervision.
This means that the grey era of purchasing agent is over.
Previously, purchasing agency has always been a career on the edge of policies and regulations. Insiders commented on the Red Star capital Bureau: "overseas purchasing agency is cheaper than the counter, so it is sought after by the majority of consumers. Where does the price difference come from? In addition to the pricing and currency ratio of various countries (regions)," tax "should be one of the big heads."
There are not a few examples of being investigated for legal responsibility for purchasing on behalf of others. Just a month ago, Zhengzhou Municipal People's Procuratorate held a hearing on whether overseas students were suspected of smuggling.
According to chinanews.com, Xiao Xu, a graduate student in a university in Spain, has opened an online store on an online platform since August 2020 to sell luxury brand bags, shoes and hats from Spain to China by live purchasing, and smuggle goods into the country through a logistics company for profit. From August to November 2020, more than 190000 yuan of customs tax was evaded.
Ding Mingyu, prosecutor, introduced that the suspect, Xu, violated customs supervision, smuggled ordinary goods into the country and evaded taxes. His behavior violated the provisions of the first provision of the 153rd article of the criminal law of the People's Republic of China. He should be prosecuted for smuggling of ordinary goods for criminal responsibility.
In addition, according to Xinhua news agency in November 2014, taking advantage of the convenience of taking the group abroad, the two tour guides in Zhejiang have repeatedly purchased cosmetics in overseas duty-free stores, brought the cosmetics purchased overseas into China by taking them with them, and chose the undeclared channel for customs clearance at the time of entry. According to the judgment of Hangzhou intermediate people's court, the two tour guides evaded customs supervision in order to seek illegal interests, smuggled all kinds of cosmetics by carrying them with them without truthfully reporting to the customs, and evaded a large amount of payable tax, which has constituted the crime of smuggling ordinary goods. On November 21, 2014, both of them were sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment for three years, suspended for four years and fined 230000 yuan in the first instance.
At the same time, legal and compliant cross-border e-commerce platforms are becoming the mainstream. According to the 2021 white paper on China's cross-border overseas shopping industry released by iResearch consulting, in 2020, the cross-border import and retail platform has become the most commonly used overseas shopping channel for Chinese consumers, accounting for 58.3%. The proportion of individual purchasing is only 3.4%.
With the tightening of supervision, the outbreak, the live broadcast outlet, the rise of domestic products and other factors, cross-border purchasing agents are slowly withdrawing from the historical stage. Chengdu Business Daily - Red Star News Reporter Yu Yaoqiang Yami