Cainiao Aliexpress introduces multiple Spring Festival warehousing guarantees, semi-fulfillment logistics average speedup by 9 days

【Ebrun Original】Earlier this year, Aliexpress announced the comprehensive launch of semi-fulfillment in conjunction with Cainiao to upgrade its logistics services. According to official calculations, under the same cost, the average cross-border logistics speed for merchants will be improved by about 9 days by upgrading the ordinary postal service to standard and priority express products.

It is reported that the core of the semi-fulfillment service is to help merchants manage the "logistics fulfillment" process to improve fulfillment timeliness and certainty, while retaining the unique advantages in product development and brand operation, which is more suitable for merchants with product development capabilities, brand operation needs, or non-standard product categories (such as clothing, auto parts, etc.).

Different business models have different logistics modes and fulfillment timeliness. It is reported that self-operated POP merchants are mostly engaged in cross-border direct mail, using ordinary postal/economy routes, with an average fulfillment timeliness of 16-24 days; semi-fulfillment POP merchants are mostly based on the JIT model, mainly using Cainiao Express, with most countries achieved within 7-12 days, and Cainiao promises compensation for late delivery; fully-fulfilled merchants are mainly based on warehouse delivery, also using Cainiao Express, with most countries achieved within 5-10 days, and enjoy late delivery compensation service.

The difference between warehouse delivery and JIT modes is that warehouse delivery mode allows merchants to prepare the goods in advance to the Cainiao warehouse, and the orders are shipped directly from the warehouse after being generated; while JIT mode allows merchants to send out products to the warehouse through Cainiao after the actual order is generated.

For orders generated under JIT mode, Cainiao has launched free door-to-door collection within 24 hours, starting from one piece, covering 33 cities including East China and South China. Semi-fulfillment merchants can prepare the goods to Cainiao's preferred warehouse in advance, and orders are automatically issued through the platform without any action required by merchants. In addition, during the Spring Festival, Cainiao has increased investment in door-to-door collection, warehouse expansion, trunk transport capacity, etc., to ensure that the international express delivery timeliness for 23 countries does not degrade.

Semi-fulfillment is the focus mode for AliExpress this year. In order to encourage merchants to upgrade to semi-fulfillment, AliExpress has successively introduced a series of measures, including commission exemptions, on-time delivery subsidies, pre-inventory funding similar to "guaranteed sales", as well as exemption from a series of warehouse fees, etc.

According to platform data, sales of products on AliExpress with New Year elements such as red envelopes, paper-cuts, lanterns, Chinese knots, couplets, toys, etc., have risen by 2.6 times year-on-year, and related toys with "Chinese dragon" elements increased by 50 times month-on-month. During the Spring Festival replenishment period, the shipments to the AliExpress selected warehouses by Cainiao compared with the same period last year increased by 600%, mainly from fully-fulfilled and semi-fulfilled channels.