boyutpedia Chapter 54: 10,000 orders sold daily?
Chapter 54: 10,000 orders sold daily?
Zhao Caihua is a young woman from a small town and also a stay-at-home mom.
Her family was in poor financial condition. She attended junior high school for a few years and then worked for a few years before her parents called her back to get married when she turned 18.
At that time, Zhao Caihua lived in a daze, going to school, working, getting married, getting pregnant, and giving birth all in a daze. Then a sudden accident shattered her chaotic life.
Her husband treated her well, but he died in a car accident. As a victim's family member, she received a compensation payment, but it wasn't much, only tens of thousands of yuan.
The person responsible for the accident was a truck driver heavily in debt. Left with no other option, Zhao Caihua had to accept the meager compensation and refused her parents' offer to keep it for her.
Her husband's unexpected death made her understand many things. She had to live on, and live well in this cruel world with her daughter.
Zhao Caihua received tens of thousands of yuan in compensation and opened a small shop in town.
While breastfeeding her child, she was also busy with the small shop, moving and unloading goods, tidying up the shelves, and using her status as a widow to gain sympathy so that people would come to her shop to make purchases.
She worked hard to earn money, penny by penny. Her hands became calloused, the crow's feet around her eyes deepened, she looked much more haggard, and her hair turned much whiter.
Recently, she's become obsessed with joining online deals and bargain hunting groups. These groups frequently post deals on items that sellers are offering at a loss to boost sales, and she then creates multiple accounts to snag those items and resell them in her own store.
For example, she once snapped up a can of Coke that cost only one yuan and resold it for two yuan and fifty cents. She could make 36 yuan profit from a case of 24 cans, and it sold very well.
She has taken advantage of many such opportunities, sometimes earning two or three hundred yuan a month, and sometimes earning over a thousand yuan a month.
Just today, many of the discount groups she joined had a pinned announcement with a link to a bakery. That bakery sells incredibly cheap bread; a classic small bread costs only one yuan, and during certain time periods, it can even be discounted by half, costing only 50 cents.
Furthermore, the store recently launched a new membership system. As long as you spend 50 yuan or more in the store, you can automatically become a member. After becoming a member, you will receive a 15 yuan coupon with no minimum spend. With this coupon, you can get 15 yuan free in the store.
This store even has a link to Alibaba's Alimama platform, where customers can earn a 10% commission on purchases made through the store.
Zhao Caihua was shocked. Even from a bargain-hunting perspective, this was a huge deal. She thought to herself, "Online business is really ruthless! They'll go to such lengths to boost sales."
Zhao Caihua rushed into the shop immediately, afraid that if she was too slow, she would miss out on this great deal.
It just so happened that it was 8 p.m., the time for a super discount of 50% off everything. Zhao Caihua glanced at the product list and saw that many old-fashioned breads were available, and almost every bread was priced at the lowest online.
These old-fashioned breads sell quite well in rural towns. For example, their flagship product, the Honeybee Mini Bread, can sell for 2 yuan offline. However, because it's nearing its expiration date, they sell it for 1.5 yuan, making a net profit of 1 yuan.
Zhao Caihua carefully selected and added the items to her shopping cart, reaching the 50 yuan limit.
And then, something magical happened: the number representing 50 in the shopping cart jumped down to 35. A 15 yuan coupon, from who knows where, was automatically added to the discount.
Huh? What kind of event is this? She didn't notice, or is there a system error?
Zhao Caihua quickly clicked the payment button and submitted the order successfully, now just waiting for the seller to ship it. She did the math in her head: this was equivalent to buying 80 loaves of bread for 35 yuan. Even if she sold them at the cheapest price of one yuan each, she could still make a profit of 45 yuan.
Zhao Caihua frantically operated the system, working for a full 20 minutes before finally placing orders for all ten accounts. Only then did she have time to check the group chat for any new deals.
She switched her focus back to the QQ group, where the group admin tagged everyone and posted a message: "I have something to inform everyone. There's a bug in the shop linked at the top. If you add 50 yuan worth of items to your shopping cart without paying, the system will automatically recognize that you've been upgraded to VIP and will give you a free 15 yuan discount coupon, allowing you to snag a bargain for 35 yuan."
Upon seeing this message, Zhao Caihua suddenly realized, "So that's how it is! No wonder I got a 15 yuan discount for nothing." She suddenly found it a bit funny; how could such a large company like Alibaba make such a mistake? The boss must have suffered a huge loss!
After that, Zhao Caihua stopped paying attention to the matter and continued to keep an eye on the QQ group to see if any new deals would appear.
Meanwhile, news of the incredibly low prices and price loopholes at the Three Little Bees shop began to spread like wildfire across various QQ groups, news websites, and even blogs. The reason was simple: the prices were just too low. In an era before e-commerce reached its most competitive stage, no one had ever seen goods priced so low; it was practically free.
The next day, Zhao Caihua realized something was wrong—a whole day had passed, and there was still no movement on the product's logistics status. She hurriedly went to inquire with customer service, only to discover that customer service had already sent her a message the day before.
The customer service representative sent a crying face emoji and said, "We're so sorry, dear customer. Due to an operational error on our part, the price was set too low. We sold 1 orders yesterday, and our boss suffered huge losses. We are currently assessing the losses and may have to process some orders for refunds. We are truly sorry, dear customer."
1 orders? Zhao Caihua was shocked. She was a businesswoman herself and knew very well that this boss was losing money to gain market share. She calculated that if each order was priced at 50 yuan, the boss would lose 50 yuan per order. After all, the cost of 80 loaves of bread was 80 yuan, but he was only selling them for 35 yuan. So, with 1 orders yesterday, wouldn't this boss have lost 50 yuan?
"Hiss!" Zhao Caihua gasped. If she were this boss, she would have closed the store and run away. What would she have left to ship?
Thinking of this, Zhao Caihua suddenly felt a pang of anxiety. Oh no! Could it be that she'd been hunting eagles all day, only to have them peck her eyes out? It seems they've taken too much of her money. She quickly messaged customer service, asking, "Could you prioritize my order cancellation? I don't want this order anymore."
Then she logged into all ten of her other accounts and sent the same message to customer service.
However, to her dismay, customer service stopped responding. She then rushed to the QQ group and found it in an uproar.
"Refund! Refund now!"
"Are you kidding me? If you can't handle the game, don't play it!"
"Now I see. No wonder they're selling it at such a low price; they're just planning to scam people and run, they never intended to actually ship the goods!"
"Where's the group owner? How much dirty money did the group owner take from him? You have to take responsibility!"
Finally, the group admin couldn't withstand the pressure and spoke up. He first muted everyone, then tagged all members and said, "Don't panic, everyone. I'm communicating with the other party to understand the situation. Don't be afraid, they won't run away. The money is stuck in the Taobao platform. As long as you don't click 'confirm receipt,' they won't be able to withdraw the money."
……
P.S.: The data is terrible. Everyone is willing to follow the book or whatever, but no one likes to speak up or vote, which is why the new book can't even get on the charts.
Please vote with your monthly tickets, everyone!