Chinese social e-commerce company Pinduoduo’s co-founder Dong Zao vowed on Friday that his company will help foster and host 500 agricultural supply chain brands on its platform, according to a press release of the company.
Dong made the remarks during the 2019 China’s International Agricultural Trade Fair held in Nanchang, capital of Central China’s Jiangxi province. He said that there are some mature chains that are able to supply agricultural products to final buyers via e-commerce platforms, so the next goal for these producers is to stratify their products and their quality.
He explained that currently, it is hard for consumers to judge which agricultural products are of better quality due to the lack of enough brands in the sector.
“For example, apples grown in the city of Yantan in Shandong are famous, but this fact is only around a geographical concept, not a commodity brand. Perhaps only a few people, or only some agricultural supply chain companies know that apples from villages in Yantai are of the best and most stable quality,” Dong said.
Pinduoduo co-founder added that his company will join hands with farmers and other firms in the agricultural chain to use different “villages” as elements in fostering brands.
Pinduoduo revealed in the press release that a total of RMB 65.3 billion (USD 9.3 billion) agricultural products were sold via its platform in 2018, and predicted that the sales value of this segment will hit RMB 120 billion in 2019.
Recently, Pinduoduo’s chairman and co-founder Huang Zheng told employees that two current priorities for the company are strengthening its merchants’ network to reframe Pinduoduo as a marketplace for branded merchandise, as well as attracting and retaining talents, Late Post reported.
Pinduoduo has already announced plans to help factories foster 1,000 brands for consumer goods, according to an earlier press release of the company. Some companies have jumped onto this bandwagon to roll out their own brands on Pinduoduo, including kitchenware brand Sanho.
Alibaba, which is now competing with Pinduoduo for consumers living in small cities and rural areas in the country, has been increasingly attracting brands worldwide. More than 200,000 brands participated in the e-commerce giant’s 2019 Singles’ Day shopping fest, up from 180,000 brands in 2018, according to a press release of Alibaba.