Shanghai follows Seoul down to the virtual subway supermarket

Shanghai is following in Seoul's footsteps by creating more shopping opportunities for metro commuters.

Yihaodian (一号店), China's leading online grocery store, introduced “virtual supermarkets" to Shanghai's metro stations earlier this week. Large LED screens advertising everything, from diapers to raw meat, have been posted at nine metro lines across the city.

The time-saving idea is inspired by the subway supermarket in Tesco Homeplus in Korea,  where active mobile users are among the highest in the world. But Yihaodian and Tesco Homeplus are two separate entities, and are not related to each other at all.

How to shop

Smart phone-friendly QR bar codes are printed next to each item on the Shanghai metro advertisements, and with a special app, shoppers scan what they want and check out on their own phones, according to The Global Times.  

Once they have completed their purchases, the goods are delivered to doorsteps within 48 hours.

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Commuters and shoppers can enjoy the market-like aesthetic selection of a variety of products -- with the convenience of online shopping.

The cost of the whole process depends on the total weight of the groceries and delivery distance. For example, if you live in the Huangpu district in downtown Shanghai, home delivery takes 24 hours. The shipping fee is RMB 10 for orders that total to less than RMB 50 and weigh less than 5 kilogams. Shipping is free for orders that cost over RMB 100 in total and are less than 10 kiolograms in weight. 

(Check Yihaodian to see what the rates are in your region.)

Why in Shanghai

"The virtual supermarket targets young, tech-savvy consumers who don't have time to shop the conventional way," Zou Ping'e, Yihaodian's public relations manager, told the Global Times on Tuesday.

"The idea is to bring convenience to busy people, who can buy what they need and want during their daily commute," she said.

"It essentially allows them to do something useful that they wouldn't have been able to do before on the way to work."

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With China cell phone users topping 879 million in February this year and the number of daily metro commuters in Shanghai set to reach nine million by 2013, no wonder the country's major online grocery is catching up with the trend of subway virtual shopping. 

Get your smartphone and the digitized shopping cart ready, now you know what to buy.

Consumers' response

An enthusiastic (and understanding) Weibo user “Shawn” tweets, “Yihaodian is so fast! I got my stuff ordered yesterday afternoon in the morning. The delivery man said he fell on the way and went to a hospital, it should be faster if it wasn't for that.”

This semi-tangible grocery store is great for lethargic commuters who don't mind waiting a day for their milk. But others with more time and energy may just prefer to continue working out their arms carrying a jug of oil and watermelon on the way home.

Shopping tech boom

This isn't the only high-tech shopping trend in Shanghai. Last week, mobile service provider SK Telecom put out a pilot in Shanghai Lotus Supermarket (易初莲花) to test out the "Smart Cart" in Shanghai's Lotus Supermarket carts.

After downloading the Smart Cart application to their smartphones, customers can search for shopping or discount information and store coupons in real time. Most conveniently, the digitized shopping carts can pull up a shopping list from your smartphone. 

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At the checkout counter, the tablet screen shows the list of purchased items and membership points.

It's about time grocery stores got a kick from the tech boom, but some shoppers may wonder: "What are tech companies going to do with our information now that they know what brand of soy sauce we buy?"

Yihaodian's virtual supermarkets are currently available at the following Shanghai metro stations: People's Square, Xujiahui, Jing'an Temple, Nanjing Dong Lu, Century Avenue, Jiangsu Lu, Shaanxi Nan Lu, Changshu Lu, Shanghai Stadium, Hongqiao Lu and Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park. Download the app here.