Chapter 523 Trust Crisis
During the entire National Day holiday, group buying is developing steadily and healthily.
The successful establishment of Hengtong Freight’s first supply chain has greatly reduced the subsidy costs for community group purchasing, and the collaboration between Alipay and group buying has also rewritten the tourism landscape in first-tier cities.
However, for the group buying market, the crisis has finally arrived.
On the last night of the October holiday, Jiang Qin, shirtless, drank beer and ate side dishes delivered by group buying with three of his roommates, as well as Zhang Guangfa and Zuo Baiqiang from the next dormitory.
This is probably the most wonderful time in college life.
But before he could get tipsy, Wei Lanlan suddenly called Jiang Qin on his cell phone and read him a news bulletin.
[Tuanbao.com is suspected of having a funding chain break, no one answered the 400 customer service phone number, and the boss may have run away]
Hearing this title, Jiang Qin frowned and thought to himself, as expected, after the last round of market competition, the group buying websites that failed to raise funds have begun to collapse.
"Lao Jiang, where are you going?
"It's okay, you guys eat first, no need to wait for me."
Jiang Qin reached out and took away the only meat dish on the table, then turned around and turned on the computer, completely ignoring the beautiful Chinese culture behind him.
Tuanbao.com entered the group buying market right after it emerged and developed rapidly in the early stages. They were the first to establish the group buying membership points system.
In August last year, before major websites raised funds, the company had 2,300 employees and more than 8 million members.
During the advertising war in 2009, he invited Peter Ho and Qin Lan to be spokespeople, which was earlier than Lashou.com inviting Ge Daye. The advertisements he shot could be seen everywhere on CCTV and satellite TV.
However, by the third round, capital no longer looked favorably upon him, which slowed down his development.
Unexpectedly, in just one year, the website ran out of funding.
However, it is difficult to verify the authenticity of online news, and Jiang Qin did not believe it completely, and he has been searching for early news on Tuanbao.com.
Then he found out that Tuanbao.com had announced a layoff plan at the beginning of this year, and 50 percent of the employees were laid off in the first round.
This matter caused a lot of uproar at the time, but it was quickly suppressed.
Leading websites like Pintuan, Dianping, Lashou, Nuomi, and Wowotuan only look forward and not backward when doing marketing, so it is normal to miss some information from the future.
I just didn’t expect Tuanbao.com to be so miserable and go bankrupt.
But what surprised Jiang Qin was that they did not just suddenly go bankrupt, because just three days before Tuanbao.com was deserted, they held a large discount event.
In other words, they once sold discount coupons from their own website on a large scale, then exchanged them for money, and they were gone immediately.
This matter was exposed, and the matter suddenly became a big deal.
Group buying is currently the hottest emerging industry, especially the combination of Alipay and group buying, which has even been given the title of "changing the times".
Once the scandal broke out, many mainstream media outlets across the country began to follow suit.
Merchants who had cooperated with Tuanbao.com saw the news and directly announced to unilaterally terminate the cooperation and no longer recognize their coupons.
The coupons in the hands of consumers are not even waste paper because they have lost their original value. They are just a string of codes and a text message.
As a result, Baidu Tieba was instantly filled with angry consumers.
"I have accumulated 30 supermarket shopping vouchers. Are they useless?"
"Damn it, I've said group buying is a scam. How can it be so cheap? I've really been ripped off!"
"Call the police, call the police immediately!"
"Do you guys have WeChat? I have set up a rights protection group, the group number is posted below."
"The government must give us an explanation for this matter!"
“What does the government have to do with it?”
"The government allows this kind of website to operate. Shouldn't it strengthen control? How can they just run away like that?"
"We have called the police. They said they will file a case and asked us to go back and wait for news."
"I'm not a consumer, I'm the owner of Zhenguo Supermarket. Tuanbao.com hasn't paid me for three months!"
"I am also a merchant, and they still owe me more than 800,000 yuan!"
"It's over. They didn't even pay the merchants. This website must have run away!"
Jiang Qin clicked into the forum and silently read the comments, his expression gradually becoming more serious.
Just like what he talked about with the old professor during class, group buying websites have developed rapidly and fiercely, but at this stage, the market will definitely cool down slowly.
Websites like group buying have a strong ability to resist risks and may not be affected too much, but some websites that are already struggling will definitely suffer a funding cut.
But Jiang Qin really didn't expect Tuanbao.com's operation.
He actually sold a lot of coupons before going bankrupt and ran away with the money. As a result, the credibility of the entire group buying industry may be affected.
Because when people buy coupons on other group buying websites, they will definitely worry whether it will be the next Tuanbao.com.
"Old Jiang, do you still want to drink?"
"No more drinking, let's focus on business."
Jiang Qin held up a finger and said, "See? I press this finger down and millions appear."
After hearing this, Cao Guangyu crushed the can in his hand: "Fuck, too pretentious."
Zhang Guangfa looked at Jiang Qin and had an illusion that the classmate sitting next to him was a billionaire, so he burped and said, "I think what Mr. Jiang said might be true."
"Need I tell you? Of course it's true!" Cao Guangyu slammed the table.
"Then why do you say that Mr. Jiang is showing off?"
"I'm fucking angry because it's real. If it's fake, I won't be hurt!"
Jiang Qin laughed twice, then copied the WeChat group number in the post and joined it.
Many rights defenders have already joined the group and are communicating in the traditional Chinese language. The voices for defending their rights are extremely loud. Even if you suddenly send a pornographic picture in, it may not be able to interrupt their scolding.
Then major media outlets also began to follow up, and news about the group buying website suddenly running away began to spread across the entire Internet.
Some experts even came out to comment on this phenomenon.
"The popularity of the group-buying market itself is abnormal, so it is not surprising that this situation has occurred..."
"For an industry that burns money, if it fails to upgrade services and operate well, it is only a matter of time before its funding chain runs out."
"There may be more websites like this in the future. Consumers need to choose carefully and not blindly seek cheap prices."
The expert's remarks were not directed solely at Tuanbao.com, but at the entire group-buying industry, and these remarks will inevitably arouse consumers' vigilance.
So in the following days, several leading group buying websites issued statements claiming that they had sufficient funds and that there would absolutely be no accidents.
But the seeds of doubt have been planted, and sometimes they cannot be resolved in a few words. The scammer will not tell you directly and clearly that he is a liar at the beginning.
As a result, many people who liked to hoard coupons began to return their coupons. Even website business such as group buying, which has been constantly marketing its image of integrity, was affected and received a large number of coupon return applications.
The amount of these returned orders is huge, and even added up to be enough to make a website of the size of Lashou.com go bankrupt. As a result, all group buying websites have become a little nervous.
I arrived at six in the morning to catch the flight, and then have been working on the manuscript at the airport. I'll update these first, and continue after I land. There's more to come in the evening.
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
