Just ordered from China, 3-4 days later the shipper delivered to the door, sometimes faster than ordering domestically, very cheap, even "covered" cross-border shipping costs. Why?
The secret to "lightning-fast" shipping orders lies in large-scale livestream centers and warehouses set up both domestically in Vietnam.
Tuoi Tre newspaper reporters have just completed a 10,000km journey, starting from Ho Chi Minh City to Chinese localities including: Hangzhou, Guangzhou, Dongguan, Nanning...
Then continue to the border area of Bang Tuong (bordering Lang Son), Ha Khau (bordering Lao Cai). From there, decode the secret behind the impressive cross-border export model through online channels in terms of quantity, price and delivery time.
Vietnam is in the top of Chinese goods purchasing list.
At nearly 12 midnight, Ms. Duong (HCMC) ordered a mini neck fan from a store. Chinese goods on Shopee. Thought I would have to wait 7-10 days because of international shipping, but surprisingly three days later the item was delivered to my home.
"Faster than buying from some stores I ordered from in Hanoi. They don't deliver quickly and then increase the fee, but they offer free shipping. The product is good and the design is pretty," Ms. Duong praised.
According to the itinerary reported on the shopping app, this fan had to go through a series of stages: from Shenzhen warehouse, to Bang Tuong border gate (bordering Lang Son), imported into Vietnam, then delivered to a shipping unit in Vietnam, to a sorting warehouse in Ho Chi Minh City, to the delivery station in Binh Thanh district.
To learn about Chinese logistics "technology", in mid-2024, Tuoi Tre newspaper reporters traced the route of transporting goods into Vietnam, to the "capital" of the Dongguan logistics area (Guangdong province), specializing in gathering international transit goods.
After the customer books through the platform e-commerce, large volumes of goods from many localities in China are gathered here, traveling thousands of kilometers to Vietnam.
This warehouse is operated by Best Inc - a Chinese "logistics giant". This is a business that owns a closed ecosystem, transporting goods for e-commerce platform big Shopee, Lazada, TikTok. Not only operating in the country of a billion people, they also expand in Vietnam, Thailand, Philippines, USA...
Taking us on a tour of the warehouse in Dongguan, Mr. Cuc Uy Giang - director of Best Cross-border (cross-border transportation business) - said that this place is one of the important links in the closed ecosystem.
The seller only needs to type in the key/order, the shipping unit will receive the goods, transport them, clear customs, and bring them to Vietnam. They will deliver them to the customer in just a few days, cutting out the intermediary step through other units in the traditional way, thereby optimizing costs.
Inside the e-commerce warehouse for international transit, there is an area of over 3,000m2 . Small, large, bulky... containers from many provinces and cities in China are continuously transported.
The staff here checks the weight, size, and labels to distinguish goods shipped to Vietnam or other countries in Southeast Asia, and also tracks the delivery journey.
In Southeast Asia, Mr. Giang said Vietnam is always in the top group receiving the most goods from this warehouse, at some times second only to the Philippines.
Customers include: Chinese businesses operating in Vietnam, Chinese individuals and businesses with stores on e-commerce platforms in Vietnam, Vietnamese e-commerce platforms. Commonly include household appliances, electronics, clothing, machinery...
On the side of this warehouse, dozens of vehicles and containers are lined up neatly, waiting to be loaded with goods to go to the border.
Goods pass through the border gate at night and reach Vietnamese customers in the morning.
Standing next to a container truck waiting to be loaded with goods, Mr. Hoang (driver, Chinese) shared that every week he has several trips full of e-commerce goods to Vietnam.
The distance is far but short because it is on the highway, minimum 80km/h, the road is clear. The car is rarely stopped or checked along the way.
Randomly selecting a cargo box with the symbol VN-L and the bill of lading code BSO924..., we follow the shipping route, many interesting things appear in the race for speed and cheap freight rates.
At exactly 2:50 p.m. on July 3, the container containing batch BSO924... full of goods began moving to Bang Tuong border gate (bordering Lang Son) with a distance of more than 800km.
Arrived the next morning, completed customs clearance procedures through Vietnam in the afternoon. Then, the shipping unit in Vietnam received, classified and finished on July 6 and was ready to deliver to the customer in Thanh Khe district, Da Nang.
Thus, the total time from when the container truck leaves the Dongguan warehouse (China) until it is ready to be delivered to the customer in Da Nang is only about three days with a distance of more than 1,700km, including customs clearance and import procedures.
Note that before leaving the warehouse, this shipment (including goods ordered by businesses and goods purchased by customers on e-commerce platforms) waits for about a week. The goods are sent by ZTO (a Chinese domestic logistics giant) for Best to bring to Vietnam.
Notably, there is another way in which the seller coordinates with a Chinese logistics company to deliver goods "lightning fast" at a low price.
Back at the Lang Son border, we picked up a container shipped from China. This shipment was transported by the Chinese seller to the border gate area (under the form of Seller Own Fleet), then Best received it right at the border and took care of the remaining distance. Through the border gate at night, to the Vietnamese customer in the morning is what we witnessed.
Vietnamese people, Vietnamese warehouse, Vietnamese sewing machine move very fast
At 7:30 p.m., a container truck with license plate 12F 002... carrying Chinese e-commerce goods gradually rolled out of the Huu Nghi border gate area (Lang Son), heading towards Best's sorting center in Bac Ninh.
On the night bus, Mr. Thinh (48 years old, Vietnamese driver) confided that he has 20 years of experience, from driving dump trucks, trucks to large containers. In recent years, e-commerce has developed, work has become more stable, he has money to take care of his family. Every day, this container driver drives about 300km.
At around 10:45 p.m., after more than three hours of travel, we arrived at the Vietnam - Singapore Industrial Park in Bac Ninh. Here, Mr. Thinh drove the car into the Best Express Goods Sorting Center, which is over 45,000 square meters wide and has an investment of 5.5 million USD.
Approaching the container door, Mr. Thinh cut the sealing wire, proving that the goods were "intact".
As soon as the container door opened, many employees immediately unloaded the goods. Large sacks of Chinese goods were put on the conveyor belt, then separated into small packages, passed through the barcode scanner, and automatically sorted into the storage compartments of each different post office, very quickly.
Randomly picking up a package that had just been unloaded from a container truck from the border, we continued to monitor the journey. At around 1am the next morning, this package and many other goods were loaded onto large and small trucks, waiting to be sent to the post offices.
Before 6am, the car was already at the post office in Vinhomes Ocean Park urban area (Gia Lam, Hanoi). That same morning, the post office staff contacted and delivered to the customer.
On the morning of June 30, holding in his hand a bean bag chair ordered from China for only VND390,000, Nguyen Van Phap (20 years old) said he ordered it on Shopee on June 22 (so the total time was about eight days, not too fast).
However, Phap said: "The price is quite reasonable, the product is bulky in size 110x110cm, but the shipping fee from China according to the quote is only 10,000 VND. This order has a promotional code, free shipping fee".
Regularly buying Chinese goods, France said that before he had to wait about 14 days, but now it has been shortened a lot.
Because of the cheap price, diverse designs, and stable quality, it is acceptable. The bean bag chair was just received, most of the time related to the stages in China. When the goods just passed the Vietnam border gate at night, they were received in Hanoi the next morning.
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