As New Year's Day approaches, e-commerce giants are once again introducing novel tactics in the instant retail space. Driven by sales promotions, on December 25th, the 30 Beijing stores of 7Fresh Kitchen received over 16,000 orders. Simultaneously, Taotian Group and Meituan have also rolled out "Double Festival" promotional banners, offering substantial membership coupons. In the eyes of many industry insiders, 2025 is poised to be the breakout year for instant retail. Throughout this year, the three major e-commerce titans have been fiercely competing in the instant retail arena, escalating the battle from one-dimensional price wars to a comprehensive test of their entire platform business ecosystems, thereby reshaping the market landscape. As the market scale approaches the trillion-yuan mark, sustainable profitability will become the next major hurdle for e-commerce companies.
The race to capture the holiday market is intensifying. "Since opening today until 11 a.m., our store has already dispatched over 500 orders, and we are still experiencing a surge," reported the store manager of the 7Fresh Kitchen at Changbao Plaza in Beijing to a reporter. During the lunch peak hours, numerous delivery riders from platforms like JD.com and Meituan were busy picking up orders inside the store. A rider who frequently works in the area mentioned receiving roughly a dozen orders daily from 7Fresh Kitchen locations.
The dramatic surge in orders is primarily fueled by marketing campaigns. Recently, 7Fresh Kitchen launched a promotion in Beijing offering free chocolate with every order, an initiative also featured on the homepage of JD.com's main platform. According to JD.com's statistics, within just three hours of operation, the total order volume across all Beijing 7Fresh Kitchen stores had already surpassed 16,000 orders.
JD.com launched its first 7Fresh Kitchen store at Changbao Plaza at the end of July this year. Currently, 7Fresh Kitchen has expanded to 30 locations in Beijing, achieving basic coverage within the Fifth Ring Road. The store manager at the Changbao Plaza location noted that their customer base mainly consists of nearby residents, office workers, and students.
Ahead of the New Year holiday, major e-commerce platforms have already adorned their sites with promotional banners. An industry insider revealed that, based on past trends, sales of gift-oriented items such as cosmetics and skincare sets, trendy gifts, and gold typically see significant increases during the year-end holiday season. Additionally, symbolic fruit gift boxes, mulled wine, and festive candy assortments also become hot sellers. "During holidays, fresh produce e-commerce platforms will concentrate on promoting fresh ingredients suitable for group gatherings, along with snacks and other related products," the insider added.
Currently, fresh grocery platforms like Dingdong Maicai and Hema have launched themed pages such as "Warm Winter Party" and "Good Times Together" catering to social gathering scenarios. Meituan and Taotian have also introduced campaigns like "50% Off Holiday Hot Sellers" and "Flash Sale New Customer Benefits Zones" to attract shoppers, while releasing multiple high-value membership coupons.
The competition among the major players has been fierce this year. JD.com, Meituan, and Taotian are engaged in a "Three Kingdoms" style battle in the instant retail sector, competing online for new businesses like food delivery and hotel/travel services, while vying offline through hard discount models and flash sale warehouse networks.
In March, JD.com aggressively entered its competitors' core territories with strategies emphasizing "quality," zero commissions, and social security benefits for riders. Within 90 days of launch, its daily order volume surpassed 25 million, with over 2 million merchants joining the platform. The cross-selling potential from JD.com's high-frequency delivery consumption prompted Alibaba to move from observation to action, investing 50 billion yuan in subsidies to enter the fray. During the summer peak season, daily order volumes for Taobao Flash Sale and Meituan Delivery both exceeded 100 million.
Sensing the incremental business opportunities, the e-commerce giants are not only investing heavily but also restructuring organizations and integrating resources to besiege their rivals. In June, Alibaba initiated its "Major Consumption Platform" strategy, incorporating businesses like Ele.me and Fliggy into its China Commerce Business Unit, and integrating a unified membership system covering "food, drink, entertainment, and leisure" to enable cross-scenario benefit sharing. By the end of December, the Ele.me app was fully revamped and rebranded as "Taobao Flash Sale."
This year, the two e-commerce platforms have marshalled their full forces to challenge Meituan's long-established dominance in the local life services market, compelling the latter to consolidate resources and defend its position. This defensive battle is critical not only for Meituan's market share but also for defining the future "gateway" to local生活 services.
In April, Meituan elevated "Meituan Flash Sale" to a primary entry point on its app's homepage, strengthening its full-category coverage in instant retail. Concurrently, Meituan made strategic cuts, discontinuing non-core businesses like Tuantuan Haohuo and Meituan Youxuan to focus resources on instant retail. Its network of "Flash Sale Warehouses" has now exceeded 30,000, covering 2,800 cities and counties. Towards the year-end, Meituan not only signed Jay Chou as a brand ambassador to enhance brand recognition but also removed the 15-kilometer delivery limit for flower categories and accelerated its "One-to-One Express Delivery" service.
"Alibaba has deep pockets and a long 'health bar,' and they have indeed taken a significant share of the food delivery market from Meituan, creating substantial pressure. However, in the hotel and travel segment, Meituan's roots are deeper, so the impact feels less intense," commented an internal source at Meituan.
Amid the pursuit involving manpower, resources, and capital, the instant retail performance of traditional e-commerce platforms has been particularly notable this year. In the third quarter, Alibaba's instant retail revenue surged 60% year-over-year, while JD.com's "New Businesses" segment, which includes its food delivery operations, saw a sequential growth of 12.56%. However, the cost of this growth has been steep, with Alibaba's operating profit plummeting 85% year-over-year in the same quarter.
Clearly, sustaining massive subsidies indefinitely is not feasible. Consequently, e-commerce companies are leveraging their inherent strengths to implement countermeasures. JD.com, for instance, is not only addressing market needs by incubating innovative formats like 7Fresh Kitchen and 7Fresh Gourmet Mall but also utilizing its supply chain capabilities to reduce costs and increase efficiency. Merchants入驻ing 7Fresh Gourmet Mall can共享 resources from JD.com's retail and logistics divisions, thereby lowering their operational expenses.
Alibaba is integrating near-field and far-field e-commerce resources, utilizing models like Taobao Convenience Store flash sale warehouses to help more brands access the instant retail market. This approach enriches the product assortment while also potentially improving profit margins. Jiang Fan, CEO of Alibaba's China Commerce Business Unit, stated that the next phase for Taobao Flash Sale will involve meticulously refining the user experience, focusing on managing high-value customers, and developing retail categories. It is understood that non-beverage orders on Taobao Flash Sale now account for over 75% of the total, with the average order value increasing by a double-digit percentage sequentially since August.
According to a report from the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, China's instant retail scale is projected to reach 9.714 trillion yuan this year, surpass 10 trillion yuan next year, and potentially hit 20 trillion yuan by 2030, with an average annual growth rate of 12.6% during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period.
Looking ahead to 2026, the rivalry among e-commerce giants in the local生活 services domain is expected to persist, and the competitive landscape of the instant retail market will remain fluid. However, it is evident that the decisive factors for victory will no longer be confined to the scale of subsidies or order volume alone. Instead, the battle will hinge on a multi-dimensional contest involving a company's ecosystem synergy, operational refinement, and supply chain efficiency.