On September 20th, when setting the location to Shanghai, reporters discovered the "local group buying" feature on the Taobao Flash Sale page.

Unlike Gaode's high-profile launch of the "Gaode Street Scanning List," the launch of "local group buying" was handled extremely low-key.

On the same day, Taobao Flash Sale confirmed that the group buying launch was authentic. The local group buying business has been initiated, initially covering core commercial areas in three cities: Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Jiaxing. Categories include beverages, desserts, dining, buffets, and various local specialty snacks across multiple restaurant categories.

According to the company, this represents a natural business development. Meanwhile, after entering some merchant pages through the "Gaode Street Scanning List," the "group buying" feature was also visible. Additionally, under the "Magic Coupons" page in Alipay's "Card Package" interface, the "local group buying" option can also be found.

For Taobao Flash Sale, launching "local services" not only completes an important piece of its local lifestyle puzzle but also adds more functionality to the Taobao app. For the already intensely competitive local lifestyle track, this move by the Alibaba ecosystem undoubtedly adds fuel to an already heated battle.

On the Taobao Flash Sale page, the newly launched group buying mainly includes high-frequency consumption categories such as beverages, bread, snacks, and fast food.

In fact, this is not Alibaba's first venture into "local group buying" services.

In 2008, Koubei was fully acquired by Alibaba; in 2018, Alibaba announced the formal merger of Ele.me and Koubei, with Koubei focusing on "local" scenario services, centered on mobile ordering, providing consumers with comprehensive services including store discovery, coupon collection, ordering, payment, and reviews.

After being acquired by Alibaba, Koubei's development has not been smooth. In 2021, Koubei disappeared from Alipay's bottom navigation tabs.

In March 2023, Gaode held an internal meeting announcing its formal merger with Koubei, Alibaba's local lifestyle business. At the time, messages indicated that all of Alibaba's local lifestyle services would be unified and integrated into the Gaode Map interface.

However, multiple sources now suggest that neither Gaode's rankings nor the group buying services from Taobao Flash Sale and Ele.me are related to Koubei anymore.

Regarding the prospects of the "local group buying" business jointly launched by Taobao Flash Sale and Ele.me, renowned digital economy scholar and expert committee member of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's Information and Communication Economics Expert Committee, Pan Helin, stated that Taobao Flash Sale's local group buying represents a new business venture for Taobao that could help develop new group buying models.

"Group buying essentially exchanges volume for price. On one hand, it can attract customers for traffic generation, and on the other hand, it can facilitate cooperation between Taobao Flash Sale and more offline stores," Pan said.

Notably, on September 10th, marking Alibaba's 26th anniversary, Gaode Map under Alibaba announced the launch of the world's first user behavior-based ranking list, the "Gaode Street Scanning List." According to Gaode's disclosure at the time, Gaode Map covers over 7 million restaurant locations nationwide, with currently 120 million daily life service-related searches and navigation to 13 million life service destinations.

Looking at Alibaba's current local service business layout, the "Gaode Street Scanning List" focuses more on content services for the local lifestyle industry, while Taobao Flash Sale and Ele.me handle group buying business, each with distinct roles.

"Alibaba's layout this time represents a response to the enormous market demand for local lifestyle services," said Zhang Yi, CEO and Chief Analyst of iiMedia Research. Alibaba is building a complete ecosystem for home delivery and local services. "Currently, Alibaba has integrated e-commerce, payment, transportation, and delivery services, which helps improve overall efficiency and user experience in local lifestyle services, accelerates digitalization of the local lifestyle service market, and drives the market toward greater diversification and integration." However, he also noted that this means competition in the local lifestyle market will become even more intense.

It's worth noting that "local group buying" is not an easy business to operate.

Zhuang Shuai, founder of Bailei Consulting, explained that currently, only Meituan and Douyin perform relatively well in "local group buying," "but the overall market share is not particularly large."

Zhuang believes there's a paradox in local services: good stores don't need promotion and subsidies, while poor stores won't improve even with promotion and subsidies. So most platforms focus on promoting new stores and new products, along with payment subsidies and review systems.

Before Alibaba refocused on the "local group buying" market, Douyin had already made moves.

In November 2024, Douyin's Life Service Learning Center announced that the original "group buying delivery" business would gradually migrate to the "Freestyle Group" business starting November 1st, meaning the same group buying product would support both in-store redemption and home delivery.

In July 2025, according to reports, since Douyin Life Service began trial operations of "Freestyle Group" business at the end of 2024, it has attracted quality merchants based on premium brand admission standards, primarily chain brands covering beverages, Western fast food, bakery desserts, Chinese dining, and other categories. The platform continues to encourage brand chain merchants to join.

According to reports, Douyin Life Service's "Freestyle Group" main feature is "group buying for in-store or delivery," allowing Douyin users to choose between in-store dining experiences or home delivery of the same group buying products after purchasing group buying coupons on the platform, meeting diverse consumer needs for "freestyle" group buying.

Regarding the prospects of Alibaba's "local group buying" business, Zhuang Shuai believes Alibaba has Alipay, providing payment subsidy advantages. "Additionally, Alibaba has Gaode Map and Taobao Live, plus Taobao's already well-established and mature review system, all of which are advantages for local group buying." However, he also mentioned that the disadvantage is that user mindset still needs time to establish.

For this business, Pan Helin believes Alibaba's advantage lies in Taobao Flash Sale's recent rapid growth, and merchants use such features primarily for traffic and customer acquisition. "Abundant traffic naturally helps local group buying expand quickly."

Pan also mentioned that Alibaba faces competition in the local group buying field. "How to differentiate and distinguish from competitors to achieve flywheel effects in local group buying business is a challenge for Taobao Flash Sale."

Zhang Yi stated that Alibaba's launched group buying business will undoubtedly compete directly with Meituan.

Zhang analyzed: "Meituan has always led significantly in local group buying, while Alibaba has traffic advantages and resource integration capabilities, especially with long-term focus on female user demographics."

Currently, Alibaba's strategic direction has become relatively clear.

In June this year, Alibaba Group CEO Wu Yongming issued an all-hands email announcing the merger of Ele.me and Fliggy into Alibaba's China E-commerce Business Group. At the time, Wu stated in the letter: "This is our strategic upgrade from an e-commerce platform to a comprehensive consumption platform."

At the end of August, Alibaba's Q1 FY2026 financial report showed that the instant retail business achieved rapid phased results, with the first three weeks of August driving a 25% year-over-year increase in monthly active consumers on the Taobao app. Wu Yongming stated at the time: "Through integrating our consumption platform, we're generating significant synergistic effects, driving monthly active consumers and daily order volume to new highs."

Under the strategic goal of building a comprehensive consumption platform, Alibaba's layout in local services is logical. What offensive moves Alibaba will make next deserves further attention.