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Walmart launches Hypermarket O2O platform “Walmart To Go” in China

Walmart launched its hypermarket O2O platform "Walmart To Go" in the Chinese city of Shenzhen on Tuesday. The platform consists of the newly launched "Walmart" mobile shopping APP, To Go Service Centre, in stores for self-pickup and multiple online & offline e-payment options.

Walmart will pilot "Walmart To Go" in Shenzhen (except Yantian and Dapeng) and provide quality e-commerce experience to customers with its network of 23 stores. "Walmart To Go" will be adjusted and upgraded according to customers’ feedbacks and gradually expand its service nationwide.

By searching for key word "Walmart" in both iOS and Android APP stores, customers can easily download the APP onto their phones. Currently the APP offers more than 10,000 items, with 1000 fresh/dairy/frozen SKUs as well as products covering grocery, health and beauty products and household chemicals. More items sold in physical stores will be added to the APP gradually.

"Walmart To Go" is aimed to provide quality shopping experience to customers. From ordering on the APP, picking products from the shelf, to home delivery or in store self-pick-up, customers will experience a thoughtful service by Walmart dedicated teams.

"’Walmart To Go’ is an important milestone as it is an enhancement and extension to our brick and mortar business. We are uniquely positioned to integrate physical and digital retail seamlessly. Walmart wants to be a real O2O company. We will continue to innovate both online and offline to meet the changing demands of our customers, and will be the most trusted omni-channel retailer in China," Sean Clarke, President and CEO of Walmart China spoke at the "Walmart To Go" launch ceremony.

To provide the best delivery services to Chinese consumers, Walmart leveraged its experience in the US, UK, and other comparably more matured E-Commerce markets. Every physical store acts as an independent customer service and operation centre with a dedicated team of Walmart staff responsible for APP orders. These trained specialists will cover the order preparation process from product picking, packaging, to delivering or handing the products to customers in store. For fresh foods that require a certain storage temperature, the Walmart delivery team will use special insulated bags to guarantee the same off-the-shelf freshness a customer expects in a Walmart store.

Meanwhile, Walmart works with logistics company to build delivery team only responsible for Walmart orders.

If customers choose home-delivery services and complete an order before 11 am, the products can be delivered on the same day. Delivery fee will be free of charge if the purchase is over CNY188. Customers can also decide to pick up their order in any store they want. The assigned store will prepare the items within about 4 hours according to customer preference of the pick-up time. After customers receive the reminder message on their mobile phone, they could go to the "To Go Centre" to pick up the order by order number.

Products sold on the APP are the same as the ones sold in physical stores. APP users also enjoy the same price and after sales services as in physical stores. Walmart’s 100 percent Worry Free Fresh Guarantee also applies on APP. If APP users are not satisfied with the fresh products they bought, they could refund within 14 days of purchase.

Walmart APP provides flexible payment options for customers such as Union Pay, Alipay and E gift cards. Walmart physical stores will also have special e-payment checkouts to accept Alipay and other mobile payment methods. The retail giant said it will add more e-payments in the stores and on the APP in the future to provide more convenient payment services.