Alibaba Group Holding Limited's logistics affiliate Cainiao has established its first supermarket distribution center in Chengdu.
This new outpost will allow users in southwestern China to enjoy next-day delivery services for Tmall.com supermarket products.
Investment totals for the new center were not made public.
Cainiao also revealed plans to increase the number of supermarket distribution centers to seven, allowing grocery products ordered on Tmall Supermarkets to be delivered to more than 250 cities in 25 Chinese provinces. Residents in 50 of those cities will be able to enjoy same or next-day delivery service by the end of 2015.
The Chengdu supermarket distribution center will initially provide next-day grocery deliveries to Tmall Supermarket users in Chengdu and Chongqing, and will gradually expand delivery services to other regions in southwestern China. The Tmall supermarket vertical sells groceries, pantry items and other non-perishable fast-moving-consumer goods.
Cainiao plans to add one more centre in Wuhan to cover the provinces of Hubei, Henan and Hunan, as well as rural areas, allowing next-day deliveries to more than 250 cities in 25 Chinese provinces covering a customer base of more than 100 million. The Chengdu centre is the sixth supermarket distribution center. Cainiao has five existing distribution centers in Tianjin, Shanghai, Suzhou, Guangzhou and Jinyi.
