This morning, to my surprise, I got an email from the CEO of eguo.com. It was a pleasant surprise to me, since the letter quickly bring me back to the old days of 2000…
2000 is a crazy year in China. Just like U.S., ecommerce is the buzz word. Everyone is talking about it, investing in it and setting up companys around it. 8848.com is the leader in eCommerce in China (now the company has gone) and I, a small potato, just switched from technical team to eCommerce team and running between one meeting and the other, one project to another, to see how to use Microsoft technology to help build eCommerce.
With this background, eGuo.com stands up with its ambitious plan: 1 hour deliver at anytime in Beijing (within the 4th outter ring road). That is amazing – it happens 5 years ago. They setup 10+ center and hired 300+ workers to deliver the goods with bicycles.
Personally, I am a faithful user of eGuo.com. When I arrive in Cui Gong Hotel near the Microsoft office, I connect to the net and order some thing to eat. Within one hour, a deliver person will know the door of my hotel and bring everything I need. I can pay him cash and get the goods. I remember once, they even bring me a lot of coke as gift – one coke per 10 RMB of purchase.
I worried a lot and think they may not making any money so I will lose this good service soon. I asked the deliver man – how can you make money because the goods are not more expensive than market price, the nice deliver man just told me he didn’t know either. :-)
eGuo.com inspired me a lot of how we can leverage the advantages of China to do realistic ecommerce in China.
You are a big name now. And people would line up to get to know you. Me too. :-)
yeah,i tried Eguo at 2001,too…..
i bought 2 bottle of coke,and i was near tsinghua at that time,it is crazy to bring me those coke for the 5yuan…:D
Actually, eguo one hour is almost dead in Beijing.
It only promised to deliver to locations within 1km to its 9 centers in 1 hour.
Microsoft sigma building is one of the center. lol.
To other locations inside 4th ring road, it promised to deliver on the same day.
I can hardly see a bike with eguo symbol on the street, but joyo or dangdang.
Jian Shuo :
I sent you various messages yesterday – I presume since you haven’t responded that you no longer need any assistance.
Bye
Segway to replace bike? haha, give me a break. Do you know how many bike you can buy with the price of Segway? I guess if you use Segway to deliver Food and Coke, you will lost money no matter how fast you can go
It sounds like the internet version of Shaper’s to me. In this case, that they should have a deal with their partners that from the monthly amount of orders they bring in, they will take certain percentage of it.
Cheers,
K.
“One Hour” is a great idea.
“Segway to replace bike? haha, give me a break. Do you know how many bike you can buy with the price of Segway? I guess if you use Segway to deliver Food and Coke, you will lost money no matter how fast you can go
Posted by: Oncerest on August 22, 2005 02:51 PM ”
LOL yes Onecrest, a Segway. if you want the fastest delivery speed to travel around the city, a Segway is the way to go. Police departments, the US Postal Service and others have found the Segway unbeatable in the US!
A Segway will also keep a pizza *hot* from the time you leave the store with it until it is dropped off at the customer’s place.
wondering who is the VC behind Eguo. Surfed the site briefly yesterday, it seems that the business model and structure needs to have a serious makeover. As an online service provider, the site is not that easy to go around.
hehe in China human power is cheap
Quite intrestinf article posting.I enjoyed reading this.
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Something missing – in US, manpower is so expensive, to buy a segaway is no big deal, but in China, I guess eGuo even want to the deliver guy to deliver in bare foot if possible.