Company:Baopals

From HandWiki
Baopals
Baopals-Logo-June-2016-Blue-Orange-200px.png
Type of businessPrivately held company
Type of site
Online shopping
FoundedJuly 2015; 8 years ago (2015-07)
Shanghai, China
Headquarters
Shanghai
,
China
Area servedChina
Founder(s)Charles Erickson
Jay Thornhill
Tyler McNew
Key peopleCharles Erickson (Head of Business Development)
Jay Thornhill (Head of Product Development),
Tyler McNew (Head of Tech Development)
Websitewww.baopals.com
Alexa rankIncrease 27,439 ((As of November 2017))[1]
LaunchedFebruary 2016

Baopals is an online shopping platform based in Shanghai, China, that enables users to shop from Taobao and Tmall in English. The platform serves as a bridge to products and sellers on Taobao and Tmall, with information updated in real-time and translated to English. Product organization, customer service, payment, and delivery are geared towards non-Chinese users. The platform is accessible online as well through the company's official WeChat service account.

The platform organizes products into departments, subcategories and selects official Tmall stores and products to highlight throughout the website and blog. Baopals currently operates out of the Jing'an District of Shanghai, with an office dog named Doge who was pictured in an article from China Daily about the benefits of having pets in the workplace.[2]

In October 2017, Baopals was the first foreign team to receive honors and win the “Top 10 Up-and-Coming Entrepreneurs in Shanghai” award — one of the longest running startup contests in the city held by the Shanghai Human Resources and Social Security Bureau.[3]

In a 2018 interview with CNBC, Baopals reported that over 2 million items have been sold on the platform, with a gross merchandise value of over US$14 million. [4]

History

Baopals was founded in Shanghai, China. After seven months of development, the platform opened to beta users in February 2016.

In an interview with China Daily, Charles Erickson said:

The idea was born out of necessity from all of us. I was always asking my Chinese colleagues to help me buy things on Taobao. So, we just wanted to figure out a way to do this independently.[5]

On the company's tech platform, Jay Thornhill said:

[People may] think that we’re hand selecting products from Taobao and Tmall, but our tech actually bridges everything over from Taobao and Tmall automatically, in real time. So all the products and sellers are there.[6]

In 2017, Baopals was the winner of the OTEC International Startup Competition and Shanghai Innovation and Startup Competition. According to a profile on Baopals from Shanghai Daily digital media blog Shine, approximately 43 percent of Baopals orders come from shoppers in Shanghai, 20 percent originate in Beijing and the rest flow from other parts of China.[7]

Recognition

After launching in February 2016, Baopals was featured by local media in Shanghai. That's Shanghai wrote: "Worry no more, because Baopals was tailor-made for you. Is it Taobao translated into English? Well, yes, but you could just as easily do that on your browser. What Baopals does instead is reconfigure the interface, making it sleek and approachable, and compartmentalizing all that miscellanea into 16 categories. Game status: changed."[8]

In April, City Weekend (Shanghai) published a piece on Baopals, saying, "At long, long last: shopping start-up Baopals has cracked the world of Taobao and Tmall wide open for the expat community. Translating the treasure trove of these products into English would have been enough, but the company also offers phenomenally easy delivery and payment options that reflect the gradually opening Chinese market in which us expats participate on a daily basis. Unlike existing concierge services that act more as middlemen, the Baopals team wanted to provide a more independent shopping experience."[9]

In the following months Baopals received national attention in an article from the Global Times in an article about young foreign entrepreneurs in China,[10] and was featured on the front page of Tech Crunch media partner TechNode, who wrote: "While a handful of expat entrepreneurs try to bring innovation from their country to China, this startup builds on the success of one of China’s largest companies and adapts it to expat tastes."[11]

An article published in March 2017 by City Weekend (Beijing) referred to the platform as "...a solution for those of us illiterate in Chinese." [12] A photo essay published in August by China Daily quoted Charles Erickson as saying, "When you return to the west, you realize that opportunities are still in China".[13]

In August 2017, 海豚视频 (Dolphin Video) published a comedic video[14] filmed at the Baopals office and co-founder's home outlining the history of the company and some of the crazier products available for purchase of the platform. Within the first 12 hours of publication the video received over 1 million views, peaking at 1.95 million two days later.

References

  1. ↑ "Baopals. Site Info". Alexa Internet. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/baopals.com. Retrieved 2017-03-15. 
  2. ↑ Wenting, Zhou (15 August 2016). "Office pets cut stress, help morale". China Daily. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2016-08/15/content_26472301.htm. 
  3. ↑ Huizhi, Chen (26 October 2017). "Expats win prize in entrepreneurs contest". Shanghai Daily. https://www.shine.cn/archive/metro/society/Expats-win-prize-in-entrepreneurs-contest/shdaily.shtml. 
  4. ↑ Saiidi, Uptin (4 October 2018). "How three Americans founded an award-winning start-up in China". CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/04/baopals-americans-founded-an-award-winning-start-up-in-china.html. 
  5. ↑ Gonzalez, Emma (7 May 2016). "Website makes online shopping easier for expats". China Daily. Archived from the original on 8 May 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160508120437/http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/tech/2016-05/07/content_25124288.htm. 
  6. ↑ Jain, Mayura (22 April 2016). "One More Thing: Baopals". City Weekend. http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/shanghai/article/one-more-thing-baopals/. 
  7. ↑ Daily, China (16 August 2017). "Three American entrepreneurs' Chinese dream". Shine. http://www.shine.cn/biz/tech/27df91ef-3e9a-4fb0-ace9-2e88fa3f6c8e/shdaily.shtml. 
  8. ↑ dos Santos, Lucas (24 March 2016). "This New Website Translates Taobao into English". That's Mags. Archived from the original on 7 May 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160507122000/http://www.thatsmags.com/china/post/12796/baopals-taobao-for-the-rest-of-us/. 
  9. ↑ Jain, Mayura (22 April 2016). "One More Thing: Baopals". City Weekend. http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/shanghai/article/one-more-thing-baopals/. 
  10. ↑ Wang, Han (17 July 2016). "Foreign entrepreneurs find Shanghai friendly for new businesses". Global Times. http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/994772.shtml. 
  11. ↑ Yoo, Eva (18 September 2016). "This Startup Provides Taobao And Tmall For Expats In China". TechNode. http://technode.com/2016/09/18/startup-provides-taobao-tmall-expats/l. 
  12. ↑ Yan, Mina (15 March 2017). "Baopals: Taobao of the People". City Weekend. http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/beijing/article/baopals-taobao-of-people. 
  13. ↑ Yan, Mina (15 March 2017). "Baopals: Taobao of the People". China Daily. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2017-08/16/content_30684310.htm. 
  14. ↑ "美国人的中国梦:边逛淘宝边赚钱". Dolphin Video. 25 August 2017. http://www.miaopai.com/show/vKZBqrm59awfe4-BLG9PPvwdpjkGAAVROVOsOQ__.htm. 




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