Page 20 - Food & Drink Business Magazine September 2018

FOOD EXPORT
Grey road to China
Suitcase, which was founded by Jessica Rudd after spending a few years living in Bejing as a young mother. When visiting Australia, she would source as many baby products as possible to bring back with her to Beijing.
“I would go to unpack my suitcase and put everything into the pantry, and then all my Chinese mum friends would come over and raid my suitcase, and I would be, like, ‘steady on guys, this is my haul.’
“And, so, what I found
was that this was a natural market... and I thought, well, maybe there’s a business
in this.”
“So I set up my store. It’s called Jessica’s Suitcase, and I sell lots of mother and baby products.”
According to Rudd, it’s not always obvious which products will take off. For instance, she is selling a huge volume of coconut oil at the moment.
“I started selling a product by the name of Absolute Organic Coconut Oil in 900g jars... and it’s now the leading brand of 45 coconut oils on Alibaba platforms, so we’re very proud to have helped an Australian brand.”
Earlier this year, Jessica’s Suitcase merged with a company called eCargo, which is a back office service provider for online retailers, with a view to building on the enormous Daigou opportunity.
Rudd says many Australian food companies have profited from the hard work
of the Daigou community.
They may get a bad rap in the media, but many Australian brands owe their success to the Chinese Daigou.
AUSTRALIA Post recently opened a concept store in the Sydney suburb of Chatswood. It doesn’t offer traditional postal services, though – it stocks health and beauty products bound only for China.
The pilot store is squarely targeting the Chinese Daigou (personal shoppers), of which there are an estimated 70,000 in Australia and a further 20,000 in New Zealand who collectively ship tens of thousands of parcels per day. While the Daigous have attracted criticism for clearing the supermarket shelves of some high-demand products such as organic infant formula, the Daigous also endorse and support many Australian brands, according Livia Wang, a director of consulting firm Access CN, who is an expert on the Daigou phenomenon.
While a lot of people see the
Daigou as illegitimate,
as a group they have high influence, Wang says.
Wang shared her views recently in a panel session at The Australian’s Global Food Forum alongside the chair and founder of Jessica’s Suitcase, Jessica Rudd.
ABOVE: Journalist Glenda Korporaal (left) with Access CN’s Livia Wang and Jessica Rudd of Jessica’s Suitcase.
The panel, which was hosted by journalist Glenda Korporaal, sought to explore what’s happening at the coalface in China.
Wang said the sheer size of the Chinese market meant it could support multiple outlets, alliances and platforms. One such platform is Jessica’s
“They put in the hard work to go out into pharmacies and supermarkets and pick up products that no one in China has ever heard of, and then represent them in that country,” Rudd says.
“I think that ultimately we just have to get better at channelling Daigou demand.” ✷
“ They put in the hard work to go out into pharmacies and supermarkets and pick up products that no one in China has ever heard of, and then represent them in that country.”
20 | Food&Drink business | September 2018 | www.foodanddrinkbusiness.com.au