Business Model Innovation and Evolution of Freshippo -- A Global Online-to-Offline Development Analysis from Premium Membership to Low-Price Discount Stores

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6239-642-5_107How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Freshippo; New Retail; Discount Stores

Abstract

Freshippo, which was launched by Alibaba Group in 2016 as a benchmark for new retail, has a development history that could be regarded as a landmark case for the digital transformation of China's retail industry. According to the “2024 China Supermarket Top 100” data released by the China Chain Store & Franchise Association in July 2025, Freshippo has risen to become one of the third-largest retail enterprises in China's supermarket industry. These rankings place it just behind Walmart China and Kangcheng Investment (China). This achievement signifies that after years of exploration, Freshippo has preliminarily validated the success of its business model. Underpinning this success, Freshippo's attempt to transform its membership-based model stores into discount stores has played a significant role in its development journey. Under this transformation strategy, Freshippo's profit margin has seen significant development. This paper will investigate whether this transformation has had a positive impact on Freshippo by examining its profit margins. The findings of this investigation will offer actionable insights for industry practitioners navigating digital transformation. To show how strategic format pivots could be leveraged to enhance financial sustainability in competitive retail landscapes.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Xiaoyu Li
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/04/29
TI  - Business Model Innovation and Evolution of Freshippo -- A Global Online-to-Offline Development Analysis from Premium Membership to Low-Price Discount Stores
BT  - Proceedings of the 2026 11th International Conference on Financial Innovation and Economic Development (ICFIED 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 1016
EP  - 1023
SN  - 2352-5428
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6239-642-5_107
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6239-642-5_107
ID  - Li2026
ER  -