The past few months, we’ve been stationed in Singapore, a place we potentially want to call home for the next few years. While the city is pride for its safety, cleanness, and efficiency, the livability is in question (for me) all because its terrible digital retailing ecosystem. As a major transportation hub, plenty of goods are shipped via Singapore from all over the world. It is also a major testing ground for companies who want to enter the Asian (or Southeast Asian) market. You can buy almost anything in the world and get it shipped to Singapore. With its strategic logistical backdrop, Singapore is supposed to be a place I though I’d be able to get anything within a timely manner. The past few months however, proved my hypothesis awfully wrong.
In the States, we often order and automate purchases for all things we need for our day-to-day household from two major retailers: Target and Amazon. Both these companies have almost all range of products we ever need at the reasonable price—and most importantly deliver within a promised timely manner. The mobile apps and desktop websites also work together seamlessly.
When we first arrived in Singapore, we initially opted in to buy things in nearby supermarkets and pharmacies but soon realized online pricing tend to be much better than in-store stickers, so I started doing research on where to shop online. Overwhelmed by the super apps in Asia, I decided the best place to start would be Amazon Singapore. The Amazon app looks identical with a small caveat—you almost always need to meet the minimum SGD 60 spending before goods can be shipped complimentary. Meeting the minimum was never an issue for us. We cancelled our prime a long time ago to avoid spontaneous purchases, so having a minimum is helping us keeping things in the cart as we sleep on it. So what is the issue here? The issue is two parts. One, our order almost never delivered on time. Two, our order cannot be tracked. This perhaps is a very classic service design problem. The frontend interface is designed in a way to provide good user experience but the back stage activities are all over the places which make the frontend user experience essentially useless. The promised delivery time cannot be met because logistically there is a gap. The tracking doesn’t work because there is no sufficient date updated in the system to be fed into the tracking bar. For that reason, I never know when I’d receive my goods and where my goods are. AND—there’s been multiple incidences that order is placed and even customer reps have no way of figuring out if my good would ever be delivered except asking me to check back again the next day. What happened to these orders at the end? they eventually never made it. Usually after waiting for an absurdly long amount of time, the order would be automatically cancelled and then I was asked to reorder again. To be honest, I almost decided to start a case study on how international businesses implement their operational strategy across the globe because it seems to me that it is impossible to keep up with the same standard of experience even for well-profited companies like Amazon.
Now, let’s look at local player since international player can’t deliver a good online experience in Singapore. Shopee is a local online retailer that has footprint across Southeast Asia, Taiwan, and Latin America. While I intentionally try to avoid super app, since Amazon could not deliver, I had to give these super apps a shot. All the problems I mentioned with Amazon, unfortunately, are also found with Shopee. In fact, there were a number of times, the third-party local delivery parties handed my goods to the wrong building. With their required picture-proof delivery, I was able to trace where the goods are. And I guess thanks to the honesty of Singaporean citizens, my goods are always re-routed back to me if I reach out to the building security. But it is a hike. I once even had a delivery driver, afraid of losing his job, so he asked me to write to Shopee after my goods were returned to me from a different building resident.
After my disappointment with Shopee, I tried another local super app called Lazada. I also tried Shein and Taobao from China. Not a fan of any of them but I don’t really have a choice if I want to purchase things online instead of in person. Another unique incident happened in this online shopping experience is that I once ordered a product with picture of Frida Baby branding but ended up received a white label product that didn’t have the Frida Baby branding but with all the specs and packaging the same as the branded one. Why? I assume the manufacturer that make the product decided to sell the product online. And that’s perhaps why I got a discounted pricing online rather than in-store. Fascinating, isn’t it!?
Why do we shop online? I don’t know about you. I shop online because it’s supposed to be efficient. I don’t always have the time to go to different stores to pick up my kid’s diaper or 3M hooks I need for my shoe rack. Shopping online is supposed to take off some of those mental loads for the modern working mothers and anyone who want to spend time at the most valuable things rather than chores. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been the case in Singapore. Oh and those super apps? If you’re curious, I encourage you to check it out. If you live in the U.S., I think you’ll be very happy to know that Target is your go-to store!