In the dead of night, when you're scrambling for diapers; at a hotpot dinner, when you realize you're out of sesame paste; or just before heading out, when you notice a missing shirt button—when 'I need it now' becomes the new normal, a consumption revolution dubbed 'Everything Delivered to Your Doorstep' (instant retail) quietly takes off. This 'battle' has brought two industry giants onto the same playing field: on one side stands Meituan, renowned for its food delivery services; on the other, Taobao, offering 'everything under the sun'.

In the instant retail sector, these two companies possess distinct strengths and weaknesses. Meituan, the kingpin of local life services deeply entrenched in the 'local' realm, is making a full-speed push into the 'all-encompassing' goods market from our 'local' life circles, leveraging its minute-level delivery network. Taobao, the e-commerce behemoth with a vast 'all-encompassing' inventory, is attempting to magically 'pre-position' its extensive stock into the intricate networks of every city.

This is not merely a business overlap but a direct clash of two underlying business philosophies. Meituan embarks on an expedition from 'local' to 'all-encompassing', while Taobao launches a strong offensive on 'local' with its 'all-encompassing' advantage.

Thus, the competition in the flash sale arena has escalated: on the surface, it's a contest of 'delivery speed' to consumers and 'comprehensiveness of goods', but at its core, it has evolved into an 'ecosystem synergy efficiency battle' based on the core strengths of the two companies. Whoever can more efficiently translate their advantages into a 'momentary satisfaction' experience for consumers will gain the upper hand in this instant retail battlefield. Behind this, an ultimate showdown between Meituan and Taobao over 'local' and 'all-encompassing' has commenced.

PART 01

Meituan's Battle:

Building an 'All-Encompassing' Moat Based on 'Local'

Meituan is transforming from a mere 'food delivery tool' on our phones into a universal gateway for all instant needs. And Meituan's blitzkrieg begins precisely from its most formidable stronghold: 'local'.

The extensive network woven by millions of Meituan riders across the country makes '30-minute delivery of everything' a reality. This addresses the most fundamental pain point of instant retail—the certainty of delivery. It means 'ensuring fast delivery with minimal failures'.

However, Meituan's shortcomings are equally evident. For instance, when you're looking for a specific model of foundation, a newly released game cartridge, or an obscure book, Meituan is unlikely to be your first choice. Its 'product inventory' has long been defined by catering and supermarket standard products, unable to match Taobao's 'all-encompassing' comprehensiveness.

Thus, Meituan's battle is a precise breakthrough centered around 'goods'.

Instead of attempting to replicate Taobao, Meituan cleverly reconstructs the supply of 'all-encompassing' goods with the logic of 'local'. The 'brand official flagship flash warehouses' previously established by Meituan are not mere replicas of offline stores but a surgical reconstruction of traditional retail supply chains by Meituan.

It dismantles the e-commerce 'centralized shelves' and reorganizes them into distributed pre-positioned fulfillment nodes across cities. These nodes are essentially data-driven, high-turnover, and highly precise mini-warehouses. Their product selection is not based on traditional supermarket experience but on Meituan's heatmap analysis of surrounding users' instant needs—what brand of skincare products sees a sudden surge in nighttime orders, which internet-famous snacks are frequently searched on weekends. This makes 'goods' not statically wait there but dynamically 'grow in the most demand-dense places'.

While building a rich product inventory, Meituan recognizes the need to upgrade 'security' to undertake high-value goods and brands. Thus, the 'Worry-Free Flash Purchase' plan was introduced, aiming to cover the entire shopping process. For example, buying flowers can include 'pre-delivery photo return', purchasing private items offers 'privacy packaging', and even relying on AI large models for minute-level return judgment. The purpose of this combination is to firmly upgrade user perception from 'using it for food delivery' to 'using it to buy everything'.

The ultimate goal of Meituan's battle is to complete an ecological leap from an 'instant delivery network' to an 'instant demand solution platform'. Its strategic core is to build a closed-loop flywheel of 'demand-supply-fulfillment' with geographical location and instant data as dual cores.

When this system matures, the moat Meituan builds will not just be the visible rider network but a 'nervous system' deeply embedded in the urban fabric, instantly perceiving and efficiently satisfying fragmented demands. The endpoint of this efficiency revolution is not merely winning by scale but defining the basic operational rules of next-generation urban commerce—making the acquisition of 'everything' as readily available, stable, and predictable as utilities like water, electricity, and gas.

This marks a shift in competition from traffic acquisition to reprogramming urban commercial spacetime.

PART 02

Taobao's Breakthrough:

Weaving a 'Local' Fulfillment Network with 'All-Encompassing' as Its Spear

Taobao's breakthrough battle is a grand 'spatial magic': it will employ every strategy possible to infuse this vast 'ocean of goods' into the intricate networks of the cities you live in. This strategy is called 'The City as a Warehouse'.

What does this mean?

It means that the lipstick you order on the Taobao app may not be shipped from the main warehouse in Shanghai but picked from a cooperative beauty collection warehouse in a commercial district near your city and delivered to you within an hour by Taobao flash delivery riders or Cainiao direct delivery couriers.

It means that the large supermarket, digital specialty store, or even fashion boutique near your home may have quietly become a pre-positioned fulfillment node in Taobao's 'all-encompassing' network in the unseen background. They stock the goods that nearby residents are most likely to need instantly, functioning as offline stores normally and transforming into Taobao's 'pre-positioned cloud warehouses' when receiving orders.

This directly targets Meituan's 'Achilles' heel'.

Meituan's moat is the certainty network woven by millions of riders, reaching within 30 minutes. What Taobao is doing is also 'airdropping' its vast inventory directly to the starting point of this network. It doesn't need to rebuild a rider army from scratch but shares existing instant delivery capabilities by allying and integrating, making goods infinitely closer to consumers.

However, as an e-commerce giant long possessing an 'ocean of all-encompassing goods', Taobao's pre-positioned cloud warehouses can be supported by data from a large number of previous historical orders, better analyzing what regional residents need most. Therefore, the decisive factor in this showdown is no longer 'who positions warehouses closer' or 'who is faster' but 'who can provide the most needed and irreplaceable product choices for residents while being fast enough'.

When you encounter those 'urgent and unique' demands next time—such as buying a prescription diet for your pet, finding a special part for your child's science project, or wanting a specific patterned umbrella on a rainy day—your first reaction may start to waver. Should you open Taobao, which has everything and is getting faster, or Meituan, which is fast but may have limited choices?

Taobao's 'The City as a Warehouse' is vying for your moment of hesitation. It attempts to prove that the ideal instant consumption in the future should not be 'sacrificing choice for speed' but 'I want it all, and I want it now'. This battle to weave a 'local' fulfillment network, if successful, will not only challenge Meituan but also thoroughly reconstruct our 'momentary satisfaction' experience once again.

PART 03

The Battle Is Clear, but the Outcome Is Far from Decided

The flash sale showdown between Meituan and Taobao is essentially a 'reverse march': Meituan, with millions of riders, sets out from downstairs your home to conquer the vast 'ocean of all-encompassing goods'; Taobao mobilizes half of China's goods to launch a 'spatial compression' battle, cramming its vast inventory into every corner of your city.

This is not a simple imitation show but a perilous yet necessary 'gene supplementation'. Meituan, the king of 'local', is desperately learning the 'goods' and 'quality' of e-commerce; Taobao, the giant of 'all-encompassing', is frantically catching up on the 'speed' and 'density' of local life services. Both are striving to become what they were once the 'opposite' of.

For us consumers, the most fascinating outcome of this competition is precisely the blurring of choice boundaries. In the future, when you urgently need a certain product at night, you may no longer need to think about 'which app to use'. You might find it and get it delivered instantly on Meituan, or click 'hourly delivery' on Taobao to have it sent from a nearby store. What determines the experience will no longer be the app but who can deliver the 'right product' at a 'determined speed' at that moment.

Therefore, the future of retail is no longer a single-choice question between 'online' and 'offline', 'local' and 'distant'. It is becoming a fusion question. Its endpoint is a new retail ecosystem that is both deeply localized—where every street and community is precisely covered by digital commercial networks—and infinitely rich—where the choices at your fingertips are as vast as the entire internet.

By then, the term 'instant retail' itself may become obsolete. Because 'retail' itself will mean richness and immediacy coexisting. What this giant war has catalyzed will ultimately be another silent upgrade of our lifestyles: everything is within reach, and choices are boundless. This, perhaps, is the ultimate answer that this 'efficiency battle' offers to consumers.