Pinduoduo Partners with Fertilizer Giant to Kick Off Horticulture Fad

With China’s Lunar New Year around the corner, many Chinese people have cultivated a new hobby as a horticulturist. China’s leading interactive e-commerce platform Pinduoduo (PDD) quickly jumped onto the bandwagon and partnered with Chinese integrated agricultural service giant Stanley Agriculture at the beginning of 2021. 

Due to the pandemic lockdown, many Chinese households spent time developing their horticulture interest. In 2020, the sales volume of Pinduoduo’s overall horticulture category had achieved over 150% year-on-year growth, in which electric mower, garden water pump, and planting box are the most popular items. 

In January, Stanley Agriculture joined PDD’s New Brand Initiative that aims to help China’s small, medium, and micro-manufacturing enterprises. By now, PDD has worked with over 1,500 companies in its initiative program since 2018. 

“The demand for horticultural fertilizer comes in from scattered channels, so we need an e-commerce platform as the main channel supported by offline sales. Pinduoduo’s user profile fits us very well,” said Zuo Jinliang, General Manager of Stanley Agriculture.

With nearly 30 years of experience, Stanley is one of the industry’s largest agricultural fertilizer companies. According to the firm’s financial report, Stanley achieved nearly 4.7 billion yuan in revenue during the first three quarters of 2020. 

Unlike many Western countries’ family gardening trends, Chinese consumers are more interested in planting fruits and vegetables. The fertilizer for fruits and vegetables is Stanley’s potential market. Therefore, Stanley highlighted its special compound fertilizer for vegetable gardens as its key promotional product in its early e-commerce trial. So far, this strategy has proven to be successful as Stanley’s sales volume is climbing rapidly.

SEE ALSO: AI Planting — Pinduoduo’s Next Move in Smart Agriculture

Gardening has become a new hobby for people around the world. According to a New Yorker article, the therapeutic power of gardening caused a surge in horticultural supplies amid the pandemic. In the week before the lockdown, sales of gardening products increased by 35% from 2019.