1) Containers are time-consuming: Liu spent a significant share of time in the market attempting to offload the containers his fruit came in – from selling his cardboard boxes to trying to get the deposit back on the multiple varieties of plastic crates in his vehicle. Between the amount of space they occupy in his vehicle’s cargo bed, the money needed to pay the deposit for them that could be used for buying fruit instead, and the numerous complications involved in trying to return them, plastic fruit crates are a salient pain point for vendors at this wholesale market. I’m surprised a system comparable to that of the cardboard boxes (buyers waiting at the market entrance) is not yet in place.

 

2) Buying fruit is complicated: Besides consideration for what the fruit is contained in, purchasing the fruit itself is not a straightforward process. From finding a vendor offering the precise combination of price and quality that you require (or at least that you believe you can bargain down to the desired price point), to the need to personally and rigorously inspect for quality, to actually transporting the fruit from the sales point to your vehicle (a daunting proposition if you are parked outside the market, or the vendor is in a traffic-prone area), buying fruit in a wholesale environment is markedly more complex and stressful than buying it in a typical retail-level setting in Chongqing.

 

3) Time is money; trust is priceless: Although his three-wheeled vehicle is the most valuable thing Liu owns and necessary for his livelihood, he did not hesitate to hand the keys over to Zhang and have him navigate through the crowded market while he went to inspect vendors’ inventories. This indicates several things; One is the high value of time to Liu (and, I imagine, all fruit vendors), for whom competition is stiff and every second saved in the wholesale market is another second spent selling on the street. The time Liu spent inspecting the inventories of sugar cane and clementine sellers on foot instead of extricating his vehicle from the gridlocked grape section was valuable enough to justify momentarily turning his vehicle over to Zhang. Two is the high level of trust that Liu places in Zhang – both morally to not drive away with his vehicle, and also in his skills as a driver to believe that he would not damage his vehicle. Three is the inadequacy of simply “driving by” a vendor’s inventory for deciding upon its quality, and Liu’s perceived need to physically approach a vendor’s stall to ascertain whether the fruit meets his requirements (though admittedly the need to approach on foot could also be due to the high-stress and attention-intensive act of driving within the market making it hard to do anything besides concentrate on not crashing). Considering these facts, I was surprised not to see vendors approaching drivers in their vehicles (particularly those stuck in traffic) with a “sample platter” – physical examples of the various types and qualities of fruit that they are offering for sale – with the hopes of attracting the drivers to their stalls.

 

4) Analog > digital: Vendors keep purchase records in physical notebooks, and I did not see any evidence of creating a duplicate digital record. Potential customers are able to see the final price and quantity of all previous purchases on a page, setting fairly concrete guidelines for price negotiation by creating a record to refer to. This record is also important for buyers unable to immediately transfer their purchase to their vehicles, and for whom  the vendor must temporarily set aside their order. When wholesalers must handle hundreds of purchases a day, the “solidness” of a physical record and its incorporation into the purchase process minimizes the chance for mistakes. Nonetheless, the time will come where technology is sufficiently usable, reliable, and affordable enough to lead this wholesale market to effectively “go digital”.