Crossing thousands of kilometers in 48 hours: How does the "Sweet Keeper" of Xiaoxiang Supermarket help the mottled fruits out of the mountains?
In the Chinese fruit industry, Ailao Mountain holds a rather unique position.
Ailao Mountain is located in Yuxi City, Yunnan Province. It has a complex and changeable climate and an ancient and mysterious primeval forest, yet it gives birth to some of the world's best crystal sugar oranges. Whenever the early - autumn sun casts a golden veil over the mountains, the heavy oranges among the forest leaves are like shining pearls, illuminating and nourishing the land at the foot of the fruit trees.
At 6:30 in the morning, Li Donghui, a fruit farmer from Yunnan Chushi Agricultural Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Chushi Agriculture"), carried fruit shears and a headlamp and headed towards the orchard. Loosening the soil, fertilizing, and picking fruits, the labor went on day after day, but it didn't bring him the corresponding rewards. Because Li Donghui's orchard was located in a windy area, he became the recognized "unlucky guy" in the village. No matter how he adjusted the planting plan, the yield of his "speckled fruits" was always the highest.
Speckled fruits are crystal sugar oranges with natural scars on the peel surface due to being exposed to wind and sun.
At the end of 2023, Huang Zhouyang, a purchaser from Xiaoxiang Supermarket, went deep into Ailao Mountain and by chance tasted these "ugly fruits". The speckled fruits began to leave the mountains, and the fates of people like Li Donghui also changed.
01
An Orange with a Story
Years ago, an agricultural expert told Chu Shijian that Ailao Mountain is located in a dry - hot valley area with relatively high temperatures, little precipitation, no frost throughout the year, and long sunshine hours. Such a climate and environment are very suitable for planting crystal sugar oranges. However, due to the relatively high altitude, to grow the saplings successfully, the water source problem needed to be solved.
In 2002, Chu Shijian, a legendary figure in his life, sowed the first seed of "Chu Orange" on a wasteland in the middle section of this mountain, in Jiasa Town, Xinping Yi and Dai Autonomous County. In the following years, despite his poor health, Chu Shijian rushed around in the mountains. After overcoming a series of problems such as water source, seed selection, and soil, this wasteland developed into the Chu Orange Manor, which covers an area of 7,000 mu, has nearly 2,000 fruit farmers and nearly 300 employees.
It is reported that the Chu Orange Manor is divided into different areas, and fruit farmers get commissions based on the finished - product rate. Many people farm here. After 2023, more and more "second - generation fruit farmers" inherited their fathers' forest areas and also rooted the spirit of "perseverance and pursuit of excellence" of Chu Orange in their hearts. Li Donghui is one of them.
Li Donghui's home is on the hilltop of the village where the mountain wind is strong. The proportion of speckled fruits in his orchard can exceed 40% of the total output every year. In contrast, the output rate of speckled fruits of the "best farmers" in the village is at most 0.7% per year. This means that although Li Donghui puts in the same amount of effort as others, he can only get half of the results.
At first, Chushi Agriculture also hoped to help Li Donghui "eliminate" the speckles. For example, they pasted "masks" on the young fruits to prevent further exposure to wind and sun; they also dynamically monitored the soil every 15 days, supplemented nutrients, and adjusted the planting plan to ensure the same taste in each operation area as much as possible. Even though they tried every means, they still couldn't resist the power of nature. Li Donghui gradually "accepted his fate" until Huang Zhouyang's "accidental discovery".
As a representative of instant retail, the purchasing team of Xiaoxiang Supermarket never stays confined to the office. Instead, they rush around the world to discover popular products on their own.
In November 2023, during the picking season of Chu Oranges, Huang Zhouyang, who was in Ailao Mountain, took a bite of the speckled fruits that were ignored by the retail market and were divided among the growers themselves out of curiosity. For a moment, Huang Zhouyang felt the juice splashing in his mouth, and the taste of these "ugly oranges" was sweet, and their taste was even better than that of other well - looking crystal sugar oranges.
Soon, Huang Zhouyang brought these speckled fruits back to Shanghai. At the beginning of 2024, his supervisor overruled the objections and introduced the speckled fruits into Xiaoxiang Supermarket. This decision unexpectedly received a lot of praise from users. In many consumers' reviews, the speckled fruits taste sweet, and "the juicy taste is like drinking fruit juice directly".
02
The Overlooked Treasures in the Deep Mountains
In order to let consumers continuously taste the deliciousness of the speckled fruits, the "sweet - locking people" of Xiaoxiang Supermarket, including Huang Zhouyang, came to Ailao Mountain to negotiate with Chushi Agriculture.
At first, when the sales manager of Chushi Agriculture heard that the cooperation was about speckled fruits, he refused. At this time, Chushi Agriculture was more worried that the channel providers couldn't understand the formation reason of the speckles, and also worried that the speckled fruits, which had never been standardized as a single category, couldn't pass the screening system of Xiaoxiang Supermarket.
Unable to withstand the persuasion, Chushi Agriculture finally decided to "try something new" with Xiaoxiang Supermarket. The two sides built sorting warehouses in various places. From the origin to the large city warehouses, a total of three quality - inspection links were set up, and a way from Ailao Mountain to all parts of the country was explored.
However, the good times didn't last long. In 2024, hail suddenly hit Ailao Mountain. The speckled area of the fruits was larger than in previous years, and they couldn't withstand long - distance transportation. As a result, after the speckled fruits were launched, users' evaluations were mixed. Some people reported that "the fruit sizes were uneven", and some people "lost their temper" when they received the goods.
Immediately, the "sweet - locking people" of Xiaoxiang Supermarket stationed in Ailao Mountain, unified the quality - control standards from the source, and adjusted them in real - time according to market feedback.
It is reported that Xiaoxiang Supermarket has three major standards for the speckled fruits on the shelves.
First, the speckles cannot cover more than one - third of the fruit surface, and the weight of a single fruit cannot be less than 100 grams.
Second, the speckled fruits have a strict logistics and transportation plan, which requires a full - time cold chain and the completion of transportation from the origin to the city's large warehouse within 48 hours. At the same time, the fruit - selection team covered each basket of speckled fruits with a glass bag from the source to prevent further "speckling" during the journey.
Finally, like other signature products, the speckled fruits are also dynamically optimizing the "sales closed - loop". Xiaoxiang Supermarket will collect user information in real - time through a digital system and directly feedback it to the origin for iteration.
So far, the full - channel sorting connection of Xiaoxiang Supermarket's speckled fruits has become closer. There are only two checkpoints from the origin to the sales area. After accumulating a certain amount of data, the sales area can directly skip the inspection, and the storage temperature can be adjusted dynamically according to the environment.
On the contrary, the standardized speckled fruits have been proven to have a sugar content of 13 - 14 degrees for the fruits at the top of the tree, which is higher than the 10 degrees of ordinary crystal sugar oranges. Another quality - control staff member of Xiaoxiang Supermarket revealed that during the sorting and random inspection of the speckled fruits, after the machine detected the sugar content, manual inspection was also required. It was required to taste at least 18 fruits from the "upper, middle, and lower" shelves of each vehicle, and the fruits should not have a "mushy feeling" when eaten. Moreover, from the fruit - hanging period, the speckled fruits last for 290 days, 35 days longer than ordinary oranges.
03
Sweet - Locking People + Top - Notch Fruits = From the Field to the Table in 48 Hours
All of a sudden, Li Donghui's speckled fruits have changed from being ignored to being the favorite of consumers.
In fact, the turnaround of the speckled fruits is just one example among many non - standard agricultural products of Xiaoxiang Supermarket. In two years, Xiaoxiang Supermarket and Chushi Agriculture have invested a lot of manpower and material resources and jointly explored a new model of "sweet - locking people + top - notch fruits + out of the mountains in 48 hours".
The core of this model is to move the quality - control checkpoint forward and then improve the logistics efficiency with a systematic plan.
In terms of cost investment, Xiaoxiang Supermarket dispatched a "sweet - locking people" team to the origin, and the cost is much higher than that of the traditional model. In terms of time investment, it took more than a year for Xiaoxiang and Chushi Agriculture to gradually explore the screening standards from trial cooperation to in - depth cooperation.
Xiaoxiang Supermarket has created three logistics links from the origin to the city's large warehouse and then to the consumers. This short - chain model reduces the intermediate circulation cost and loss, making the comprehensive cost better than the traditional multi - level distribution. Judging from the results, the damage rate of the "top - notch fruits" has decreased by more than 90%.
In the short term, the emergence of the speckled fruits from the mountains, that is, the breakthrough of a single product, has found a new way to increase income for "second - generation fruit farmers" like Li Donghui. More importantly, Xiaoxiang Supermarket and Chushi Agriculture have explored the screening standards for "top - notch fruits" through the speckled fruits.
In 2025, the No. 1 Central Document emphasized "vigorously develop the cultivation of green and characteristic agricultural products, strengthen leading enterprises, improve industrial chains, develop new business forms, and build brands". From a policy perspective, the model of "sweet - locking people + top - notch fruits" of Xiaoxiang Supermarket can also be regarded as a sample of the "supply - chain ability" transfer of new retail enterprises.
In recent years, in addition to Ailao Mountain in Yunnan, Xiaoxiang Supermarket has established a wide - ranging fruit - origin cooperation network in places such as Korla in Xinjiang and the Lingnan area in Guangdong, especially emphasizing the quality control at the source and the optimization of logistics. It is believed that in the future non - standard agricultural product market, there are still many high - quality products that go against the traditional market standards waiting to be further explored.
When retail enters the "3.0" era and returns to the development logic centered on user needs, the short - link model of "sweet - locking people + top - notch fruits" of Xiaoxiang Supermarket will also open up more ways for high - quality fruits to leave the mountains within 48 hours and provide more samples for the future of the retail industry.