For years, Chinese “daigou” made money by bringing hard-to-find luxury products from Hong Kong to the mainland. Now, as the city’s borders reopen, they are ferrying goods in the other direction.
多年来，中国的 "代购 "通过将难以找到的奢侈品从香港带到大陆来赚钱。现在，随着该城市的边界重新开放，他们正在反向带货。
For years, Shenzhen resident Elaine Kong made money by ferrying goods from Hong Kong into the Chinese mainland. Each weekend, she would cross the border and buy up crates of infant formula, Lancôme eye cream, and other products that were pricey or hard to find on the mainland, and then sell them on at a profit after returning home.
多年来，深圳居民Elaine Kong通过将货物从香港运至中国大陆来赚钱。每个周末，她都会过港，购买成箱的婴儿配方奶粉、Lancôme眼霜和其他在大陆很贵或很难找到的产品，然后带回去后再出售获利。
Now, as China finally eases travel restrictions after three years of strict pandemic controls, Kong is making regular trips across the Hong Kong border once again. But this time, she is carrying products in the opposite direction.
现在，在经过三年严格的疫情控制后，中国终于放宽了旅行限制，Kong再次定期过香港边境。但这一次，她把产品带向了香港。
For the past few weeks, the 30-year-old has been buying trendy snacks and bubble tea in Shenzhen, and then delivering them to clients in Hong Kong. The demand from Hong Kongers and mainland students in the city has been astonishing, Kong says. She has already made dozens of trips and handed over more than 100 items.
过去几周，这位30岁的年轻人一直在深圳购买时尚小吃和珍珠奶茶，然后将其送到香港的客户手中。Kong表示，香港人和内地学生对这座城市的需求令人震惊。她已经进行了几十次旅行，代购了100多件物品。
“In the past, I bought things from Hong Kong for mainlanders and made money from that,” Kong told Sixth Tone. “It’s funny how I’m now doing it the other way around.”
“过去，我为内地人从香港买东西，并从中赚钱，”Kong说。“有趣的是，我现在却反过来做。”
Many Chinese professional shoppers, or daigou, have jumped on this same trend since the Hong Kong border reopened in early 2023. Shuttling goods from Shenzhen into Hong Kong has become so common, the phrase “reverse daigou” has become a buzzword — and a symbol of how much has changed since the COVID-19 pandemic first erupted.
自2023年初香港边境重新开放以来，许多中国专业购物者（或称代购）也纷纷效仿这一趋势。将货物从深圳运至香港已变得非常普遍，“反向代购”一词已成为一个流行语，也象征着自新冠肺炎疫情首次爆发以来发生了多大变化。
Before 2020, the daigou trade was a massive industry in China. Around 1 million Chinese were said to be employed as daigou, who primarily made money by bringing foreign products into China.
在2020年之前，代购在中国是一个庞大的产业。据说大约有100万中国人从事代购，主要是通过将外国产品带入中国来赚钱。
In some cases, daigou helped mainlanders avoid high import taxes on luxury goods. Other times, they helped them access products that weren’t available in mainland stores, such as certain foreign cosmetics or baby formula.
在某些情况下，代购帮助内地人避免了对奢侈品征收高额进口税。其他时候，他们帮助他们获得大陆商店没有的产品，比如某些外国化妆品或婴儿配方奶粉。
Chinese authorities passed a law to stymie this gray market in 2019, yet the daigou trade continued to grow. The daigou industry generated $40 billion that year, according to one estimate.
2019年，中国当局通过了一项法律来阻止这个灰色市场，但代购交易仍在继续增长。据估计，代购行业当年创造了400亿美元的收入。
For this reason, many Chinese are starting to explore the “reverse daigou” trade. Since late February, hundreds of reverse daigou ads have been posted on social platforms including Facebook and Xiaohongshu.
出于这个原因，许多中国人开始探索“反向代购”贸易。自2月下旬以来，包括脸书和小红书在内的社交平台上已经发布了数百条反向代购广告。
Bubble tea from Yidiandian, Master Bao’s pastries, and specialty products from Alibaba’s Hema supermarkets or Walmart’s Sam’s Club stores are all reportedly popular choices for reverse daigou.
据报道，一点点的奶茶、鲍师傅的糕点，以及阿里巴巴盒马超市或沃尔玛山姆会员店的特色产品，都是反向代购的热门选择。
The handover usually takes place at a station along the Hong Kong metro’s East Rail Line, which runs from the border to Hong Kong Island, so the daigou don’t have to exit the metro and pay for an extra ticket.
交接通常在香港地铁东线（East Rail Line）沿线的一个车站进行，该线从边境线一直延伸至香港岛，因此代购无需出地铁站也不必支付额外的车票。
The profit margin for these reverse daigou deliveries is small: Customers often pay just 15 yuan per bubble tea delivery, three daigou involved in the trade told Sixth Tone. But the daigou say it also has a number of advantages compared with their former business.
这些反向代购配送的利润很小：三位代购说，顾客通常每次只需支付15元。但代购表示，与之前的业务相比，它也有很多优势。
First, the daigou can make use of the fast and super-cheap delivery services on the mainland. Whenever a client in Hong Kong makes an order, the daigou can quickly get the snack delivered to their homes in Shenzhen. This means they no longer have to run from one store to another, as they did when they were buying up goods in Hong Kong.
首先，代购可以利用大陆快速、超便宜的快递服务。每当香港的客户下单时，快递很快可以将小吃送到他们在深圳的家中。这意味着他们不再需要像在香港购买商品时那样从一家商店跑到另一家。
Second, daigou no longer have to make large upfront purchases of goods. Now, the clients place the order and pay for the delivery in advance.
其次，代购不再需要进行大额的前期商品采购。现在，客户下订单并提前付款。
“When I used to daigou Hong Kong goods to mainlanders, I once accidentally bought a fake product and lost a lot of money,” Kong said. “Reverse daigou doesn’t require bearing risks like that.”
“我过去代购香港商品到大陆时，曾经不小心买了一件假冒产品，损失了很多钱，”Kong说。“反向代购不需要承担这样的风险。”
Third, it is far easier to bring things from Shenzhen into Hong Kong than the other way around. Although Hong Kong restricts food imports, the border inspections are very lenient, Kong said.
第三，把东西从深圳带到香港要比从深圳运到香港容易得多。香港表示，尽管香港限制食品进口，但边境检查非常宽松。
Kong now works five hours a day delivering snacks, earning around 300 yuan. She considers it the perfect job for her at the moment, as she has two young children and doesn’t have time to work a full-time job.
孔现在每天工作五个小时送零食，收入约300元。她认为这是目前最适合她的工作，因为她有两个年幼的孩子，没有时间做全职工作。
“I want to try my best to see how far I can go, and whether I can optimize the logistics and do it better,” she said.
她说：“我想尽我所能，看看我能走多远，以及我能否优化物流并做得更好。”。
She has already invented a few tactics to save her time and energy. For example, she uses the real-time location sharing function on WeChat, a Chinese social app, to give her clients an idea when she will arrive at the station.
她已经发明了一些策略来节省时间和精力。例如，她使用中国社交应用微信上的实时位置共享功能，让客户知道她什么时候到达车站。
Kong is also thinking about developing a WeChat mini-program to coordinate orders, payments, and deliveries, just like some Chinese startups did to organize group-buying networks during the lockdowns of 2022.
Kong也在考虑开发一个微信小程序来协调订单、支付和交付，就像一些中国初创公司在2022年封锁期间组织团购网络一样。
But she is also worried that if the reverse daigou business becomes too big and formalized, it could create complex legal issues that will eat into her profits.
但她也担心，如果反向代购业务变得过于庞大和正规，可能会产生复杂的法律问题，消耗她的利润。
“I am sure making a platform compatible for both systems in Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland is very difficult,” Kong said. “The daigou industry is profitable precisely because it bypasses all these difficulties.”
“我确信，要为香港和中国大陆的两个系统建立一个兼容的平台是非常困难的，”香港表示。“代购行业之所以盈利，正是因为它绕过了所有这些困难。”
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