This Day, That Year

Item from March 18, 1983, in China Daily: The Miscellaneous Service Cooperative of Dashila in Beijing's Xuanwu district is doing brisk business as it has now become famous for its reliability and policy of "consumers first". Started as a tea stall three years ago, the cooperative has expanded into a major enterprise employing more than 800 young people and earning more than 1.5 million yuan of profit each year. It has four separate retail stores and a staff training center.

Just a few decades ago, many Chinese consumers would crowd department stores, mostly run by State-owned enterprises, for the latest products from home and abroad. In the mid 1990s, global retailers started to make their mark in the domestic market.

Amid rapid economic and technological development, more consumers have been looking beyond the physical retail stores at home to buy foreign products via online shopping platforms.