Visual Report: JD.com's JD Mall Strategy
How JD wants to grow its business by opening more than 30 malls.
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Introduction
This report describes the operational strategy, customer experience model, and business drivers of JD’s JD Mall physical retail stores, based on research and in-depth facility tours of the Qujiang location in Xi’an and the Shuangjing location in Beijing, as well as two visits to other JD Mall stores.
The first section of this report, available for free, describes the malls' strategies and facilities. The second section, for paid subscribers, contains a visual report with more than 60 pictures and videos taken at four JD Malls between July 2023 and October 2025, along with an assessment of the feasibility of its goals. The report closes with some thoughts on what this could mean in the context of JD’s planned acquisition of Ceconomy in Europe.
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Ed Sander, Tech Research Analyst
Before the Mall
Unlike Alibaba, JD has always had a strong foothold in offline retail, either through self-operated stores or franchise formulas. The JD brand has been a common sight in the streets of both high-tier and low-tier cities in China. You’ll see anything from computer stores to pharmacies, from mother & baby stores to car maintenance workshops and from liquor shops to (unmanned) convenience stores.
Examples of offline JD stores.
I have seen many of these stores appear and disappear in specific locations, but the JD Mall stores are without a doubt JD’s most ambitious offline retail project to date.
Unlike Alibaba, JD actually has its early roots in offline retail. The company even takes pride in the fact that in 1998, its founder, Richard Liu, started the company by selling hard drives from a small store in Beijing’s Zhongguancun. JD even replicated the store in its headquarters’ exhibition space.
Replica of Richard Liu’s optical disc store at JD’s headquarters in Beijing.
While the company moved online in 2004 as 360buy and changed its name to JD Mall in 2007, it began launching more offline initiatives in the mid-2010s. In the battle for ‘New Retail’, both Alibaba and JD kept launching comparable physical stores. Both opened their own supermarkets, with Alibaba leading with Hema (Freshippo) and JD following with 7Fresh. Both launched franchise convenience store initiatives: Alibaba with Tmall Convenience Stores, and JD with JD Convenience Stores. Around the same time, JD began launching 3C retail experience stores under the JD Home (JD 之家) and JD Exclusive (京东专卖店) brands. Here, consumers could touch and feel products before buying them. We will later discuss the relevance of this.
In 2019, this idea was taken to the next level …
The Dream of Offline
In 2019, on Double 11 (Singles' Day, 11-11), JD opened the 50.000 square meter ‘JD E-Space’ in Chongqing. At the time, a press release stated that E-Space ‘enhances shopping by offering unique and immersive experiences, allowing customers to interact fully with state-of-the-art, innovative, and smart products from more than 1,000 of the world’s leading brands in various themed experience areas. (..) It brings experiential shopping to the electronics and home appliances category, enabling consumers to touch and test in-store, and then buy online, hassle-free. (..) After experimenting with the products, consumers can scan a code to buy and have items delivered to their homes by JD Logistics, usually within 24 hours, or they can complete their purchase onsite and carry home in-stock products immediately.’ [11]
As early as 2019, JD had proposed the goal of “recreating JD Home Appliances offline”, and Jiangsu Five Star Appliance, the third largest home appliance chain-store in China after Suning and Gome, was an essential part of realising this plan.
In 2019, JD.com purchased 46% of Five Star Electric’s shares. A year later, it announced the completion of the acquisition of the remaining 54% of Five Star’s shares, achieving full ownership. Next, JD Home Appliances and Five Star Electric Appliances started the road of integration, and a complete offline business map was formed: [1]
JD Mall for core cities
JD Electric City Flagship Store (京东电器城市旗舰店) for large and medium-sized cities
JD Five Star Electrical Appliance Experience Stores (京东五星电器体验店)
JD Home Appliance Stores (京东家电专卖店) for county and town markets, etc.
In 2023, while traditional home appliance retailers such as Gome and Suning were in retreat, JD accelerated its offline expansion, opening stores frequently, especially with the launch of JD Electric City Flagship Stores. By the end of 2023, more than 100 self-operated stores were operating in 80 cities across 15 provinces/municipalities. [1] JD currently operates 4,000+ JD Electronics Stores and 100+ JD Appliance City Flagship stores nationwide. [2]
JD Mall
The E-Space stores that were opened in 2019 (Chongqing) and 2021 (Xi’an and Hefei) were eventually upgraded to JD Mall. In addition to traditional categories such as electronics, home appliances, and digital accessories offered in E-Space, JD Mall also provides a wide range of items in home, furniture, kids, smart healthcare products and auto accessories. [3]
In August 2020, JD had announced it would open 20 ‘E-Space stores’ by 2025. [4] It has more than met that target, which could be called unique, given JD’s reputation for overpromising the number of offline stores across any format. At the time of writing, there were 26 JD Mall stores, with an additional 7 stores preparing to open. The preparation time for opening a store is typically 6 months, starting from the moment the location is selected and renovation begins.
Most JD Malls have 30,000-70,000 square meters of shopping space, over 200 well-known brands, over 200,000 products, tens of immersive themed experience zones, and online services similar to those offered on JD.com. The Malls provide a diverse range of categories, including home appliances, mobile communications, trendy digital products, and home decoration materials. It aims to create an immersive, digital, one-stop shopping experience centred on the “home scenario.” JD.com has also established robot demonstration and sales areas in its JD Malls.
With the milestone of reaching 100 JD.com City Flagship Stores and the rapid rollout of JD Mall, JD’s offline commercial model is gradually taking shape. Centred on these two main formats, and branching out with JD.com Five Star Appliance Experience Stores, JD.com Home Stores, JD.com Home Appliance Exclusive Stores, JD.com Computer & Digital Exclusive Stores, and JD.com Exclusive Stores targeting county and township markets, this model is becoming a reality. The dream of “recreating JD.com Home Appliances offline” is becoming a reality. [1]
Regarding pricing, JD claims: “JD Mall operates on a self-operated model, sourcing directly from brands and managing prices. This ensures competitive market pricing, eliminating distributor markups and guaranteeing competitive pricing. For example, in the home furnishing category, JD Mall’s price advantage is particularly pronounced compared to traditional home furnishing stores. Prices for the same brands and configurations are generally 50%-60% lower than in traditional stores.”
In the next section, we will further explore JD Mall's strategy.
The JD Mall Strategy
JD describes the Malls as “one-stop shopping for home appliances and home goods, and first-hand experience of tech-enabled lifestyles.” [5] While JD.com’s strategy echoes Amazon’s and Walmart’s push into omnichannel retail, it has its own unique twist: the mall doubles as a tech showroom and lifestyle hub. [6]
The core philosophy is “Experience-Driven Sales,” a model that moves beyond traditional retail by creating immersive, hands-on environments where customers actively use and test products before purchase.
Several key pillars anchor the strategy.
1. The Core Philosophy: Experience-Driven Sales
The fundamental principle guiding the JD Mall is to shift the retail paradigm from passive viewing to active participation. The stated goal is to “gradually drive sales” by allowing customers to go beyond simply seeing a product online or on a shelf; they are encouraged to interact with fully functional items in realistic settings.
Active Participation vs. Passive Demonstration: Unlike traditional electronics stores, where staff demonstrate products, the JD model requires customers to perform the actions themselves. For example, visitors are guided to make a cup of coffee with an espresso machine, bake cookies using an in-store oven, or test a vacuum cleaner on a deliberately dirtied floor.
A participant of a ChinaTechTrip study tour is being instructed how to use the espresso machine.
Purpose-Built Environments: All display models, from washing machines to ovens, are fully connected to power, water, and drainage. This infrastructure is central to providing an authentic user experience.
Driving High-Consideration Purchases: This hands-on approach builds customer confidence and reduces purchase friction, especially for high-value items. By experiencing a product’s performance firsthand, customers can identify the item that genuinely meets their needs, which in turn is expected to increase customer satisfaction and reduce return rates.
2. Store Strategy and Design
The physical store is conceptualised as more than a point of sale; it is a dynamic, themed destination and a local community asset.
Community Hub Model: The “5-Kilometre Penetration” Strategy
JD aims to integrate each JD Mall into its local neighbourhood, fostering repeat visits and community loyalty.
Target Radius: The primary goal is to achieve high penetration within a 5-kilometre radius, turning the store into a “neighbourhood space.”
Free Value-Added Services: To attract local residents, the store offers complimentary services, most notably a professional-grade laundry and shoe-washing facility. Residents can book these services and visit the store, creating regular foot traffic.
Lifestyle Integration: The store features food areas and hosts activities such as children's baking classes, positioning itself as a quasi-recreational destination for families.
Themed and Dynamic Environments
Each JD Mall is given a unique identity that reflects its location, and the interiors are regularly updated.
Localised Themes: The Xi’an Qujiang store, for instance, features a “Tang style” and “Guochao” (national trend) design, with a central atrium designed to evoke the Silk Road. In contrast, the Nanjing store has a Ming Dynasty capital theme.
Renovation Cycle: Every JD Mall undergoes a major renovation every three years to refresh its look and offerings, ensuring the concept does not become dated.
Construction Timeline: A new JD Mall can be built and ready for opening in a maximum of six months from site confirmation.
Store Layout and Structure
The mall is organised by product category across multiple floors, with a consistent structural division between brand-led and JD-led spaces. Take the Xi’an Qujiang store as an example:
The sales floor is divided into two primary sections:
Brand Showrooms: Dedicated spaces managed by individual brands like Huawei, Apple, or Haier.
JD Self-Built Areas: Curated sections managed directly by JD to supplement the brand offerings.
3. The JD Self-Built Area: A Curated Experience
The Self-Built Areas are a strategic component designed to showcase a unique product mix and deliver the core “experience-driven” philosophy. These areas are further divided into two sub-sections.
Experience Zones & “Experience Officers”
These zones are staffed by “Experience Officers” who are explicitly not salespeople and do not carry sales quotas.
Their sole function is to guide customers through product experiences, provide expert assistance, and ensure a positive interaction, effectively acting as brand ambassadors and product educators.
Curated Product Selection Areas
Present on every floor, these sections display a dynamic assortment of products based on two key criteria:
Online Best-Sellers: Top-selling and “explosive” products from the central JD.com online platform, giving customers a chance to interact with popular online items physically.
Locally Scarce Products: Items that are difficult to source through local supply chains. This includes niche brands, products with limited distribution, and items from JD’s national procurement team that supplement local inventory sourced from Five Star Appliance's legacy supply chain (a company acquired by JD).
4. Key Experiential Zones and Services
The store’s “experience-driven” model is brought to life through numerous specialised zones.
Personal Healthcare & Beauty: Customers can freely test devices such as high-end hair dryers (equipped with instruments to measure wind speed and temperature), facial massagers, and receive a professional-grade skin analysis. Massage devices, particularly popular among male customers, are also available for trial.
Coffee & Baking Experience: A comprehensive station where customers can get free coffee daily. The process is educational, with staff teaching visitors how to choose beans and operate various machines. The goal is to create a complete experience that showcases accessories and demonstrates how to recycle used coffee grounds. The baking station holds daily classes for children and adults to make items like cookies and doughnuts, using different appliances each day to highlight their specific strengths.
Gaming & DIY Computers: An e-sports area hosts competitions and features live-streaming capabilities. A dedicated “Trendy Block” allows enthusiasts to assemble their own high-performance PCs from a wall of components (keyboards, mice, video cards, etc.). The assembly itself is often live-streamed, catering to a niche online audience.
Family Gaming Zone: Equipped with consoles like PlayStation, this area encourages parents and children to play video games together. The aim is to reframe gaming as a positive family activity and allow users to test different systems to find the best fit for their home.
Home Theatre Experience: A soundproof room designed to demonstrate high-fidelity surround sound systems, including Dolby Atmos. JD staff offer customised home theatre configuration solutions based on a customer’s room size and budget.
Retail study tour group experiencing the home cinema room.
Professional Laundry & Shoe Washing: A major community draw, this area provides free laundry, dry cleaning, and shoe washing services. Customers book appointments through a JD mini program. For high-value clients, a pickup and delivery service is available through JD Daojia. The area features professional-grade commercial equipment and separate, specialised machines for washing shoes.
Interactive Cleaning Demonstrations: To showcase cleaning appliances such as robotic vacuums, staff create realistic messes (e.g., spilling trash on floors and rugs) for customers to clean up using demonstration models.
5. Omnichannel Marketing and Customer Acquisition
Customer acquisition for JD Mall stores is a sophisticated omnichannel effort that combines in-store promotions, targeted online advertising powered by JD’s backend data, and a novel social media matrix in which all employees maintain individual accounts on platforms like Xiaohongshu to build influence and drive traffic.
JD employs a multi-pronged strategy to attract and retain customers, seamlessly blending online and offline channels.
Online Channels:
JD App Integration: When a user searches for a product on the JD app, the platform recommends the nearest physical store. A click-through leads to the store’s dedicated mini-program, which lists all current activities and promotions and allows for booking experience sessions. For activities in experience zones, people register and redeem a voucher. This way, JD identifies the offline customer.
“Virtual Store” Operations: In the store, there are many activities on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. From Monday to Thursday, JD basically operates a ‘virtual store’. This includes content marketing on platforms like Xiaohongshu and Dianping, posting videos, and hosting live broadcasts.
Employee Social Media Matrix: Every store employee (the Xi’an Qujiang store, for instance, has ~300 staff) is required to operate a personal Xiaohongshu account. They are trained to build an online profile (e.g., as a foodie or tech expert) rather than act as direct salespeople. They create content, livestream, engage with users, and build trust, subtly guiding interested followers to the store.
Data-Driven Advertising: JD leverages its extensive backend user data to deliver targeted ads and promotions to users who have shown interest in relevant product categories.
Offline Channels:
Community Outreach: Staff are regularly dispatched to residential communities within a 5km radius to host events (e.g., free massages, movie screenings, free haircuts) and promote the store’s services.
In-Store Events: The central lobby is used every weekend for activities such as new product launches, brand promotions, and culturally relevant events, including cosplay gatherings, to attract younger demographics.
The Omnichannel Bridge: Electronic Price Tags
The price tags are electronic displays, not paper, and are centrally updated to ensure price parity with the JD.com website. Still, offline discounts are often better than online discounts, because JD wants to give customers a reason to visit the store and experience products.
Crucially, each tag has a QR code. If a customer scans the code in-store but completes the purchase later online, the sale is automatically attributed to the physical store. This system tracks the store’s influence on online sales and strengthens its value proposition for brand partners in an omnichannel ecosystem. The actual time tracked for this ‘see offline, buy online’ effect depends on the product category, but can, for instance, be several hours for a TV.
6. Operational Model and Performance
The store’s success is underpinned by a unique staffing structure and a business model that capitalises on its target demographic.
Hybrid Staffing Model
Employees are distinguished by the colour of their lanyards, indicating their employer and role.
Red Lanyards (60%): Direct JD employees (”自营员工”). They are responsible for store management, training, and upholding JD’s customer experience standards. Their focus is on the overall service quality, not just selling a specific brand.
Grey Lanyards (40%): Brand Product Specialists (”厂家的产品专家”). They are employed by the brands (e.g., Haier, Siemens) but work within the JD store. They provide deep, specialised product knowledge. JD management reserves the right to request a replacement if a specialist’s sales tactics are too aggressive or misaligned with the store’s experience-first philosophy.
Employee Sales Empowerment
Staff are not limited to selling products physically present in the store. Using a backend system, they can sell any item available on the entire JD.com platform, significantly expanding their commission potential and contributing to high employee satisfaction.
7. Future Directions and Strategic Initiatives
JD continues to evolve the JD Mall model with several key initiatives.
One-Stop Home Solutions: The company is expanding its “appliance and home furnishing one-stop” service. This involves offering pre-renovation consultations and products like central air conditioning, water purifiers, and heating systems. For larger renovations, JD offers a service in which it acts as a guarantor, allowing customers to pay via JD Baitiao (credit service) only after the project is completed and approved, mitigating risk for consumers.
Commercialisation of Experience Zones: There are plans to commercialise successful experience zones. For example, the popular coffee-making area in the Xi’an Qujiang store is envisioned to become a full-fledged coffee shop with its own sales revenue stream.
Continuous Enhancement of Customer Service: A key focus is on post-sale service. When a customer purchases a product, they are added to a dedicated group chat with pre-sale, sale, and post-sale staff. This team provides ongoing support, sharing tips, tutorials, and recipes to help the customer fully utilise their new appliance, fostering long-term relationships and encouraging repeat business and referrals.
A store manager in Xi’an explained how JD Mall helps customers learn how to use home appliances.
“All these appliances have a lot of functions, and the instruction manuals are very thick, so you have to spend a lot of time learning how to use them every time you buy a new appliance. You might have mastered the basic functions when you buy it, but you still have to learn the other functions and additional features. So, it’s like buying a lot of appliances after renovating a house; it takes a lot of time.”
JD will create online communities to solve the problem.
“We will show you the different functions of the product and teach you how to use it. There may be hundreds of people in a group. Every day we will, for instance, broadcast the oven we are using today, what it can do and how to use it. We will tell you about a recipe and teach you how to make it. There are classes every day so that you can learn in a fun way instead of always having to read the instruction manual.”
The rest of this report, which is available to paid subscribers, contains a visual report with more than 60 pictures and videos taken at four JD Malls between July 2023 and October 2025, along with an assessment of the feasibility of its goals and thoughts on what this could mean in the context of JD’s planned acquisition of Ceconomy in Europe.