The spatial linkage of Taobao Villages in Haining City based on the operation process

Abstract As an industrial phenomenon with rich Chinese characteristics, Taobao Villages have formed a complete industrial chain from production to sale and core goods to supporting industries, bringing extensive spatial linkage and profound influence. Through questionnaire surveys and interviews, the paper obtained first-hand data on Taobao Village stores in Haining City and explored the spatial linkage characteristics of Taobao Village’s industrial chain from the operation process perspective. The results revealed that the operation process of online stores can be divided into four core parts: research & development or sampling, production or purchasing, online sale, and delivery. The main operation parts of self-production and sales stores and local-dependent online market-oriented stores were in Haining City, forming close industrial linkages, whereas for nonlocal-dependent online market-oriented stores, only a few parts of the operation process were in Haining. Accordingly, Taobao Villages and Haining City undertook all parts of the operation, becoming a complex space and also the main area realizing a strong spatial linkage among Taobao Villages. The area outside Jiaxing City is mainly a sales market (Hangzhou City provides a sales platform), and their connection with Taobao Village relies primarily on the Internet. To form a more extensive spatial linkage and play a leading role, Haining City should encourage the self-production and sales stores and local-dependent online market-oriented stores to create a locally-rooted production system or industrial cluster.