In China, you can buy a bouquet of roses from Yunnan for just 14 yuan. The flowers travel over 2,000 kilometers to cities like Shanghai, and delivery is free. However, fresh flowers are very delicate. They lose moisture quickly and must arrive fast. This requires a highly efficient logisticslogistics/ləˈdʒɪstɪks/L2物流；后勤the process of planning and organizing the movement of goods or people system.
China's huge parcel volumevolume/ˈvɒljuːm/L2量；数量the amount of something, especially when it is large helps make this possible. In 2025, express companies handled nearly 200 billion parcels. This scalescale/skeɪl/L2规模；范围the size or extent of something, especially when it is large allows them to build large sorting centers and create efficientefficient/ɪˈfɪʃənt/L2高效的；效率高的working well without wasting time or energy routes. If you add another parcel to the system, it costs very little extra. As a result, costs are spread across millions of parcels, and delivery is very cheap.
For example, a sorting center in Kunming processes 20,000 flower parcels every hour. Automated equipment sorts them in just three minutes. After sorting, trucks, trains, and planes take the flowers to cities across the country. Most flowers reach their destination within 48 hours. This speed is important for keeping flowers fresh.
As a result, a cheap gift can travel very far and very fast. This system shows how supply chain management works at a large scale. It turns a difficult task into an everyday service. People across China can now enjoy fresh flowers from far away. The system combines scale, speed, and efficient organization.
