Wanderlust: Expat Life & Style in Thailand June / July 2017: The Business Issue | Seite 13

the likes of Villa Market and
K-Market, the online app and
website lists the items avail-
able to order — as you would
find in a typical online shop —
along with their prices. You’ll
find more than 10,000 products
to shop from, including organic
food, fresh meat and imported
products.
Pop the products you want
in your virtual shopping basket,
and an honestbee team mem-
ber (or shopper bee, as they are
called) will call in to the store to
hand-pick the exact items you
requested, looking for optimal
quality with each item. For ex-
ample, your shopper bee will
choose the freshest pineapple
available, instead of blindly pick-
ing one from the shelf simply to
tick another thing off your list.
Bounthay Khammanyvong,
honestbee country manager
for Thailand, explains: “Today,
people tend to buy fresher and
on-demand; they don’t want to
stock up and eat old food. Our
professional concierge shoppers
give customers the peace of
mind that they are getting the
best and freshest products de-
livered to their doorstep, which
we achieve through solid com-
munication with customers.”
Part of this strong commu-
nicative approach is keeping
customers informed of their
order. A shopper bee will send
a text message to the custom-
er during the shop to let them
know if an item is not the fresh-
est at the time. They can make
suggestions for an alternative,
or omit the product altogeth-
er —just as you would if you
were in the store yourself.
Product quality also comes
into play here. Your shopper
might get in touch to let you
know that the broccoli you re-
quested, for instance, is not
looking its best by the end of
the day and then suggest an al-
ternative. On average, a shop-
per bee will contact the cus-
tomer between two to three
times with an update, even
sending photos to show them
what items look like.
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