Life as a fresh food picker: 30,000 steps a day, 3p per item
On an ordinary day, you decide to cook a meal at home, so you open a fresh grocery app. After picking out your ingredients, you decide to add a few snacks and a 4.5-litre bottle of mineral water. The moment you pay, the words ’30-minute delivery’ stand out on the screen, giving you peace of mind, knowing your food will arrive within half an hour.
What you might not know, however, is that the convenience of ’30-minute delivery’ is powered by the relentless running of delivery riders and pickers. For pickers, ‘running’ is literal: from the moment you place your order, they are on the move, weaving through narrow, cramped shelves to pick your items. Even carrying a 9kg bottle of mineral water doesn’t slow them down.
Thirty thousand steps a day, twelve-hour shifts, 30 cents per item, nine minutes per order—this is the reality for pickers in the unseen corners of our cities.
Our guest on this episode of Food Talk, He Siqi, is a social worker. This summer, he spent a month working as a picker at JD 7Fresh, experiencing first-hand the labour rhythm within the high-pressure system of ‘dark stores’. It is a world that seems ordinary but is actually fraught with tension: a ‘psychological assessment’ before hiring; a PDA counting down in real-time during the shift; supervisors urging them on via monitoring screens, where even a minute’s delay earns a public reprimand; mistakes that lead to fines or being forced to ‘copy packing regulations by hand’ like a schoolchild.
Furthermore, their daily routine involves the consumption of thousands of plastic bags and ice packs, the freezing temperatures of the cold store, and the clamour of the supermarket’s front end.
During that month, He Siqi truly understood the meaning of ‘algorithmic labour‘—the human becomes merely a physical extension of the system, slowly drained by time, data, and efficiency. This invisible labour supports the ’30-minute delivery’ we have come to take for granted.The algorithm demands that pickers be as efficient as machines, but humans are not machines; the resulting feelings of suppression and anxiety must be borne in silence. Some stay for the social security; others slip away quietly.
When convenience becomes the norm, do we still see the people living by the countdown? In this episode, we discuss the people who keep the system running behind the ’30-minute delivery’ of fresh grocery e-commerce; we also examine how the human body and dignity become parts of efficiency within an ‘algorithmic’ picking system.
Guest
He Siqi
A social worker with a long-term focus on workers’ rights. He has worked as a delivery rider and a picker. Currently an independent content creator, he is dedicated to speaking up for workers and ensuring that ignored voices are heard.
Hosts
Yu Yang
An editor at Foodthink, focusing on labour issues within a mobile society.
Tianle
Founding editor of Foodthink and convenor of the Beijing Organic Farmers Market.
Timeline
01:27 Onboarding: Accidentally transitioning from a stock clerk to a picker, and the requirement for “psychological assessments”—it was all far more rigorous than imagined.
04:40 A high-intensity routine: 30,000 steps a day, 12–14 hour shifts, 9 minutes per order, 30p per item… Behind these figures is the daily sprint between the warehouse and the cold storage.
18:33 Pressure and punishment: Supervisors monitoring screens in real-time, chasing orders, and calling people out; mistakes can lead to fines or being forced to “hand-copy packing regulations”.
26:22 Thousands of plastic bags and ice packs wasted every day—the environmental cost behind a convenient life.
29:57 Stories of colleagues: a brisk and capable 24-year-old mother, a rebellious Gen Z summer worker, and the exhausted “Order King”.
34:11 Conflict between people and the system: Finger-pointing and constant arguments between the front and back ends; the frictions of labour stratification masked by algorithms.
43:12 Social security and identity: Can a picker truly put down roots in the city?
49:06 Viewing labour from the consumer’s perspective: Complaints, replacement orders, and the loss of empathy.
56:35 When we distance ourselves from the wet market, what do we gain, and what do we lose?
100 People Who Feed Us
The rice in your bowl, the vegetables on your plate, every meal ordered via your phone—behind it all lies a vast and complex reality. To touch the true pulse of this world, Foodthink’s podcast, Food Talk, has launched a series called “100 People Who Feed Us”. By following the vivid experiences of 100 practitioners, we are mapping out the professions of “food” and “agriculture”, revealing the most authentic human experiences behind our food.
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Unless otherwise stated, images are provided by this episode’s guest
Podcast music: Ba Nong
Produced by: Xiaojing
Edited by: Yuyang
Contact email: xiaojing@foodthink.cn