Analysis of Recent Changes in Chinese Consumer Perception of Cold Chain E-commerce Logistics Service: Focusing on Frozen Seafood Products

The expanding global cold chain market presents an opportunity for the development of cold chain logistics. However, the sudden change and imbalance in online demand due to the COVID-19 pandemic may imply changes in consumer behaviour and challenges to the quality of cold chain logistics service. To investigate this, we conducted an analysis of recent cold chain e-commerce logistics services (from 2018 to 2021) from the perspective of consumers who purchased frozen seafood products based on online reviews. Through text mining and sentiment analysis, we empirically compared Chinese consumers’ evaluations, preferences, and expectations of cold chain e-commerce logistics services before and during the pandemic and analyse the identified changes with possible causes behind them. The main findings are as follows: (1) The “Reliability” dimension was the most frequent occurrence in the sample online reviews, and consumers’ dissatisfaction with all the dimensions of logistics services was a trend of decline year by year; (2) The top six complaint issues of “Staleness”, “Thawing”, “Poor Thermal Packaging”, “Non-home Delivery”, “Damaged Packaging”, and “Low Speed” were being alleviated. But the “Staleness” issue was still affected by big events such as pandemics, festivals and sales promotions; (3) Customers gradually adopted sustainable packaging, but objections remained regarding its poor insulation effect and hygiene risks; (4) More and more consumers have gradually accepted and favoured online cold chain shopping since the outbreak of COVID-19; (5) During the pandemic, consumers have shifted some of their expectations to “Speed” and “Sanitized Delivery”. Finally, this study proposed practical implications for cold chain logistics service providers, e-commerce platforms, and e-commerce retailers.