From Gas Pump to Charging Hub: Sinopec and BYD Reinvent Retail While Great Wall Motor Logs 31,826 Orders in a Day

Two stories broke in China's retail and auto sector over the past two weeks, and both are worth a second look — not as abstract trend pieces, but as dated, numbered events.

A gas station that stopped selling gas

On August 6, a station at 1209 Huqingping Road in Shanghai's Hongqiao district reopened — still formally owned by 中国石化 / Sinopec, but with no fuel left to sell. The underground fuel tanks were demolished and replaced with buffer batteries, and the site now hosts 12 ultra-fast charging stalls from 比亚迪 / BYD rated at up to 1,500 kW: a compatible EV goes from 10% to 70% charge in five minutes, to 97% in nine. The Sinopec Easy Joy convenience store stayed in place, and a lounge with reclining chairs was added — this wasn't a replacement so much as a repurposing.

It isn't a one-off PR stunt either. On June 3 in Beijing, the two companies signed a strategic framework under the slogan "10,000 stations converging energy — fuel and flash charging together": BYD's charging hardware is set to roll out progressively across Sinopec's network of more than 31,000 fuel stations nationwide. If the pace holds, the retail infrastructure lining China's main transport corridors will physically change shape within a few years — a former point-of-fuel-sale becoming a point-of-energy-and-service sale.

Demand that's outrunning supply

The second story is the flip side of the same coin: while Sinopec and BYD figure out what to do with old gas pumps, buyers are voting with their wallets for new models. On August 5, Great Wall Motor launched its flagship crossover, the Haval H10 — and logged 31,826 firm orders within the first 24 hours. Rumors that the figure had reached 60,000 were denied directly by chairman Wei Jianjun, but even the confirmed number is one of the strongest launch results in the segment this year. The model runs on GWM's Hi4 hybrid platform: a 42.8 kWh battery, up to 232 km of CLTC electric range and a combined range up to 1,404 km, priced from 209,800 to 231,800 yuan (needs confirmation at time of publication — pricing on the Chinese auto market moves fast).

For anyone watching China as a sourcing market or a sales opportunity, both stories point the same direction: competition in auto and adjacent retail is no longer just about the model lineup — it's about the infrastructure around it, and the pace of that rebuild is faster than Western coverage tends to suggest.

What this means for buyers and researchers

New-format charging infrastructure isn't only about EVs — the same "retail point + energy + service" logic is spreading into adjacent formats, from vending to dark stores. Our automotive and EV expedition in China puts delegations on exactly these kinds of sites — plants and showrooms where you can see firsthand how the assembly line and supplier logistics actually work at companies like BYD and Great Wall Motor.

The gap between reading a press release and standing on the site shows up in details that never make it into the announcement: how staff run fueling and charging side by side, how spare-parts logistics plug into an existing network, which bottlenecks an engineer notices and a journalist doesn't. That's why in-person benchmarking still beats any news digest — provided the visit is built around a specific company need, not a generic "factory tour."

Takeaway

Sinopec and BYD show how fast legacy infrastructure can be repurposed for new demand; Great Wall Motor shows that demand is real and measurable in firm orders within the first 24 hours. For Russian businesses working with China, that's a reason to watch not just the model lineups, but how the whole chain is being rebuilt — from factory floor to point of customer contact.