INFLUENCER

Ever seen a livestreamer work Shakespeare and Nietzsche quotes into sales pitches for steaks and shrimp?

Enter Dong Yuhui, the most erudite personality in China’s livestreaming space. Born to a poor but loving family in Weinan, Shaanxi Province in 1993, Dong fostered an early love for reading and learning through his scholarly father. He graduated from Xi’an International Studies University in 2015 and found work as an English teacher at China’s tutoring giant New Oriental Education. Over the next eight years, he would teach more than 500,000 students.

On June 9, 2022, Dong began livestreaming on New Oriental’s e-commerce platform East Buy, where he sold agricultural products. Funny and knowledgeable, Dong pitched products both in Chinese and English while peppering in quotes from philosopher Plato and poet Li Bai. Dong’s style soon made him one of the country’s most popular influencers. With over 23.8 million followers on Douyin (China’s Tiktok), Dong has become the backbone of New Oriental’s East Buy.

However, the company had a bone to pick with Dong that unexpectedly evolved into a high-profile infight. On December 6, 2023, a post on East Buy’s official Douyin account insinuated that Dong’s content was mainly written by a team of copywriters instead of Dong himself. Dong’s followers jumped into action, accusing the company of trying to take the shine off of Dong’s efforts. However, the official account’s administrators refused to remove the post. Sun Dongxu, then CEO of East Buy, doubled down, stating publicly that the company pays Dong millions of yuan a year for his services. He also made digs at Dong’s fans. The drama peaked when Sun was replaced as CEO by New Oriental’s founder Yu Minhong, while Dong was made senior partner and vice president of New Oriental’s culture and tourism arm.