A Shanghai e-commerce company launched a new virtual supermarket for smart phone users on Tuesday, which allows consumers to purchase advertised merchandise on LED screens at subway stations simply by punching a few buttons on their cells.

Online shopping company yihaodian.com, which is reportedly the first company to introduce the service to customers on the Chinese mainland, said that people simply need to download special software, which enables their smart phones to zap the codes of products wanted from some 70 screens set up along nine subway lines in the city. The items purchased can then be delivered within hours, the company said.

"The virtual supermarket targets young, tech-savvy consumers who don't have time to shop the conventional way," Zou Ping'e, the company's public relations manager, told the Global Times on Tuesday.

She added that it could eventually change consumer habits.

"The idea is to bring convenience to busy people, who can buy what they need and want during their daily commute," she said. "It essentially allows them to do something useful that they wouldn't have been able to do on the way to work before."

Liu Yongyan, a senior consultant of Shanghai-based international agency Kenex Consulting, hailed the idea as "very creative" on Tuesday, but said that it was early yet to predict whether the service would catch on with young consumers.