Yili ranked first in dairy sales on the whole network, the cumulative sales of Tmall Nongfu Shanquan flagship store ranked first in all water drink categories, and the sales of Yuanqi Forest Double 11 increased by 344% over last year...
When the major brands have issued the Double Eleven War Report, there is a brand quietly, it is Wahaha.
Only the new people laugh, not the old people crying. This year's double eleven, how is the sales of Wahaha, and how the very cola reputation of the heavy "return" is, not many people know it, and not many people pay attention to it.
Can the "emotional card" save Wahaha?
Wahaha was last seen in the public eye, around September of this year. At that time, Wahaha launched the "very cola new taste" vote on the official micro, trying to communicate with netizens in a nostalgic way, and took the opportunity to bring the very coke that had been silent for many years to the public again.
Although the "feeling card" is not new, it can indeed attract the attention of a group of netizens, and Wahaha's initiative has also achieved high attention, and the number of votes on Weibo is as high as 2.4W+, which is the best data for Wahaha's official blog in recent months.
Once upon a time, very Coke can and Coca-Cola, Pepsi "fight", but time has passed, the market for carbonated drinks has long undergone tremendous changes, the attention of "two music" has declined, the emergence of domestic soda such as Yuanqi Forest, Arctic Ocean, Ice Peak, etc., will attract the attention of some consumers, the soda industry has long been a red sea, Wahaha at this time to re-"enter the game", only rely on feelings is far from enough.
As of November 22, Wahaha Weibo data showed that there were 2478 people planting grass in the very Coke Guochao version, and the official flagship store of Taobao did not find the product. From this point of view, Wahaha wants to use the "love card" of very cola to save himself, and I am afraid that the odds are not great. In fact, this is not the first time Wahaha has lost, most of the "new products" launched before are like this, a fierce operation, a look at the record of zero bars and five...
Wahaha's "invalid" new product
The domestic beverage market competition is extremely fierce, before there are Nongfu Spring, Yuanqi Forest, and then there are many Internet celebrities, niche products, the past "beverage brother" Wahaha's life is not good, the data show that in 2020, Wahaha revenue of 43.98203 billion yuan, located in the "2021 Zhejiang Province Top 100 Private Enterprises" list of the 31st place, although these two achievements are still reasonable, but compared with 2019 have declined.
In such a big environment, Wahaha has begun to change, in the past two years, whether it is a new product or a new taste has followed the trend: after the sparkling water of Yuanqi Forest became popular, Wahaha "sub-brand" KellyOne launched the angry chirp; under the trend of great health, light Nai came into being. Even the wind of sugar reduction has blown to Wahaha, and the "low sugar" nutrition express has quietly come online.
Image source: KellyOne Tmall flagship store
Compared with the old brands that conform to the rules, Wahaha has worked hard enough, but even so, the final effect is still not ideal, and the word of mouth cannot be compared with the former AD calcium milk and nutrition express, and sales have also fluctuated.
Take Wahaha's blockbuster new product angry as an example, last August angry on the market, the average monthly sales of 1000+, tepid for a period of time, this year's product increased marketing investment, in May the official publicity traffic star Wang Yibo as a spokesperson, and through posters, humanoid standing cards, handbooks and other peripherals attracted a large number of fans' attention, sales increased by dozens of times in just one week.
However, after the traffic receded, the angry meows fell silent again, and the current monthly sales volume was 2000+, which was enough to see that this product did not really attract many core users. What's even more frightening is that this is already wahaha's most eye-catching new product.
Why can't Wahaha impress young people?
Wahaha, founded in 1987, has a history of more than several decades, is the first wave of popular beverage brands in China, although it has been frustrated for a long time, but "the skinny camel is bigger than the horse", but from "a brother" to no one cares, the taste is not good. So why did Wahaha come to such a point?
Image source CCTV-2 financial channel "Dialogue" screenshot
Perhaps, as Zong Qinghou said, Wahaha's ability to innovate is not good. In fact, from the perspective of the new products introduced above, Wahaha is not backward, but the new is not equal to innovation. Looking at Wahaha's new products, whether it is sparkling water or low-sugar products, they are all "imitation" works, you can understand why the product fire Wahaha follows the trend and does what to do, but the pearl jade is in front, "imitators" are difficult to go out of the circle, and the difficulty of wanting to get market recognition is also higher.
In the case of insufficient product innovation, Wahaha also personally broke the brand filter. Previously, Wahaha and Wang Lihong's many years of cooperation was praised by the outside world as an "endorsement fairy tale", and last year the cooperation between the two sides ended, and Wahaha Pure Water officially announced a new spokesperson Xu Guanghan. In fact, the expiration of the cooperation between the brand and the star is a very normal thing, good gathering, decent "breakup", and will not be criticized by the outside world, but Wahaha successor Zong Fuli personally ended this fairy tale, she bluntly said that she did not like Wang Lihong, nor did she like Wahaha pure water packaging, because "Wang Lihong is too old" and has aesthetic fatigue.
After replacing the "past" Wang Lihong, Wahaha tried to embrace young consumers and never looked back on the way to find a "traffic star". At present, Wahaha has cooperated with Xu Guanghan, Wang Yibo, Gong Jun and others. However, nowadays, when it comes to Wahaha spokespersons, the public first thinks of Wang Lihong, and these "traffic stars" do not actually play much of a role in the brand in addition to bringing short-term traffic and sales during the official announcement.
The source of the character material Wahaha, the picture design to eat
Successive frustrations did not bring down Wahaha, its territory is still expanding, before it also extended a hand to the new tea track loved by young people, opened a "Wahaha Milk Tea Shop", just a new attempt and for its profit, and even was exposed to the negative news of pit franchisees, false investment, and Zong Qinghou, who had previously stood for the milk tea shop, was also implicated, which can be said to be more than worth the loss.
Whether it is a new product or a new spokesperson, or a new track, it can be seen that Wahaha is working very hard today, desperately trying to catch up with the pace of development. However, brands should retain consumers for a long time, not only to grasp the emotional needs of consumers, but also to transform the heat on the Internet into long-term brand value, but also to "fight" the product itself, otherwise everything is just empty talk.
As far as the current situation is concerned, Wahaha still needs a long way to go if she wants to go out of the circle again and make the next "nutrition express" and "AD calcium milk".