Jay Chou, a top presence in the Chinese music scene, seems to have recently begun to "escape" KTV.
Checking the Sky Eye, it can be seen that Xi'an True Love Fantasy Catering and Entertainment Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "True Love Fantasia") has recently undergone industrial and commercial changes, and Jay Chou, who originally held 15% of the company's shares, withdrew from the ranks of shareholders. It is worth noting that on the same day that Jay Chou withdrew, three senior executives, Li Jialie, Yin Peiran and Zeng Xianyu, also left the ranks of the company's main operating personnel.
The cooperation between Jay Chou and True Love Fantasia has a long history. As early as 2012, he took a stake in the company and cooperated with him to open a KTV in Xi'an called "True Love Fantasia" – named after Jay Chou's 2001 album Fantasia. But even with the name of Jay Chou, this KTV has not been able to go out of Xi'an to this day, and the operating conditions are even more difficult to say. In the long run, it may also sink into the times with traditional KTV such as the King of K Songs.
Image from Horse Honeycomb
From personally standing on the platform to "rain I have no melon", Jay Chou and true love Fantasia have a ten-year love-hate relationship
Turning the clock back to a decade ago, when Jay Chou still cared deeply about the KTV named after his album, after joining the shares, he not only promoted true love Fantasia KTV in his daily activities many times, but also deeply involved in its store design, from jewelry selection to box naming. This makes the Jay Chou element of true love Fantasia KTV become extremely strong, and it has also attracted many fans to come.
When true love fantasy first store opened in Xi'an, Jay Chou personally went to the local area to create momentum, and also said that he hoped to open true love fantasy KTV into a chain store, and after five years, it would be listed on A-shares." The latter did not live up to expectations, and in time to submit a public transfer prospectus to the share transfer system three years later, that is, in 2015, it plans to log on to the new third board. However, due to a number of inconsistencies in the financial data in the documents submitted, True Love Fantasia's listing application was rejected, and it has not been resolved since then.
Judging from the few financial data in this public transfer prospectus, from 2013 to 2015, its operating income was 28.187 million yuan and 17.484 million yuan, showing a downward trend year by year, and the profit and loss attributable to shareholder Jay Chou in 2015 was 93,000 yuan. It is worth noting that True Love Fantasia was still in a state of loss at that time, and its net loss was 2.554 million yuan and 617,000 yuan, respectively.
Perhaps it is not confident in its own financial data, after the failure of the first listing, true love Fantasia has never tried to break through A shares. At the same time, its relationship with Jay Chou has become increasingly distant, and the two sides have not been able to reach a decent cooperation for several years.
Despite this, True Love Fantasia still uses Jay Chou's name to attract customers, who has remained silent about it. This situation continued for several years, until a violation last year, when the actual relationship between the two parties became known for the first time.
Image from Yandex
In November of that year, True Love Fantasia was sued by the China Collective Management Association for Audiovisual Copyright, claiming that it had used more than 200 music and television works owned by Rolling Stone International Music Co., Ltd. without authorization, including three MVs called "Rainbow", which were sung by Liang Jingru as A Xin filled in the lyrics, songs composed by Ah Xin and Liang Bojun, and songs sung by Yu Quan and Du Dewei respectively, and composed by Yu Quan.
This matter has nothing to do with Jay Chou, but because "Jay Chou's KTV can't play Jay Chou's songs" (Jay Chou also happened to sing a song called "Rainbow"), rumors fermented, Jay Chou's personal company Jewell Music had to stand up and refute the rumors. In addition to clarifying the ownership of the infringing MV, Jewell also mentioned in a public statement that he did not participate in the actual operation of True Love Fantasia, and because the gap between Jay Chou and the company's major shareholder business philosophy was too large, he had expressed his willingness to give up his shares to withdraw from the investment as early as 2017, but failed to obtain the consent of the other party, so the two sides have no business dealings since then.
From the moment Jewell pointed out the truth in public, the cooperation between True Love Fantasia and Jay Chou in the past decade has drawn a rest, and this equity change is a sign of the consensus reached between the two on the matter of breaking up. For Jay Chou, it is always refreshing to get rid of a burden that may bring trouble at any time, but on the side of true love Fantasia, the real challenge has just begun - without Jay Chou's aura covering it, how to survive the desperate winter of the KTV industry is still a problem.
The cold winter of the industry has arrived, and KTV has collectively incarnated as an elderly club
Contrary to the prosperity of online K-song apps, the situation of the offline K-song market in recent years can be described as "bleak and dull" - almost at the same time as the rise of apps such as singing bars and K-songs for the whole people, KTV has embarked on the road of no return of closing stores and closing businesses. A typical example is that in 2015, the veteran KTV chain KTV Cash Cabinet closed three stores in Beijing, Namehu and Lama Temple. In 2016, Mailidi KTV, which has been operating in Zhongguancun for more than a decade, also ushered in the fate of dismantling stores.
Image from the official website of Melody KTV
Just like the resentment of physical merchants against Taobao and JD.com in those years, many KTV operators will also habitually buckle the cauldron of industry decline to the online K song App. But in fact, many chaos within the KTV industry is also worthy of people's attention.
In the 1990s, KTV replaced the dance hall as a "leisure mecca" for young people with drinks, refreshments and thoughtful services. However, after decades of development, there have been many problems in the KTV industry itself, such as insufficient professional ability of personnel, lack of differentiated brand awareness in enterprises, low-price competition disrupting market order, lack of changes in business models and venue entertainment methods, and timely impact on user experience due to infrastructure update and maintenance.
Under the influence of this series of problems, the KTV industry has long been in the dilemma of customer loss - their main audience was young people, and young people increasingly dislike KTV. According to a survey report, 77.3% of young users have reduced the number of times they go to KTV, 33.9% of users feel "tired of singing", and another 47.2% of users said that they have other entertainment projects that can replace KTV.
At that time, when smart phones were popular, the mobile Internet trend broke out, and the emergence of a number of online K song apps exacerbated the plight of KTV. After 2014, online K-song apps such as Mida and Youge have entered the offline track and opened "mini KTV" in shopping malls, theaters and other places, further weakening the advantages of traditional KTV.
The impact of the epidemic in 2020 is even more serious, and many KTVVs that have survived the tide of store closures in 2015 have been affected, a typical example is the "King of K Songs" in Beijing - in early 2020, the general manager of the King of K Songs issued an internal letter saying that due to the huge financial pressure on the company, it had to plan to terminate the labor contract with all employees, otherwise it would face bankruptcy liquidation.
Image from Canva Paintable
Nowadays, KTVvs that have survived the epidemic have almost completely incarnated as "middle-aged and elderly clubs", shrinking in the sinking market in search of increments. A KTV practitioner said in an interview with the media that the customers he currently receives are basically old men and women who are retired at home. "During the day, the family is either at work or school, they are idle and idle, it is better to call friends and lead their companions to sing and relieve their boredom."
As for the impact of online formats on offline, the practitioner said that he was not worried. "It is convenient on the line, but there is air conditioning, heating, WiFi Internet access offline, and it is better to sit and lie down and accommodate a large group of friends, which is better than a person singing on a mobile phone."
How to win back the hearts of young people?
It is undeniable that the domestic middle-aged and elderly groups still contain huge entertainment consumption potential. According to the analysis report of Ai Media Consulting, as of 2020, the total size of China's social entertainment market for the elderly has reached 718 billion yuan, and it is expected to reach 882 billion yuan in 2021. With the intensification of the aging trend, KTV can not rely on this market, relying on their own advantages and online business coexistence.
But the industry that lacks change is only a backwater after all, and relying on the elderly is not the ultimate solution for KTV. Over the years, almost all Internet companies have focused on the newly emerging Generation Z (the younger generation born in 1995-2009), and if KTV does not seize this new consumer group with unlimited potential, the continued weakening of the industry as a whole is still inevitable.
It is not difficult to find that most of the young people's dissatisfaction with KTV is focused on the single form of entertainment - singing customers can play very high in KTV, but those who do not have this talent, or are not good at expression, participants will feel bored. Without more options, it is difficult for young people to become dependent on KTV.
That being the case, expanding entertainment programs and making customers "more present" is definitely the first priority of KTV. Designing creative theme private rooms and adding movie-on-demand equipment to turn KTV into a cinema are good examples. In addition, console games, live broadcasts, billiards, board games, script killing, these more popular social entertainment models for young people should also be taken into account.
In addition, not limited to offline stores, opening up online and offline markets is also what KTVvs should do.
If it is only offline K songs, customer interaction and communication means are limited, and online + offline means more diversified interaction methods, such as K song challenges across boxes, etc. Online operations can also make the consumer experience more transparent and convenient, and enhance the consumer's sense of experience. At the same time, traditional KTV can also judge the user's consumption psychology and consumption habits through online data, and further cater to the needs of various consumer groups. In the long run, this is beneficial to the operation of the enterprise and harmless.
In general, KTV is unlikely to be replaced by online apps - the "just need" of partying + singing, as well as the diversification of entertainment means, determine that this business is always inseparable from many offline stores. But on the other hand, the continuous update of the underlying technology and the change of consumer groups will always give birth to new entertainment methods, and striving to keep up with the ever-changing market environment is the only way for KTV to survive in the new era. Who will end up halfway down and who will laugh to the end? We might as well let the bullets fly for a while.