Wen 丨 Koi Finance
Speaking of small samples, we have to go back to the 1940s, when Mrs. Estée Lauder generously gave samples and trial dresses in order to promote face creams and hand creams, so the sales tradition of "non-sale gifts" was born.
In the past two years, the popularity of the small sample economy is inseparable from the trend of "buy one get N free" set off during the double eleven period, "non-selling products" and "trial dress" have joined the ranks of formal wear, enjoying the same treatment as formal wear, and gradually becoming an annual marketing gimmick for businesses, and also allowing many consumers to have a little more psychological comfort when they pay without blinking.
It is worth mentioning that the small sample is no longer only a few milliliters, successively appeared in the medium sample, large sample, has no longer had the experience function, but more as a replacement, which undoubtedly breeds the development of the small sample economy, and even some commercial streets appear special "small sample collection store", from time to time on the market.
But this is not necessarily a good thing, and the small sample may not become the new development direction of the industry, after all, behind the small sample is the authenticity of the product and the wanton rampage of the foundry.
Cosmetic samples "walked" out of the second-hand market?
In the live broadcast room of Double Eleven in 2021, the major head anchors passionately told consumers, "Buy a set and get one set, send more than formal clothes." Among them, the product with the highest sales in Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room is Shiseido Yuewei Water Milk, with sales of 389 million yuan and 270,500 copies sold. Dressed in 250 ml of water milk, give away 280ml of samples, and 200 pieces of coupons, the final total price is 1240 yuan can buy two sets of water milk. This undoubtedly stimulated the nerves of most consumers, so that Yuewei was sold out in a short period of time.
Before the sample did not enter the live broadcast room, the most active place was the second-hand market or the purchasing group, in fact, last year's double eleven, the lively not only the live broadcast room, but also idle fish.
On the second-hand trading platform Idle Fish on the second day of double 11 days, the release of beauty samples on the previous day rose by 201% compared with the previous day. Many people have been waiting for "leaks" in idle fish early, and when the pre-sale goods have not yet been shipped, there is a lot of information on the idle fish that changes hands and spells out the "double 11" pre-sale goods. Judging from the information searched, most of them are selling samples and posting order information at the same time, and the price is slightly lower than the price of the formal dress.
For example, there are sellers who spell the original price of 1360 yuan guerlain suit, and the average price is marked as 600 yuan. This kind of operation makes many girls become "upside-down masters", on the one hand, they can share the cost, on the other hand, they can also earn the difference, and the small economy has flourished in the young people for a time on the second-hand platform.
So when the beauty of the outlet meets the marketing flood, can the small economy really go on in the consumer market without worry?
In 2020, the newly issued "Cosmetics Supervision and Administration Regulations" regulate small samples, coincidentally, on March 1, 2021, the Tmall platform also issued the "Notice on the New Tmall Sample Product Release Specification", which clearly made requirements for the packaging, price, net content and qualification of small samples, as well as purchase vouchers.
Obviously, the introduction of these regulations on the one hand is to ensure that the sample is genuine from the source of standard supply, on the other hand, the sample is regarded as a "commodity", strict specifications and requirements, and sold with unified standards. Although it cannot completely solve the problem of unclear source of supply and the flood of fake goods, the sample is indeed gradually getting rid of the labels of "non-sale" and "trial" and appearing on the counter in the form of a commodity.
For a time, many offline beauty collection stores that used "small samples" as commodities appeared, such as HARMAY talk plum, THE COLORIST colorist, H.E.A.T Xi Yan, etc., successively, the small sample collection store Harmay talk plum was exposed to a single store valuation of up to 1 billion yuan. Just recently, HARMAY announced that it has completed nearly $200 million in Series C and Series D financing. Since receiving Series A financing in December 2019, in two years, Jiemei has received 4 rounds of capital support.
It is undeniable that the small sample did create revenue for the collection store, and according to the data, the first store of TheMe plum reached the break-even in 4 months. But in fact, merchants can't rely on small samples alone to obtain sustainable profits. The report from iResearch mentioned that for emerging beauty collection stores, small samples are mainly drainage effects, and many consumers will visit stores for the purchase of small samples, and monetization is more dependent on big-name products.
The sample has gone out of the second-hand market and become a commodity with a clear price, but in essence, the value has not been upgraded, and the sample is still the most important marketing strategy of the business, using the sample to focus on traffic, attracting consumers to buy formal clothes, and finally letting consumers fall into the trap of "increasing the amount without increasing the price".
All indications are that this is just a "spectacle" business.
The "refinement" of young people makes the small sample become "just needed"?
It is still young consumers who support the entire small sample market.
According to the "2019 Online Beauty and Personal Care Population Insight Report" released by the First Financial Business Data Center, the consumption of mini makeup products based on lipstick, makeup tools, eye shadow and other categories has risen rapidly, and the main group that pays for "big brands and small samples" is mostly post-95 students, and most of the post-95 consumers in first- and second-tier cities are post-95s.
Young people choose and buy a small sample of many channels, according to the new eyes incomplete statistics, a single small red book will be "small sample" as a keyword notes, has more than 600,000 articles, in Taobao input keywords "cosmetic sample", fans in the order of hundreds of thousands, a number of goods sold more than a thousand a month, three crowns (transaction volume of 50,000-100,000) stores countless, major brands have everything.
Of course, not only the small samples in the Chinese market are quite popular, but also the foreign samples of economic development earlier. According to a survey by consultancy NPD Group, cosmetic samples in the U.S. skincare market set a new record of $1.2 billion in sales in 2018, up 13 percent year-on-year.
In the small sample market, there are more and more young people who pursue "refinement", and the pursuit of refinement and the pursuit of ritual have become a core concept of consumption, but "poor" limits the diversity of choices of many people. Although "exquisite poor girl" is the self-deprecation of netizens, the demand of buyers to "buy more" and "buy small" has indeed made the small sample market quite popular.
In fact, as early as 2021, there are data reports showing that the mainland after 90 has become the main debt group, with an average debt of up to 127,000 yuan, debt overwhelms the income, becoming 18.5 times that of the latter, in addition, the average debt-to-income ratio of young people is 41.75%, and only 13% of young people are unsolicited.
Therefore, the lower cost of the sample can immerse young people in the freshness of skin care products, "low price with big brand" not only alleviates the plight of young people "poor", but also meets the exquisite needs of consumers. The logic contained in it can easily affect the emotions of consumers, although this is just a "trap" dug by merchants.
When merchants give away small samples, they use the price of formal clothing to compare with small samples, confusing the concept that there is a difference between the price of small samples and formal dresses, which leads many consumers to immerse themselves in the cognition of "cost-effective" small samples.
Of course, there are still many merchants "stealing beams for pillars" and "filling up with good times", although the "Cosmetics Supervision and Administration Regulations" have clear provisions on the sale of small samples, but the huge profits of small sample business still make many businesses desperate to take risks, coupled with young consumers are still flocking, merchants are naturally happy to do so.
In order to cater to the preferences of consumers, the types of samples launched by merchants are varied, and more and more young people are immersed in the fun of hoarding small samples. The "exquisite and poor" young people have given the opportunity for the prosperity and development of the small sample, but on the other hand, the explosion of the small sample economy has greatly affected the development of the entire cosmetics market.
How long will the boom in the sample market last?
Earlier, the China News Network reporter had a secret visit to investigate in a factory specializing in the production of small samples of brand-name cosmetics, according to the person in charge of the factory: "High-grade imitation products are no different from the appearance, small to the color, smell, etc. are no different from the genuine products, that is, consumers who are accustomed to using special counters cannot be easily distinguished in use." ”
The "Givenchy powder 6g sample" incident also pushed the problem of counterfeiting to the cusp of the storm, the cause is that a college student beauty blogger and his roommates sold Givenchy powder 6g sample was accused of counterfeiting, thus falling into a public opinion storm. Subsequently, Givenchy officially stated that it had never produced a 6g sample, giving the oolong an ending.
The problem of counterfeiting and selling fake cosmetics has been emerging in an endless stream, and it is difficult to fundamentally eliminate this kind of thing.
Whether the small sample market can develop for a long time, in fact, the two most important levels are the formal purchase channels and sales channels, but to this day, the production chain of small samples has not yet formed.
First of all, although the sample is now clearly marked with a price, the official does not sell a large number of sample items, so the sample access channels are diverse, so the authenticity of the product cannot be guaranteed. It is understood that most of the samples currently circulating in the market come from special counters or duty-free shops, in addition to the purchase of formal clothing gifts in accordance with normal channels, most of the other samples are from the salesman privately sold, with the purchase price of the formal clothing to be gifted and regularly sorted out the samples that have not been gifted.
A beauty shop owner also revealed that if there is no special channel, it is difficult to ensure that the sample is continuously and stably supplied.
In the e-commerce platform, the formal channel for obtaining small samples, in addition to purchasing formal clothing to obtain small samples, there is also Tmall U selection. But the latter channel is still not open to most people, according to the feedback of netizens, "because many have permissions, there are various requirements for people who try it, so they are open a lot, and there are very few people who receive it."
Secondly, there is no unified sales channel for the samples obtained through various channels, and there are samples on e-commerce platforms, second-hand platforms, purchasing groups and offline stores. There is no unified purchase channel and sales channel, which undoubtedly provides an "opportunity" for cosmetics to make fakes and sell fakes.
The reason why small samples can derive countless foundries is because of its easy reproduction, low risk, high profit characteristics, which also makes the small sample economy become a "million profits" in the eyes of merchants. Since there are foundries producing, it is bound to be purchased by wholesale retailers, resulting in the final market circulation of products that are difficult to distinguish between true and false.
In this case, the development of the small economy seems to be hot, but in fact, there are fatal "defects". In order to escape the fate of "trial dress" and "non-formal wear", the small sample market still needs to be constantly transformed and inject more "fresh blood".