Per reporter: Chen Ting Per editor: Liu Xuemei
How much business potential can the hundreds of millions of tables in the north and south of the world unleash? This year's Chinese New Year's Eve meal, the "excitement" brand, capital and technology, is destined to change the appearance of the Chinese residents' table.
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A small shop of about 10 square meters, 5 refrigerators, 1 staff member - this is an ordinary store in Shanghai of the new Chinese prefabricated dish brand "Zhenwei Xiaomeiyuan", from the first appearance to the blossoming everywhere, this once unknown brand has completed the rapid expansion in the Shanghai area.
During the Spring Festival, the Daily Economic News reporter noticed when walking the grassroots that the location of the small shop was close to the community, the store decoration was simple, and it was surrounded by pastry shops and fruit shops in the surrounding area, which appeared unremarkable. Just one person and one store, but trying to cover the three meals a day of residents in the surrounding communities.
Coincidentally. In a large prefabricated vegetable research and development kitchen in Pudong, Shanghai, the prefabricated vegetable research and development team of Dingdong Grocery Shopping is working intensively to develop a new round of seasonal dishes , crayfish and green dough , to welcome the spring. The reporter saw that the prefabricated vegetable research and development personnel, dressed in overalls, were using a measuring scale to accurately calculate the weight of each crayfish seasoning in order to form a clear formula for the prefabricated vegetable factory for standardized production.
This kind of picture is just a slight footnote to the fire of prepared vegetables that has been burning fiercely since the epidemic. From research and development to channels, from supply chain to retail, a sudden fire ignited the heat of prepared dishes, and the more they burned, the hot tide is deeply shaking every upstream and downstream link of the entire industry.
According to the data, the turnover of juhuasuan prefabricated dishes during the 2022 Annual Goods Festival increased by 94% over the same period last year, and the turnover of nearly 30 single products exceeded one million yuan.
Long-established restaurant companies are not far behind. According to data from the Tmall New Life Research Institute, according to incomplete statistics, this year, each long-established brand launched more than 700 Chinese New Year's Eve rice products, covering signature dishes, sauces, staple foods and so on.
On January 18, "Zhenwei Xiaomeiyuan" announced the completion of the B+ round of financing; including new retail players such as Dingdong Buy Vegetables, Daily Excellent Fresh, and Hema, upstream agricultural and animal husbandry and aquatic enterprises such as Guolian Aquatic Products and Fuhuang Sanzhen, and catering enterprises such as Haidilao and Xibei have long begun to run horses; Lu Zhengyao, founder of Luckin Coffee, also stepped into the prefabricated vegetable track with great fanfare and launched the "Tip of the Tongue Workshop" project. In the secondary market, the overall trend of prefabricated vegetable concept stocks is strong, and the stock prices of some individual stocks have doubled during the year. Even new and old frozen food brands such as Yasui, Rixiangguo, and Daxidi have joined the Chinese New Year's Eve rice army and launched corresponding New Year dish series gift boxes.
With the fiery participation of a large number of pre-made vegetable players, this year's Chinese New Year's Eve meal competition is particularly fierce.
The table ushered in a change, and the pre-made dish New Year "inner roll"
Judging from the data, during the procurement period of new year goods, the growth rate of prepared dishes is higher than usual.
Dingdong buy vegetable data shows that in 2021, the sales volume of Dingdong buying prefabricated dishes across the board (unit: parts) increased by 300% year-on-year, and the penetration rate of orders containing pre-made dishes in the overall order has exceeded 40%.
Ou Houxi, the person in charge of Dingdong's prefabricated dishes, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that this year's New Year's Goods Festival, pre-made food products increased by more than 400% year-on-year. In particular, the growth rate of dishes related to Chinese New Year's Eve rice and good color heads is more obvious. Dingdong buys pre-made dishes that generally take 30 to 45 days to develop, and there are currently nearly 30 people in the R&D team, including chefs who develop major cuisines.
An industry insider close to the crayfish factory also said that 90% of the crayfish on the market are currently prefabricated, and "the supply of crayfish factories is in short supply." ”
At the end of the year, on top of the fire that had been lit in the pre-made dish, players from all walks of life "you sang and I appeared" and poured a little oil on the fire. However, on closer examination, although the major brands have participated in the "inner roll" competition of the year-end pre-made dishes, their respective positioning and needs are not the same.
Wang Lin, head of the new brand of "Lixiangguo", which is mainly based on fast food, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that the ideal of Lixiangguo is to create an ideal simple meal, if only dumplings, wonton and other staple food products can not fully meet the needs of the market, "At the time of the brand's establishment of a year, we feel it is time to launch a table of Chinese New Year's Eve rice." ”
Talking about the future planning of prepared dishes, Wang Lin said that in response to consumer demand, LiXiangguo will launch a one-person Buddha jumping wall product, as well as several prefabricated menu items with the highest voice in the New Year gift box.
Unlike the initial stages of The Elephant Kingdom, some players have seen prefabricated dishes as a key second growth curve. Xu Zhijian, senior vice president of Dingdong grocery commodity development, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that most of the early business of Dingdong buying vegetables came from fresh ingredients, and a small part came from standard products, such as grain, oil, rice noodles, and alcoholic beverages for groceries. "After we made the pre-made dishes, the proportion of the fresh ingredients department decreased. Although the proportion of prefabricated dishes in the company's sales today is not so high, the subsequent growth potential is very large. ”
Xu Zhijian revealed to reporters that Dingdong Buy Vegetables has plans to set up a business department on the prefabricated vegetable category in order to coordinate with the company's upstream and downstream resources to do a good job in this category.
For specialized pre-made food brands, pre-made dishes are the whole business, and the opportunity to Chinese New Year's Eve meals cannot be missed. Founded in 2019, "Rare Taste Small Plum Garden" has been on the development route of specializing in pre-made dishes for 3 years. This year, Xiaomeiyuan launched a total of 3 Chinese New Year's Eve meal sets. According to the founder Pu Wenming, as of now, including the enterprise side and the retail end, the package sales have reached millions of yuan. According to the initial feedback of the market, it is expected that the overall sales will exceed 10 million yuan.
The reason why the fire of the prepared dish was ignited is related to the epidemic. In March 2020, Hema established the 3R Division, and pre-made dishes are an important part of the 3R Division. At that time, Hou Yi, CEO of Hema, believed that after the epidemic, the living habits of many consumers would change, and eating at home would become the mainstream. Therefore, Hema should continue to develop products that meet the needs of consumers, focusing on semi-finished products.
Yu Xia, purchasing director of Hema 3R Commodity Center, said, "In the case that consumers have doubts about semi-finished products, how to experience the first time is the core point. The pandemic has given consumers the first chance to experience it. Yu Xia said.
In addition to the promotion of the epidemic, in the view of Zhang Qian, purchasing director of Hema 3R Commodity Procurement and Marketing Center, as the younger generation slowly enters the family, has children to take care of, and has the need to cook at home and is not willing to waste time washing and cutting vegetables, pre-made dishes came into being.
"In addition, the long-term busyness of work has also created a daily demand for prepared dishes in this generation of consumers, after all, they are not willing to use takeaway for a long time." Zhang Qian told the "Daily Economic News" reporter.
The opening of C-end demand has attracted a new round of competition. In the face of more and more abundant choices of prepared dishes, the tables of tens of millions of families have ushered in a moment of change.
For the definition of pre-made dishes, each player has a different expression. "Pre-made dishes are not really a new concept." Li Yingbo, rotating CEO of Tongue Technology, said: "Before 2020, the market has been discussing this concept, to some extent, Eight Treasure Porridge is the earliest form of pre-made dishes. ”
Ou Houxi, the person in charge of Dingdong's prefabricated dishes, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter, "From the perspective of the industry, pre-made dishes are the concept of 4Rs, that is, 'instant food, that is, cooking, and heat', and there is a set of standards inside Dingdong buying vegetables, and we believe that 'what can be served on the table is the prepared dish'. He concludes: "The definition of pre-made cuisine is defined internally as a high-quality, efficient and fast meal solution. ”
Guohai Securities Research Report believes that prefabricated dishes refer to agriculture, livestock, poultry, aquatic products as raw materials, with various types of auxiliary materials, with modern standards of centralized production, after slitting, mixing, pickling, molding, seasoning and other links of pre-processing, and then use rapid freezing
Finished or semi-finished products preserved by technology or other preservation techniques. According to the way of eating, pre-made dishes can be divided into ready-to-eat food, instant hot food, that is, cooking food, that is, food with food.
In addition to fresh retail enterprises such as Dingdong Buy Vegetables and Hema, upstream agricultural and animal husbandry and aquatic enterprises such as Guolian Aquatic Products and Fuhuang Sanzhen, as well as traditional catering enterprises such as Haidilao and Xibei, they are also increasing this potential market and trying to learn to "walk on multiple legs".
Anhui Fuhuang Sanzhen Food Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Fuhuang Sanzhen) is a leading enterprise in the B-end aquatic prepared vegetable industry, serving more than 360 well-known domestic grilled fish brands. In July 2021, Fuhuang Sanzhen officially launched the aquatic pre-made dish project and launched the "Fish Demon" grilled fish.
Ni Baoyou, general manager of Fuhuang Sanzhen, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that after the outbreak of the epidemic last year, many catering enterprises suspended their business, and Fuhuang Sanzhen was quite affected at that time, "The epidemic has made enterprises like us walking on one leg more dangerous." "Fuhuang Sanzhen is determined to create a second growth curve.
Capital is more frequently attacked. Relevant data show that 2020~2021 is the peak financing period for prefabricated dishes, and there are no less than 12 financing cases every year.
From restaurants to homes, industrialized tables have changed
Although the fire of the prepared dish seems to be sudden, the reporter found that as early as the layout of the B-end of the relevant enterprises for many years, the "firewood" that ignited the fire had been set up.
Ou Houxi has been rooted in the catering industry for nearly 10 years, and she can clearly feel the changes in the catering kitchen over the years.
"When I first started, a restaurant probably needed a lot of chefs, unlike now, where a restaurant needs fewer and fewer chefs." Ou Houxi for example, said, "To use a simple analogy, today we go to the restaurant to eat a plate of braised meat, there are very few braised pork that is cooked by the restaurant, because the effect of cooking itself may depend on the chef's mood and level, if the chef who has been burning braised pork is on leave, the taste of braised pork may be different." Therefore, the catering industry has undergone earth-shaking changes in recent years, and most of the raw materials for the back kitchen are industrialized. ”
Ou Houxi recalled that when she first entered the industry, the procurement of catering stores was basically the procurement of raw materials, and now they are all purchasing semi-finished products.
For this general trend in the catering industry, Guohai Securities mentioned in the research report that since 2010, the catering market has promoted the chain process, and the stability requirements of chain catering brands for the dishes produced by their stores are higher than those of traditional restaurants, and it is difficult to guarantee that all of them are made by chefs. And the rapid rise in labor costs has also prompted the industry to improve the efficiency of the supply chain, reduce the dependence on chefs, and the demand for prepared dishes on the big B end has gradually opened up.
That is to say, before the outbreak of the epidemic, there were already a large number of catering enterprises with central kitchens and prefabricated vegetable enterprises focusing on the B-end market, which are also an important foundation for prefabricated dishes to truly enter the daily lives of the people, laying a technical foundation for the standardization of prefabricated dishes.
Fuhuang Sanzhen, which has focused on standardized ingredients for grilled fish for 20 years, is one of them. Ni Baoyou, general manager of Fuhuang Sanzhen, told reporters that prefabricated dishes are currently in an infancy, but the epidemic has accelerated its popularity, "At the B-end, the standardized ingredients we make for the chain grilled fish catering are actually part of the pre-made dishes, although these ingredients are not directly supplied to consumers, which is equivalent to the supply of standardized ingredients at the B-end." ”
Prefabricated vegetable enterprises such as Fuhuang Sanzhen have already completed the construction and accumulation of product supply chains in years of technology accumulation. According to Ni Baoyou, aquatic prefabricated dishes have certain technical difficulties, and aquatic products prefabricated dishes under industrialized standards can solve the problem of stability of the catering supply chain, and are also conducive to standardized storage, which is convenient for expanding the market to the whole country.
More importantly, the improvement of the foundation of industrialization has made the standardization and industrialization of food possible, laying the foundation for the development of prepared dishes to thousands of households.
Ou Houxi takes the crayfish industry chain as an example, and it is the increasingly mature crayfish industry chain and the densely packed crayfish factory that can support the explosive demand for crayfish prepared dishes at the C-end. "Before Dingdong bought vegetables to make crayfish pre-made dishes, the industrial chain of crayfish already existed, but it was not so large; after a large number of orders, the factory would expand its scale and do more standardized."
The improvement of various technical levels has also created a possibility for pre-made dishes to truly enter the C-end.
Chen Shunsheng, a professor at Shanghai Ocean University, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that the breakthrough in freezing technology has made the pre-made aquatic products reheat after freezing, which is basically close to the fresh taste of fresh aquatic products, and the storage time has also been extended.
In addition, Professor Chen Shunsheng mentioned that the improvement of cold chain logistics capabilities has reduced logistics costs. The capacity of cold storage in mainland China increased from 60.55 million tons in 2019 to 70.8 million tons in 2020, an increase of 17% year-on-year, and the number of road cold chain transport vehicles increased from 32,000 in 2011 to 215,000 before the outbreak of the epidemic.
"In fact, prefabricated dishes are only an inevitable stage of the advancement of Chinese food standardization, in order to increase the cost structure and the demand for cooking efficiency, Chinese food standardization has been advancing." The original demand for pre-made dishes (spice packs) on the B-end is rising year by year, when the C-end has demand, the industry will re-optimize and upgrade these products and provide them to C-end consumers. Li Yingbo told reporters.
Hot or false, is it really a good business?
When the prepared dish really enters the C-end, coupled with the previous B-end pre-made vegetable market, all kinds of institutions are highly optimistic about the future market space of the pre-made dish.
Guohai Securities predicted in the relevant research report that the conservative forecast of the prefabricated vegetable industry is expected to reach 429.1 billion yuan in 2026, and the CAGR will reach 15% from 2021 to 2026.
"2021 China's prepared vegetable industry market prospects and investment research report" shows that the mainland's current prefabricated vegetable market stock is about 300 billion yuan, if estimated according to the compound growth rate of 20% per year, the next 6 to 7 years of the mainland prepared vegetable market can grow into a trillion yuan scale of the market, "in the long run, the scale of the mainland prepared vegetable industry is expected to achieve more than 3 trillion yuan." ”
Zhang Qian, purchasing director of Hema 3R Commodity Procurement Center who has worked in related industries for 7 years, also felt a significant change, "When I first entered the industry, domestic prefabricated dishes were very weak. Many years ago, when I was making Japanese short-term rice balls, I was thinking: Why can't I make Chinese my own three meals a day, in a better and fresher way? ”
Zhang Qian believes that with reference to the United States and Japan, there is a very large market space for prepared dishes, "It is rare that such a large and good track will be vacated." ”
In addition to the coveted market space, on the basis of the development of industrialization and the improvement of technical level, is prefabricated cuisine a practical business for related enterprises?
The reporter learned that in terms of pricing, pre-made dishes can be much cheaper than the same dishes in the restaurant. Ou Houxi said that the price of pre-made dishes on the platform can reach 50% to 30% off the restaurant. Li Yingbo said that the price of quick cooking dishes in the tip of the tongue workshop can be less than half of the price of the restaurant, "compared to the high rent and service cost of the restaurant, we will definitely drop to half." ”
From the perspective of prefabricated vegetable-related enterprises that have been listed, the gross profit margin of prefabricated dishes exceeds 20%. According to the data, in 2020, the revenue and net profit of Weizhixiang, which is known as the "first share of prefabricated dishes", were 622 million yuan and 125 million yuan, respectively. In the first three quarters of 2021, Weizhixiang achieved revenue of 570 million yuan and net profit of 103 million yuan. From 2018 to 2020, the gross profit margin of Weizhixiang was 25.10%, 24.97% and 29.46%, respectively.
At present, the form of prepared dishes is still changing further. Some track players believe that once the prefabricated dishes are scaled up, the cost will be further reduced.
"What the tip of the tongue workshop does is the amount of carrying and the platform, although we will give dealers more resource subsidies at this stage, hoping to quickly build a platform scale, once the platform scale begins to operate, we can further decline on the cost side." Li Yingbo told reporters.
In an interview in January this year, Pu Wenming, the founder of Zhenwei Xiaomeiyuan, said that Xiaomeiyuan has gradually achieved the goal of offline profit + online breakeven.
If prefabricated vegetables are really a new trillion market, the current domestic market stock of only 300 billion yuan shows that the domestic prefabricated vegetable market is just starting. Regarding the future potential of the pre-made vegetable business, there are different views outside the industry. Lin Yue, chief consultant of Lingyan Consulting, said that the "semi-finished product" of pre-made dishes has great potential in the post-epidemic era, and the superficial reason is convenience and diversity, and the deep reason is that the social division of labor continues to be subdivided, and most of the low-value links will be handed over to industrial manufacturing to solve. "The potential of pre-made dishes lies in the C-end, especially flexible and customized pre-made dishes, rather than cold industrial products, so that there are more opportunities to go further."
Lin Yue believes that if the dishes needed by users can be pre-processed, packaged and distributed through intensive pre-processing, the gross profit margin of prefabricated dishes can indeed be higher.
Feng Yanjiao, partner of CIC Insight Consulting, said that although China's prepared vegetable industry has bid farewell to the initial stage and the speed of development has accelerated, it has not yet reached the real ignition moment. "At present, the consumption habits of prepared dishes are not cultivated enough, the demand side changes rapidly, and it faces supply chain problems (scattered demand points, high transportation costs, easy losses, etc.), and the overall sales volume is difficult to volume."
It is easy to get ahead and difficult to get ahead, how to stand out for enterprises
As far as the current situation of the industry is concerned, although the current prefabricated vegetable industry is competing for deer, it is an industry that is easy to get started and difficult to lead. For any one player, the challenge begins.
From the perspective of the competitive landscape, the industry has just started, the competitive landscape is extremely fragmented, and any player needs to face competitors from all directions. According to NCBD (Food Treasure Book) statistics, as of December 28, 2021, there were 89,700 prefabricated vegetable enterprises of various types in 31 provinces and cities (including quick-frozen, clean vegetables, and ready-to-eat dishes).
In addition, if you really want to do a good job in the business of pre-made dishes and become a leader in the industry, it is not as simple as it seems.
Feng Yanjiao believes that prefabricated vegetable enterprises need to have at least four elements, namely, strong control ability of the upstream supply chain; sufficient understanding of consumer tastes and preferences, and a strong ability to create single products; strong control over quality control and food safety assurance capabilities in the production process; and strong channel management capabilities.
At present, the major players of prefabricated dishes have their own advantages: the prefabricated cuisine enterprises that enter the game from the B-end have stronger control over the upstream supply chain, but in terms of understanding of consumer tastes and preferences, they are inferior to front-end retail enterprises such as Dingdong Buy Vegetables and Hema. Although front-end retail enterprises have the ability of channels and consumer portraits, they still need to cultivate supply chain control capabilities.
At present, relevant enterprises are making up for shortcomings. Dingdong Buy has established its own supply chain project called "Dingdong Valley Rain", with three product lines of pork, 3R food and noodles; in addition, Dingdong Buy has also established a warehousing automation system with "urban sorting center" as the core. On January 13, the Hema Fresh Huazhong Supply Chain Operation Center project, which was capped in Wuhan in July last year, will complete the internal decoration this month and be put into use in March this year. At that time, the central factory of Hema pre-made vegetables in the project will also be opened.
Enterprises entering from the B-side are also trying to make up for their own terminal channel disadvantages. Starting from the B-end, Fuhuang Sanzhen is trying to share the offline warehousing supply chain and fresh supermarket resources, and is committed to creating a community version of "box horse" in the market with advantages.
The reporter found that compared with the above players' "checking for leaks and filling gaps", the newly entered prefabricated vegetable enterprises want to cultivate their comprehensive ability in the prefabricated vegetable industry, and pay extraordinary attention to the choice of channels, the closer to the community the more popular the channel, and the community shop has become the first choice for relevant players.
Li Yingbo told reporters that the positioning of Tongue Tip Technology is a brand product company, and the current strategy is to empower all dealers, so there will be no direct business. He revealed that at present, the number of franchised stores of Tongue Tip Technology has exceeded 3,000, and the minimum number of franchised stores is only 8 square meters.
Whether it is to complement the channel or the supply chain, in fact, this is only the basic condition for dealing with the future battle of pre-made dishes. So, what is the core competitiveness in the prepared vegetable industry?
Hu Chuncai, founder of Shanghai Shangyi Consulting, told the "Daily Economic News" reporter that in his view, the core competitiveness of prefabricated dishes lies in the development of dishes, "how to develop targeted dishes based on the corresponding customer groups is the core competitiveness of relevant enterprises." ”
Ou Houxi also believes that the technical barriers in the industry are now less than the pressure of sales, "when you sell, these problems will be solved." In fact, the bottleneck of the prepared vegetable industry is not the research and development, production end, the most important thing is commodity planning. Looking at Dingdong to buy vegetables, the most important 'brain' is still commodity planning, commodity planning determines the selection of products and determines the creation of scenarios. R & D and production, the most important thing is to implement commodity planning, to land. ”
From fresh to prepared dishes, the business that concerns hundreds of millions of families' tables can always attract "the heroes of the world to bend their waists". However, no matter how gorgeous the design of the pattern is, how huge the prospects of the track are, if you want to really put the product on the table in the north and south, these tens of thousands of players need to run a "marathon" that has not yet seen the end.
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