Thousand yuan beer "hunting" Moutai

Image source @ Visual China

Text | The Tao always makes sense

During the New Year, it is inseparable from a wine word. Family reunions, small gatherings of friends or weddings of relatives and friends, people push cups and cups at the dinner table to share blessings and joys, and wine is the first choice for gifts to give to elders years ago.

Different from previous years, in addition to liquor, ultra-high-end beer has also entered people's vision around the New Year. On January 9, Tsingtao Beer released an ultra-high-end new product "Legend of the First Century", the product price was 1399 yuan / bottle (1.5 liters), Budweiser then launched a 798ml tiger age edition beer called Budweiser "Master Legend" on the e-commerce platform, priced at up to 1588 yuan / bottle.

Thousand yuan beer caused heated discussion, most people do not understand why beer dares to sell such a high price, but some netizens said, "those who have money and do not like to drink liquor, this high-priced beer gift is very good, and it is appetizing and noodles."

For many years, liquor has occupied the mainstream of thousand-yuan products, especially Feitian Moutai as the mainstay, standing firmly. Nowadays, brewers have launched thousand-dollar beers, which may just be an attempt to seek growth, but it indirectly breaks some traditional ideas, once consumers accept the "hint" that beer can sell for thousands of dollars, will the status of liquor be so stable?

The first confrontation of the thousand-dollar market

When the brewers launched the thousand yuan wine, Moutai was not idle.

On the evening of January 18, the new product "Moutai 1935" of Guizhou Moutai was officially released and listed, the official guidance price of this wine was 1188 yuan, and the next day after the sale, the market price reached 1680 yuan, falling near the original Feitian guidance price.

Why is the emergence of this wine highly concerned by the entire liquor circle? Since Feitian Moutai "soared into the sky" and became a well-deserved pillar of Moutai wine revenue, all other products of Moutai have shown a state of "no grass under the big tree". Especially in the thousand-yuan market, the actual price of Feitian Moutai has long exceeded the official guidance price, which has caused a gap in moutai in the thousand-yuan market.

The pricing of "Moutai 1935" just fills the gap in Moutai's thousand-yuan market, directly opposing the high-end liquor of other liquor companies. We have seen that since November last year, the core products of many liquor companies such as Luzhou Laojiao, Wuliangye, Shede Liquor, and Liquor Have Increased in Price, and have made efforts to produce thousands of yuan of products.

Although the war of the thousand yuan file is likely to be rekindled by the launch of new moutai products, the industry concentration is increasing throughout the entire high-end wine market. A market source on a liquor retail platform said, "Our sales revenue in 2021 increased by more than 40%, mainly benefiting from the growth of the liquor sales market. On the one hand, sales have increased, on the other hand, the more concentrated they are to the high-end, and the unit price of customers has increased."

High-end liquor is equivalent to high-end liquor, which is a common recognition formed by the giants represented by Moutai for a long time to dominate the high-end market of liquor, but brewers are trying to break this cognition.

As early as the first half of 2021, China Resources Snow Beer launched its ultra-high-end new product "Li", priced at 999 yuan / box (2 bottles), which triggered heated discussions. At that time, Hou Xiaohai, chairman of China Resources, said that beer can not only be high-end, but also very high-end, and he predicted that there will soon be 1,000 yuan / bottle of beer in China. Sure enough, Tsingtao Beer, Budweiser and other liquor companies have actively followed up.

According to the official flagship store data of Tmall Budweiser, "Budweiser/Budweiser Craft Brewer Legend Tiger Age Edition Gift Box 798ml + Crystal Pair Cup" limited to 60 sets, which began to be sold on January 9, and the current monthly sales of the product are 47 pieces. On the official flagship store of Snowflake Beer, the price of "Snowflake Beer Liquor 18.8 degree 999ml bottle *2 gift box" is 999 yuan, and the page shows that the monthly sales of the wine are 200+.

Compared with the liquor that surged during the New Year, the sales of these ultra-high-end beers are pitifully small, but the brewers' test this year is obviously not concerned about sales, but the concept of consumption.

In the past, consumers' brand perception of beer products mostly stayed at the low end, and the consumption scene was also concentrated in the occasion of non-business banquets, and now by creating ultra-high-end beer, the purpose is to tell consumers that a bottle of beer can not only sell for a few yuan, but also sell for hundreds or even thousands of yuan. If the quality of the later products can achieve value for money, no one will pay for it.

A breakthrough in the high-end of beer manufacturers

In order to create the high-end attributes of products, we have seen that the thousand yuan liquor launched by beer manufacturers such as Tsingtao Beer and Budweiser Beer has changed from all aspects such as raw materials, brewing process and packaging. For example, the "legend of Tsingtao Beer", in addition to using conventional raw materials and yeast, is also brewed in oak barrels and bourbon barrels, and the brewing time, alcohol and original wort concentration are much higher than ordinary beer products.

Products are always hard power, brewers try to improve the core competitiveness of products from the quality of the point of view, and then achieve the purpose of raising the brand tone, but even if the wine company does the quality of beer well, compared to liquor, beer still lacks a key element - cultural heritage.

The mainland wine table culture has been passed down for thousands of years, and initially this wine refers to liquor, in other words, the mainland wine culture is liquor culture, and in today's various social scenes, the elders still think that good liquor is on the grade. Obviously, this deep-rooted concept creates a natural "barrier" for liquor to compete in liquor products.

Beer lacks a strong cultural heritage and strong social attributes, which makes the product lack premium space, and also makes the ultra-high-end thousand yuan wine look more like an IQ tax.

Therefore, if beer wants to achieve high-end, it is actually the most difficult to increase and create cultural heritage. However, recently, the outlet of craft beer has become bigger and bigger, and more and more young people who love craft beer, can this bring new ideas to the high-end route of beer manufacturers?

A set of data from iiMedia Research shows that craft beer, industrial beer, and wine are the main drinks that consumers usually drink. Among them, craft beer ranked first with 35.5%, and industrial beer and wine ranked second and third with 33.4% and 32.3% respectively.

As early as 2015-2017, craft beer was on fire for a while, zebra craft beer, Panda craft beer and other craft beer brands were financed, the track was once hot, but after the boom, the craft beer industry quickly returned to calm. Until the recovery of the domestic epidemic, craft beer sales picked up rapidly. A post-90s person who entered the pit of craft beer said that craft brewing has social potential, "With friends, my first choice is basically craft brewing." At the New Year's party, family and friends will also choose craft beer."

The craft beer track is not only traditional beer manufacturers such as Qingdao and Budweiser, but they are undoubtedly the most powerful in general. Cutting into craft beer not only caters to changes in consumer demand, but also takes advantage of this to increase prices and impact the high-end market.

The development of the U.S. beer industry has also verified the viability of this route. Before the 1960s, the product structure of the American beer industry was dominated by low-end beer, and the proportion of ultra-high-end beer was extremely low. After the 90s, American beer began the second wave of high-end, this wave is represented by craft beer, the sales of ultra-high-end beer began to rise rapidly, and surpassed low-end beer. Since then, it has presented a pattern of low-end, high-end and ultra-high-end beer.

Nowadays, not only traditional liquor companies, but also Wang Laoji, who sells herbal tea, and Haidilao, a catering giant, are also sitting on the craft brewing table.

Young people abandon liquor, and a thousand yuan beer finally "takes the position"?

Craft beer seems to provide an idea for the high-end upgrade of beer, but the price of craft beer is far less than 1,000 yuan, that is to say, if consumers want to give up liquor and pay for ultra-high-end beer, it is impossible to use the heating up of the craft beer market.

Moreover, driven by Moutai, sauce-flavored liquor brands have become the biggest beneficiaries of many high-end liquor brands, and first-line sauce liquor brands have firmly guarded the door of high-end prices and become the "forwards" of business liquor and holiday gifts. From the perspective of the current consumption concept, in the scene of gift-giving, few people will take beer to give away, even if its price is similar to the price of high-end liquor.

However, aside from the just need of gift-giving, whether it is family dinners, daily social interactions or drinking alone at home, young people do not have the loyalty of their elders to liquor, they are more and more inclined to low-grade liquor, and drinking is no longer forced by social activities at the dinner table, but is more willing to use wine to please themselves.

This change in consumer psychology is likely to threaten the position of liquor in the high-end market, and then let new products or brands have "opportunities to take advantage of".

In fact, we see that whether in the high-end market or the low-end market, young people are gradually abandoning liquor. During the New Year, in addition to the big family gatherings, most young people can not drink with the elders, after being pulled to toast to the elders, they basically do not choose liquor when they are with friends, classmates, and peers.

If you want to talk and chat, you usually find a quiet place to drink a little bit of bartending or whiskey; if you want to go to a stylish bar, you will choose to drink some niche foreign liquor or craft beer. The most popular choice is beer, playing table games, fighting wine, playing cards, or when the younger generations of the family gather at home, the younger ones are keen on beer and other low-alcohol drinks. For liquor, many people said, "In addition to the socializing and gift-giving that is unavoidable, it is rare to buy liquor at other times." ”

The production and sales of liquor are indeed declining. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the peak of liquor production was in 2016, when the annual output was 13.58 million kiloliters, and since then it has entered a sharp decline in production. 11.98 million kiloliters in 2017, 8.71 million kiloliters in 2018, 7.86 million kiloliters in 2019, 7.41 million kiloliters in 2020 and 7.1563 million kiloliters in 2021. Liquor production in 2021 fell by 47.3% from the peak in 2016, almost to the waist.

The crisis of liquor is even more evident after a new generation of young people has become the mainstream of consumption. In particular, many young people who have not grown up in the wine table culture or are extremely disgusted with the wine table culture, they are more concerned about their own feelings when choosing wine, rather than the special attributes carried by wine.

Therefore, the original admiration for liquor engraved on the genes of the Chinese people is likely to gradually wear out, which also leads to many people often not slowly turning to high alcohol as the previous generation grew older.

At that time, the high-end wine market will inevitably emerge more thousand yuan of wine, so that consumers who are not sensitive to price have new choices.

Of course, whether the change of generations will directly change the drinking habits of the Chinese people, and then make structural adjustments to the entire industry, it is still unknown. Brewers have a long way to go if they want to get consumers to accept ultra-high-end products.