Standing at the beginning of the Year of the Tiger to see a year of the tiger, when the Chinese auto market was in a stage of rapid development, purchase tax reductions, car subsidies to the countryside, new energy subsidies and other policies were promulgated, so that many families only need to spend tens of thousands of yuan to buy a car. In 2010, domestic automobile production and sales exceeded 18 million units, setting a new global record high at that time.
However, at that time, the Chinese auto market was almost monopolized by joint venture brands. According to the data, seven of the top ten car companies with annual sales in 2010 belong to joint venture brands, and the remaining three independent brands are Chery, BYD and Geely. As for other domestic brands, there is basically not much performance in the field of passenger cars. In 2010, the best-selling models were Volkswagen Langyi, Buick Kaiyue, Volkswagen Jetta, Hyundai Yuedong and Chevrolet Cruze, and only BYD F3, BYD F0 and Chery QQ3 squeezed into the top ten of the model sales list in the camp of independent brands.
Looking only at the family car market, the joint venture brands at that time made a lot of money, while the independent brands basically relied on the low price advantage to grab the market. Perhaps at that time, domestic cars left a deep "cost-effective" label.
12 years on, and now is different. Domestic cars are gradually getting rid of the "cost-effective" label, and "Chinese understand the Chinese better", in terms of comfort, space performance and intelligent configuration advantages, domestic cars are more obvious than joint venture cars at the same price. Especially for family cars, the comprehensive strength of many new cars in recent years has surprised Brother Rudder, and various configurations are leading, the power level is raised, and the space is increased and lengthened to the point of "crazy inner roll".
Now that the pressure has come to the car market in 2022, what kind of car can meet the expectations of the majority of consumers?
It's good to differentiate, but it's not good to be biased
Placed 12 years ago, a happy car experience may represent a durable and easy to open product, economic and fuel-efficient, etc., and now that the product quality tends to be consistent, a good car experience is the key to improving happiness, consumers can find their own happiness from the product, and will naturally be willing to buy this product.
What makes Brother Reel more happy is that many new cars have been back-tuned for an audience before they are listed, and the promotion of products is also carried out around this audience, and there are models designed for dads, office workers, young people who pursue individual sports or a sense of technology.
Just like the Wuling Hongguang MINIEV that has exploded in recent years, because the price is cheap enough to meet the daily transportation of consumers, it surpassed the Tesla Model 3 in the second month of sale, and the monthly sales in December last year even surpassed Nissan Xuanyi; Geely Xingyue L is full of technology, the size is beyond the level, and more than 50,000 vehicles are sold in five months of listing; the cost-effective Chang'an second-generation CS55 PLUS sold a total of 136985 vehicles last year, an increase of 26.7% year-on-year.
In addition, there are durable and fuel-efficient Toyota RAV4, Honda XR-V; Model Y, which is more brilliant than the Model 3; ideal ONE, a new energy vehicle without mileage anxiety, and so on. These models have performed well in the market in 2021, their size positioning and price range are not the same, but they can achieve a more obvious year-on-year growth because they meet the happiness of a specific group of people.
However, in the current situation, the potential of the family car market seems to have been almost tapped. According to the test driving experience of Brother Rudder, many domestic models with the same price point and positioning have similar power performance and high configuration level, and only after in-depth test driving experience can the difference between the two be found. The homogenization phenomenon is so serious that it is not good news for car companies that are not particularly well-known. Therefore, they choose to differentiate.
Differentiation can be understood as this new car will open up a new market segment. In the eyes of Brother Ruan, this move is undoubtedly a big gamble. Great Wall Motors built a "3/4 scale SUV" Haval Big Dog and a hardcore off-road tank 300, the off-road culture of the car has not yet formed a climate in China, and at the time of launch, The Brother was really worried about their prospects, and in fact Great Wall Motors won the bet.
However, there are some new cars that Brother Reel can't understand. Some cars can't tell whether it's a sedan or an SUV, and the design is strange; some cars claim to be a sporty version of ordinary models, but they only add carbon fiber decoration, use blackening design on details, and have not been upgraded in terms of power or aerodynamics. These operations can be said to have not played much role in improving the happiness of car owners, and so far, the market performance of these models has still not improved.
Details beat everything, and anti-human design is not
When the functions can meet the needs of consumers, the details become the key to the product's prominence. With the further deepening of the new four modernizations, the sense of science and technology has become the focus of attention of many car companies, but some products have abandoned some designs or functions because of too much pursuit of science and technology, and what is often complained about is the gradual lack of physical buttons.
Judging from last year's test drive experience, the lack of physical buttons also means that the secondary menu in the car is more complicated, and some models put the most important functions in the secondary menu, such as air conditioning control. Whenever you adjust the air conditioner, you must find the entrance to the air conditioning adjustment on the main page, and then make various touch adjustments. The driving danger brought by the blind operation of the touch screen is well known to everyone, and more importantly, after adjusting the air conditioner, it is found that the navigation interface is hidden, and many times it will go the wrong way, which is really uncomfortable.
There are also details such as the charging port design of the sky-facing type that needs to open the front hatch, the area under the central armrest box that interferes with each other after putting the water bottle, and the spare tire design set at the bottom of the car, which greatly reduces the happiness of our car.
In addition, many models claimed before the launch that new cars can achieve a lot of bull X functions through OTA upgrades in the future, and it has to be admitted that OTA upgrades are indeed a praiseworthy technology, but it may not be cost-effective for car owners. It is no exaggeration to say that this product was not a finished product until the OTA upgrade. Brother Reel believes that car companies need to ensure the quality of products before launching new products, and cannot rush to deliver them to car owners in order to shorten the research and development cycle.
Major car companies have competed in the three major pieces, car experience, technology configuration and other aspects of the competition, and the car experience has become a new battlefield. However, the judgment of the car experience is difficult to describe with objective data, and car companies need to consider more about how to deal with those crazy small details. The Year of the Tiger has officially opened, and it may as well look at how the major car companies will move next.