For a long time, the domestic pet economy has been regarded as a blue ocean industry by the industry. Pets have single-handedly created a large market of 100 billion.
According to the data of the 2021 Pet Industry White Paper (Consumption Report), the urban pet (dog and cat) consumption market will reach 249 billion yuan in 2021. An increase of 20.6% over 2020, the growth rate has returned to the same period in 2019.
Source: 2021 China Pet Industry White Paper (Consumer Report)
With the rise of the pet boom, the sales of related pet supplies have also shown explosive growth. Nowadays, driven by the consumption upgrade of the pet market, pet intelligent commodities represented by automatic feeders, automatic dryers, and automatic shovelers have become the hot spots in the past two years.
The pet smart products market has blossomed at many points
According to the "2021 Pet Industry White Paper" (Consumer Report), compared with 2020, the penetration rate of pet smart products reached 52.9%, an increase of 9.8 percentage points, still showing a high growth trend.
At the same time, we also see that while the overall volume is growing, the penetration rate of all the smart categories surveyed in the pet smart products market is increasing compared with 2020, and the overall development is relatively balanced, and there is no situation of trade-off.
In the double eleven pre-sale war report released by Tmall and Jingdong in 2021, the term pet smart products appeared many times, and among the top ten pre-sale sales in Tmall's pet category, six of them were related to pet smart products, and Jingdong said that the sales of pet smart products on the platform increased by 20 times, of which more than 1,000 yuan of pet smart toys and smart cat litter pots increased by more than 40 times and 15 times respectively.
It can be seen that after experiencing the awakening stage of the pet intelligence concept in 2017-2019, since 2020, this segment has entered an explosive period.
However, smart hardware still belongs to the home appliance market in essence, and home appliance giants will naturally not be absent. Under the fiery market performance, we can see that more intelligent manufacturing giants are accelerating their entry: Midea established a wholly-owned subsidiary Meixin Pet Technology Co., Ltd. in March this year, focusing on digital pet software and hardware services; Xiaomi chose to cooperate with the vertical company "cats, cats, dogs and dogs" as early as 2019 to develop and mass-produce intelligent pet water dispensers and feeders...
In the field of capital, pet intelligence is also a "fragrant food" for investors. Throughout 2021, more than 12 pet smart hardware companies have received a total investment of more than 100 million yuan; early head player Petkit's Series D financing in 2021 is also as high as $50 million...
With the rapid growth of the market, the influx of giants outside the industry, and the accelerated layout of capital, the pet smart products market is developing rapidly at multiple points. In such a big environment, how to seize the "heart" of consumers and preempt the blue ocean track has become particularly important.
The middle-aged and elderly market that cannot be ignored
Behind every hot market, countless consumers have gathered. With the development of technology and the upgrading and change of contemporary pet owners' pet demand, pet smart products related products have now covered various daily use scenarios such as pet eating, living and traveling. From smart collars, automatic feeders, smart water dispensers and other relatively basic products, to negative ion hair combs, smart toilets, smart taste purifiers, intelligent drying boxes, cat robots and other "high-end" products that make people's pet life better, it is dazzling.
According to the data of the 2021 Pet Industry White Paper (Consumption Report), among the many smart products, the penetration rate of the three categories of "smart water dispenser", "smart camera" and "smart feeder" ranks among the top three, reaching 63%, 60% and 46.4% respectively, which is much higher than other categories, and the growth is relatively stable. This shows that with the completion of user habit cultivation, some smart products are gradually becoming the "just need" of pet owners, and have been recognized by mainstream pet owners.
At the same time, for a long time, "smart" has always been linked to young consumer groups. But in this year's report, we found that the demand for smart products is not exclusive to young people, and the consumption potential of pet smart products for middle-aged and elderly people cannot be ignored.
The data in 2021 shows that the penetration rate of smart water dispensers is as high as 75.6% among the post-70s, the highest for all ages; and in the post-60s group, the highest penetration rate is the smart camera, reaching 57.1%.
It can be seen that at the moment when the aging of the population has become a foregone conclusion, how to help the middle-aged and elderly groups to raise pets more conveniently is also a dimension that smart product manufacturers need to think about.
On the one hand, pet smart home appliances can reduce the pressure on middle-aged and elderly people to raise pets, and better protect pets with the help of pet smart home appliances, so that middle-aged and elderly people can more easily get more fun from them; on the other hand, the ability of smart supplies to solve various pet problems can also help the domestic pet industry itself to open up the market for all ages, so that the age margin of the pet market can be extended wider.
What kind of pet smart products do consumers need?
According to the 2021 Pet Industry White Paper (Consumption Report), in 2021, pet owners who are "satisfied" with smart products will exceed 50% for the first time, reaching 55.5%, an increase of 14.9 percentage points over 2020. Pet owners who are "dissatisfied" with smart products account for 2.8%, a continuous decline since 2019.
At the same time, from the 2021 data, we can also see that the impact of "functional utility" and "performance stability" on consumption decisions is ahead of other factors. And "safety", "durability", and "cost performance" are having less influence on consumer decisions.
These two sets of data show that consumers' sensitivity to price is gradually decreasing, with the continuous expansion of the pet smart market, the continuous improvement of the maturity of pet smart products, and the continuous popularization of user education, consumers' concerns about the safety and durability of smart products are also decreasing.
At the same time, the practical function of the product and the stability of the product performance are the most important factors to ensure sales. Therefore, many pet smart products from mold opening to mass production of the most time-consuming is not research and development, but testing, the focus of the product is not function but quality. Even if a technical breakthrough is achieved in a function of a smart product, but the user's daily use frequency is extremely low or the use experience is not stable enough, then such a breakthrough can not bring market success.
This also conveys a core concept of pet smart products - to do a good job is the essence of everything, for people, for pets, it is the same.
Next, the white paper team will continue to launch the "White Paper Insights" series of articles, speak with data, and deeply sort out the opportunities and "money scenes" of the pet industry in 2022 for everyone, please stay tuned.