"You have no love, you need companionship, get a dog!" This golden sentence of Ma Weiwei in "Strange Story" has really become the living situation of many young people now.
Pet economy is the "lonely business" of young people, mixed with people's special emotional sustenance, with the east wind of the Internet, China's pet economy is heading for an outbreak.
Shiba Inu was asleep. Photo by Yang Bo, a reporter from China News Network
According to an agency survey, Chinese is expected to spend 202 billion yuan on pets in 2019, an increase of 19% over last year. China now has the highest number of pet cats and dogs in the world, and is expected to have 248 million pet cats and dogs in 2024. Among pet cat and dog owners in Chinese cities, almost half are post-90s, and about half are single.
In the past, the son was called a dog, and now the dog is called "son"
According to the 2019 China Pet Industry White Paper, 59.1% of pet owners regard pets as their children.
Programmer Xiao Wang has been working in Hangzhou for two years, and on a rainy night a year ago, a wet stray cat followed him into the elevator after work, thus opening the curtain of his "shoveling officer" career. Now, the little guy named "Charlie" because of a handful of chaplin-like black hairs above his mouth has taken over all of his social software avatars. "My family is not in Hangzhou, the university is not in Hangzhou, there are not many old friends here, and Charlie has been accompanying me."
Xiaolan, who graduated more than a year ago, raised an English short cat three months after entering the society. Worried that the cat was lonely at home when he went to work, he found a companion for the cat a few months ago. This year, Xiaolan spent nearly two thousand yuan on the two "cat masters".
The staff interacted with the cute pet. Photo by Yu Jing, a reporter from China News Network
Cat litter alone, there are mineral sand, wood creed sand, corn sand, and even more expensive tofu sand, crystal sand; catamine, fish oil, nutritional paste, soft phospholipids, hair cream and other one-stop down, easy four digits; the e-commerce platform worth four or five thousand smart cat toilets, casually have "100+" purchase evaluation... The post-90s generation of this "ungotten cat" is not rich themselves, but it is not soft to spend money on pets.
According to the data of an e-commerce platform, throughout the day, the turnover of pet categories increased by nearly 130% year-on-year, and the turnover of the previous year was exceeded in 65 minutes on the same day.
The "mother-like" market supported by lonely young people
It is not difficult to imagine that countless young people who come to the big city with the dream of "poetry and far away" to work hard, after experiencing the "difficulty of not demolishing people" of "asking for money and no money, asking for no object", helplessly find that life is not only the immediate and the future. In this shadowy sense of powerlessness, pets are a channel for loneliness.
Pets often have a soft and cute appearance and a simple innocence, they are willing to accept love and give love, and can properly soothe the psychological and emotional gaps of young people.
Rather than spending too much time on interpersonal interactions, young people are more willing to pour money and energy into pets for more direct pleasure and emotional reward.
On the other hand, "cute" as a cute talent, natural cute pets also have magical "social attributes", including onlooker nature and experience exchange function.
When a person has a cat and a dog, he will immediately transform into a "Shaiva Crazy Demon". In the face of the nine-square grid continuous shooting in the circle of friends, people are also happy to like it.
In the community dog walking army, there are often cases of knowing dogs but not knowing dog owners. "It turns out that you are The Master of Little White!" "Ah Hua is your family," Xiao Bai likes to play with him." In just a few words, strangers can quickly become "dog friends".
For these young people who are "alone and not willing to be alone", pets are an "investment in love" and a warm habitat for temporarily escaping the complexities of life.
In Hangzhou, Zhejiang, a cat shop with more than 60 cats became popular and was popular with young people and cat lovers. Photo by China News Service reporter Wang Gang
Medical care and food are the main expenses of pets
Treat pets as "sons", "children" are sick, and no "mom and dad" will not be in a hurry.
When Charlie first arrived at the little king's house, he was covered in mud and lice. Medical examinations, vaccinations, insect repellent, ear washing... After a set of procedures, Xiao Wang clearly remembered that he spent 6500 yuan.
Living in Beijing, the family cat once had a serious illness because of accidental ingestion of foreign bodies, and could not detect the problem in the pet hospital, so he could only infuse: "We stayed in the hospital all night, forgetting whether it was two or three days." ”
But the condition did not get better, and even became critically ill: "The original fat cat, the whole thing is deflated." "Anxious, the little one found a private pet hospital, rushed over to do a B ultrasound, and after finding out the cause of the disease, he underwent open surgery.
Tossed two hospitals, a total of nearly 20,000 yuan spent: "Very expensive, after the operation to be hospitalized, every day is money." ”
Guolian Securities research report shows that on the whole, the average cost of showing a pet a disease is about 500 yuan, while diagnosis and examination basically cost more than 100 yuan, and it costs more than 5,000 yuan when it comes to surgery.
Illness is not born every day, but meals are eaten every day.
This year, among the popular imported goods, cat staple food surpassed infant milk powder in the first place; among the 5 popular import brands, pet food brands occupied 2 seats.
It is worth mentioning that health care products have become a new demand for pet food. As the connection between pets and owners becomes closer, owners pay more attention to pet health, and many people are willing to pay a certain cost for the benign growth of pets.
The owner accompanies a pet dog suffering from severe disc disease that causes posterior corpopals to undergo acupuncture treatment. Photo by China News Service reporter Li Huisi
"It economy" rises! Where does the 100 billion market point
In July this year, the 250,000-worth of cloned cat "Garlic" was born, and the pet owner said that he did not regret it, and "garlic" was his emotional sustenance.
This undoubtedly reflects the huge profit margins of the Chinese pet market. Although not everyone is willing to spend thousands of dollars to clone pets, the emphasis on pet food, clothing, shelter and human emotional needs has always been a pain point in the pet industry.
"The ability to serve the new young population (incremental markets) and the ability to grow long-term business is quite important." Zhang Yichen, a lightspeed China fund, believes that the "snow slopes" of the domestic pet industry are long enough and the "snow" is thick enough.
According to the "2019 China Pet Industry White Paper", 46.9% of pet owners are plagued by "difficulty in traveling with pets", and pet-friendly concept restaurants have emerged. Starbucks pet-friendly stores have been stationed in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and other cities, the store is designed with easy-to-clean and scratch-resistant materials, seats near the ground there are tow ropes and hooks, and The Rug, which has a number of stores in Beijing, can not only bring pets to dine together, but also specially developed pet menus.
Now, the "anthropomorphic" personalized consumption of pets is also developing hot. Pets can not only get haircuts and bathes, but also "take art photos" and "do grooming", and even 4S stores in the pet industry are expanding.
The pets of others watching others online have also become a new marketing model for the pet economy in the Internet era. For example, on Weibo, "Lady and Dragon Boat Festival", "A D", etc. are all pet industry Internet celebrities, bloggers share photos and stories of pets on social platforms, and make profits through advertising or PET IP.
The constant release of the fighting power of the shovelers highlights the rise of "its economy", and on the track, everyone has just started.
The short story, "Buy something for my boyfriend or buy something for a cat, I choose a cat." ”
Are you also a shoveler? Objects and pets, who do you give to spend more money?