Text | Yao Lan
What does a product that matches "freedom" look like?
Founded in Shanghai and founded in 2019, "Fajo Pepper Planet" is a sports life brand that helps users solve the problem of free dressing in diversified scenarios, and its main products are "Ice Cream Silk Shoes" launched in April 2020 and "fufu Silk Shoes" launched in June 2021.
fajo ice cream silk shoes
Specifically, the ice cream silk shoes refer to the traditional jogging shoes in appearance - similar to the "Forrest Gump shoes" shoe type, but changed the structure of the traditional running shoes, allowing users to "wear barefoot more freely", which is characterized by the addition of silk materials, visually bringing users a comfortable feeling; at the same time, there is a nest structure embedded in the inside, using cool yarn materials, and there will be obvious "cool" and "quick-drying" experiences when wearing bare feet. The fufu silk shoes will be better in terms of wrapping and wearing, the color collocation is more neutral, and the wearing scene should be more.
fajo fufu sesame black silk shoes
According to 36Kr, "Fajo Pepper Planet" launched the first sneaker mainly for fitness enthusiasts in August 2019, but after a period of testing, the team found that competing with sports brands such as Adidas and Nike in the vertical sports scene is not a wise choice for new brands. Therefore, the team decided to adjust the research and development ideas and launch a "median product" that can bring a similar slipper experience between sports and daily life scenes, so as to meet the demands of young users who are "lazy and efficient" to switch freely in fragmented scenarios.
In December 2019, "fajo pepper planet" launched a cashmere shoe, because it can be worn across scenes, and emphasizes comfort, the product reached 3 million sales in two months of launch, and also gained a good reputation on the consumer side. "The sell-out of cashmere shoes made the team understand that users need products that can easily 'cope with life', and such products must have achieved some balance between functionality and fashion." Founder Pang Xiaomin said.
Pang Xiaomin graduated from the School of Journalism of Fudan University, was the former head of products at LeTV Sports, focusing on lifestyle directions, and also founded the male content e-commerce "Reject Basic".
"In the concept of ordinary people, sneakers refer to running shoes, basketball shoes, and football shoes, but in fact, canvas shoes, board shoes, and some other casual shoes like Converse are also the categories of sneakers. On Tmall, sneakers are divided into men's shoes, women's shoes and sneakers, in other words, the volume of men's shoes and women's shoes is not as large as the category of sneakers. Pang Xiaomin told 36Kr that the current size of China's sneaker market is about 360 billion to 380 billion, and the clothing market is 2500 billion to 2800 billion, the former can account for about 1/8 of the latter, "Its annual growth rate is double digits, the past 10 years are like this, the next 10 years is still like this." ”
What does this reflect? No matter how people's living habits have changed, sneakers must be the main category of future wear, and it will produce many sub-categories, achieving different levels of integration between sports and life.
Most sneaker brands are through sports events and sports stars to prove their professional attributes to users, and "fajo pepper planet" is thinking about whether it is possible to use professional technology in the products that ordinary people come into contact with every day, so that they can feel the life of the technology experience. "Helping ordinary users adapt to changes in work-life scenarios (such as work, travel, city commuting) or low-intensity but more varied exercise styles (such as running, fitness, hiking, ball games, etc.) in a comfortable state is what a 'professional' sports brand should do." A 'profession' for ordinary people is also a 'profession', and it is more difficult than an athlete, because the scene of ordinary people is much more complicated than that of an athlete. Pang Xiaomin told 36Kr.
Taking "fufu silk shoes" as an example, "fajo pepper planet" self-developed "SILKOO technology silk", using natural plant-extracted composite fibers, sweat absorption effect is obvious, and breathability is good; the team designers are inspired by soft, full of tough glutinous rice cakes, after testing dozens of materials and processes, developed the "nuomifoam" sole, which is more flexible than the general sole, easier to reduce the pressure of activity, and can also be naturally degraded to reduce the burden on the environment.
fajo fufu silk shoes
Pang Xiaomin believes that although "Fajo Pepper Planet" is a start-up brand, the competitive advantage of its products is obvious enough compared to many sneaker or casual shoe brands on the market. Because the category cut into by "Fajo Pepper Planet" is a high-frequency category that users may wear at any time when they go out, "we are more concerned about the location of the shoe cabinet we are in, and what it will be used for in that position." What kind of shoes have the highest status? It is placed in the first row of the shoe cabinet, or not in the shoe cabinet, but in the door of the shoe. "The natural integration into life, the possibility of more definitions at the level of clothing and values, and becoming one of the best choices or the best choices in the minds of users within the conceivable scope of the category are the characteristics of the "fajo pepper planet" that are currently manifested, and it is also the direction in which it will continue to strive." Fajo Pepper Planet "does not want to benchmark others, but wants others to benchmark themselves.
From the perspective of product price, 699 yuan a pair, "fajo pepper planet" is indeed not afraid of controversy. In this regard, Pang Xiaomin bluntly said that domestic products should not pursue absolute cost performance, and products with both practical value and spiritual value should strive to pursue a higher market position.
Generally speaking, the age group of users of sports shoe brands is concentrated in 17 to 24 years old, if you look at it from the e-commerce data, the proportion of 17 to 24 years old can roughly account for 50% to 60%, and the proportion of men is the highest. But the "fajo pepper planet" is almost the opposite, with 80% of female users, of which about 60% are women aged 27 to 33. "Fajo Pepper Planet" hopes to first accurately convey the life status and concept pursued by the brand to this part of the mature and comfortable urban female users through interesting brand content output, and then expand the user group with the "word-of-mouth effect".
At present, "Fajo Pepper Planet" will take the public account and xiaohongshu as the basic communication position, and will follow up with vibrato to present brand creativity in the form of short videos. In Pang Xiaomin's view, the user volume of Douyin is very large, relatively speaking, the user stickiness will be stronger; it is very important that some of the content on Douyin satisfies the curiosity of some users, "Many things that can be remembered have this quality, moreover, a brand uses silk to make shoes, how can it not make people curious?" ”
Fajo products have gained a good reputation on the Little Red Book
Many users have reported to the team that whether it is brand content or visual design, they are far inferior to the product. To this end, "fajo pepper planet" next in addition to continuing to do product iteration polishing in shoe type, material and design, there are two key adjustment actions:
First of all, the content of external output covers innovative design, fabrics, research and development processes as much as possible, and finds a language system suitable for itself, so as to deepen the user's understanding of the brand.
Secondly, the official launch of a new brand slogan - "ordinary life artist". Pang Xiaomin and his team hope that the person who wears fajo is a more free person, from this point of view, "fajo pepper planet" will unite more artists or other kols and KOCs with great personality in other fields to output richer content through different forms, so that fajo is more than shoes.
Finally, Pang Xiaomin emphasized to 36Kr that "Fajo Pepper Planet" will apply 5% of the revenue of each product to the research and development of environmentally friendly and sustainable materials, while promising to use 10% of the overall revenue in the future to improve the industry's labor treatment.