Recently, Royal Friesland of the Netherlands announced its 2021 financial report. Friesland China's performance was outstanding, with double-digit net sales for the whole year, with cross-border e-commerce business and new business growing by more than 20% and specialty dairy business growing by more than 30%. Friesland's Royal Meisu Jiaer market share has repeatedly broken new highs, and its annual sales have increased by more than 50% year-on-year, continuing to lead the ultra-high-end milk powder market.
"Friesland China's performance has maintained rapid growth in the face of challenges thanks to the rejuvenation of brand building, the continuous promotion of channel sinking, digital transformation and upgrading, and the joint promotion of pragmatic and efficient teams." Chen Ge, president of Friesland China, said in an interview with the media.
Chen Ge, President of Friesland China, shares performance highlights (Courtesy of enterprises)
Maintain growth: brand building is young, and continue to promote channel sinking
In 2021, Friesland revenue increased by 3.2% to 11.5 billion euros, and operating profit increased by 32.5% to 355 million euros, according to the announcement. In China, despite increasing competition, Royal Meisu Jia'er has shown strong growth. Compared with 2020, Meisu Jiaer's market share in China remained stable.
Chen Ge said that Friesland China's performance can continue to maintain growth, thanks to several aspects. The first is the brand building of youth, in the Z generation crowd to carry the banner of consumption at the moment, Meisu Jiaer in the brand marketing level of vigorous innovation, not only with China National Geographic to explore the mystery of natural nourishment, but also successfully challenged the "Largest postcard sentence" Guinness World Record title, the "persistence", "nature" and "extraordinary" brand value rooted in the hearts of young consumers.
In addition, Friesland insists on working with strategic key customers to create a more comfortable brand experience for consumers and accelerate the exploration of consumption increments in lower-tier cities. With the help of its own digital capabilities, it has launched the offline market channel penetration APP, made useful attempts with minimalist cargo flow and light binding professional cooperation mode, made initial progress, and brought more nutrition to more Chinese babies, including babies in the offline market.
In 2021, dairy enterprises will enter the "transformation period" of digital upgrading, and Friesland will take the lead in applying digital technology to consumer services and internal management. Through digital and systematic solutions, cross-business and cross-departmental parameters are shared to form a simplified and efficient business model. Friesland has also established a full-link data visualization system to support business units to make the right decisions and identify more opportunities for investment efficiency.
Future layout: tap the new business increments to enhance the comprehensive strength of enterprises
Friesland 2021 results release (courtesy of enterprises)
Talking about Friesland's next strategic layout in the Chinese market, Chen Ge pointed out: "The Chinese market has always been a very important market for Friesland in the world. Adhere to the concept of long-term and sustainable development to lay out the business, around the brand building and consumer experience, digitalization, channel innovation and other aspects, continue to insist on doing the right thing. ”
Chen Ge introduced that nutrition is still the core business, this year Friesland will continue to create a better brand experience, while making efforts to sink channels, improve the penetration rate of lower-tier cities, and achieve further growth in market share. For the professional dairy business, Friesland will increase localization research and development efforts, further expand product lines, and try to localize the supply chain. In addition, Friesland will actively incubate new businesses, such as new categories such as cheese, so as to meet consumers' growing consumer demand for health and nutrition.
In Chen Ge's view, the milk powder market will continue to integrate in the next five to ten years, and the brand concentration will be higher, so the comprehensive strength of the enterprise will be tested, including brand building, digitalization, channel management, formula registration, quality management and other aspects, in order to continue to remain in the head. Chen Ge also revealed that in the milk powder business, in order to help Friesland better achieve growth in the Chinese market, it is not excluded to consider acquisitions or cooperation with local enterprises in the future.
As a cooperative dairy enterprise, Friesland adheres to the concept of "natural nourishment", more than 10,000 member dairy farmers are the owners of the company, treating dairy cows like family, and family farms are passed down from generation to generation. Sustainability is one of the core components of the concept of "nourishing nature". Chen Ge said that the same values are also for business and business development, and will not sacrifice long-term business health for short-term performance.