Image source @ Visual China
Text | New consumption of deep krypton, author | Wang Pihua, Editor | Huang Xiaojun
Few products can be characterized by the state media as "more profitable than drugs", but health care products have done it.
In February, CCTV's original information short video column "Quick Look" published content on its official Weibo account, with the title of "More profitable than drugs!" The purchase price of health care products priced at 5,000 yuan is only 9 pieces.
Weibo content shows that Ms. Jin, 82, of Beijing's Haidian District, and more than 10 other elderly people were invited to a dinner party in the name of giving back to old customers.
At the dinner table, a lecturer introduced his health care product called PQQ Phosphatidylserine Composite Tablet Candy, claiming that the efficacy of the product is unprecedented and can cure various physical discomforts and diseases without medicine.
The lecturer said that this health care product has a market price of 9,000 yuan, while the purchase on the same day only needs 7,500 yuan, plus a special quota, a set of only 5,000 yuan.
Under the efficacy and discount, Ms. Jin spent 5,000 yuan to buy a set, while another Mr. Wu even took out 20,000 yuan to buy 4 sets.
This is actually a real case tried by the Haidian District People's Court in Beijing, and was later reported by CCTV13 CCTV News Channel. According to reports, after the visit and investigation of relevant department personnel, the purchase price of a bottle of PPQ products is only 9 yuan, and a set of products is 12 bottles, that is, the purchase price is 108 yuan; and the lecturer gang gets the purchase price of the product for 1050 yuan, and finally sells it to the elderly at a price of 5000 yuan.
Finally, the court found that the gang concealed the truth for the purpose of illegal possession, defrauded others of property, and the large amount of money constituted fraud - Ms. Jin, 82, recovered the loss.
But for China's more than 260 million elderly, this is just the epitome of many health product scams.
01 Direct attack speech training, specializing in cutting leeks for rich and elderly people
The elderly have become a gold mine in the eyes of traders.
According to the results of the seventh census in 2021, the number of people over 60 years old in the mainland reached 264 million, accounting for 18.7%, an increase of 5.44%; of which the population aged 65 and over reached 190 million, accounting for 13.5%.
According to the China Business Daily, the mainland has shifted from a mildly aging society in 2000 to a moderately aging society.
The expansion of the elderly group will also boost the corresponding consumption. Jingdong data shows that in 2021, the consumption of geriatric dentistry will increase by 8 times, and the consumption of health examination will increase by 2 times; the number of health service products will increase by more than 10 times year-on-year, and the number of drugs and nutritional health products will increase by more than 1 times year-on-year.
According to the calculation of the Puhua Research Report of the China Research Institute, the total consumption of the elderly population will reach 7.01 trillion yuan in 2020, and the scale of the elderly market will reach 5.4 trillion yuan. It is estimated that by 2050, the total consumption of the elderly population in the mainland will reach 61.26 trillion yuan, and the scale of the elderly market will reach 48.52 trillion yuan.
The elderly who contribute to such a market scale have become the food in the eyes of the health product fraud gang. In their view, this group of people has the following commonalities:
The first is to have enough spare money. In particular, the elderly in first- and second-tier cities have a certain amount of cash deposits and a part of their retirement pensions after half a lifetime of work. And they don't have the economic pressures that prevail in today's society, such as mortgages, car loans, and baby-rearing, and have enough spare money to spend.
The second is one's own health anxiety. As they get older, the physical fitness of the elderly deteriorates, and some chronic diseases and geriatric diseases begin to plague their lives. As a result, watching health channels, learning square dance health exercises, and even buying expensive health care products have become channels for the elderly to release anxiety.
Finally, there are some common "weaknesses of human nature" in the elderly.
For example, without the company of his daughter's family for a long time, the elderly are eager to talk to people. At this time, health care products will decorate a façade in the community, and the name will be like the infrastructure built by the state, such as "xx center" and "xx service center". The salesman will invite the elderly to the façade to play cards, dance, chat, and then quietly open a health lecture.
In the lecture, the so-called well-known health experts will be in the process of teaching health knowledge, mixed with private goods, selling the protagonist of the lecture "xxx health care products". Coupled with the fact that the elderly are easily disconnected from society and cannot keep up with the update and change of information, experts will continue to exaggerate the efficacy of health care products. On an online video, the blogger once said that even if you only put a small number of sea cucumbers in your health care products, then what the efficacy of sea cucumbers will be fully displayed.
Among them, there are even lecturers who make up slogans and songs for products to brainwash the elderly.
The official weibo of CCTV News has released a health care product sale in Ya'an, Sichuan. And when the law enforcement personnel directly pounded the scene of the sale, the elderly who actively shouted slogans and sang songs still failed to realize that they had been deceived, and even accused the law enforcement officers of finding nothing to do.
In addition, CCTV's "Focus Interview" column also published a piece called "Hongrui Lebanon Company Internal Training Video". It is mentioned in the video that the health product salesman must talk about the slow type (of efficacy), and the slow type of talking about it is actually to retain the people who have not seen the effect.
In this training video, it also takes advantage of the psychology of the elderly who generally love to be greedy and cheap. The trainer said that the number of health care product lectures did not reach 200 people to prepare to distribute eggs, and its words were, "Uncle and aunt, during the National Day, the company issued an advertising fee, and we used this fee to sell eggs and send them to everyone."
Receiving eggs to listen to lectures and free travel to listen to lectures has almost become one of the main ways for the elderly to participate in the sale of health care products in the country.
The "Survey Report on the Consumption Status of the Elderly" shows that more than 42% of the elderly are deceived by the purchase of health care products, and only 1 in every 5 deceived elderly people will choose to call the police.
02 average annual sales of 200 billion, 70% of health care products are "cheating" you
The health product scam incident does not seem to have stopped under the exposure of various media.
A few days ago, the Supreme People's Procuratorate reported that in 2021, procuratorial organs across the country handled a total of 30,000 public interest litigation cases in the field of food and drug safety, an increase of 10% year-on-year.
Among them, the problem of illegal addition and false publicity of health care products is prominent. For example, in one case, the gang purchased the "three noes" health care product containing the Western medicine ingredient metformin hydrochloride from an unknown source, packaged it itself, falsely claimed that the product was pure Chinese medicine and had a sugar-reducing effect, and lured many patients with high blood sugar to buy and take it.
Police in Shijiazhuang, Hebei Province, also destroyed a den, mainly selling health care products that "enhance male physiological function". However, after identification, these products are all "three no products".
According to reports, the product is produced in Guangxi, the factory workers can rub out about 3,000 products per day with their hands, and even add ingredients banned by the state in the product, which will also have a certain impact on human health, such as swelling and prostration of the whole body.
In terms of price, this net red product, which costs about 800 yuan, costs only 8 cents.
These "fake" goods are not only the work of some illegal gangs, but also the sales tricks of some registered regular enterprises. A survey by the China Consumers Association showed that more than 70% of health foods have false propaganda and exaggerated efficacy.
For example, the well-known health care brand Tomson By-Health has been notified by the food and drug regulatory authorities in the past few years that "there are problems such as unscientific efficacy assertions in the propaganda content, expanding the publicity cure rate or efficiency, and deceiving and misleading consumers".
At that time, the advertising slogans of Tomson By-Health's "collagen vitamin C vitamin E powder" and "lycopene vitamin E soft capsules" appeared in the advertising words of anti-aging, collagen supplementation, enhanced antioxidant and whitening type, anti-tumor and radiation, regulation of blood lipids, prevention of cardiovascular disease and other exaggerated expressions.
In addition, as early as 2014, there were also consumers suing By-Health for "false publicity", and Yao Ming, the spokesperson at the time, also became one of the defendants.
The other is a correction. China.com has reported that it was introduced by customer service as the "centennial correction flagship store" of the official direct sales mall of the correction group, and the introduction of a certain substitute tea sold on the detail page has obvious hints of "sleep aid" and "sleep well" and other effects, making it believe that the seller advertises that it has the effect of improving sleep.
The "improvement of sleep" for the health food "blue hat" batch number of health care products, can be publicized special effects. The "Centennial Amendment Flagship Store" advertises "substitute tea" as a health food with health care effects, and there is obviously serious false publicity and misleading consumers.
Of course, false publicity of health care products is not only a drawback of the domestic market.
Recently, the US Food and Drug Administration FDA has issued an announcement that 12 warning letters and 5 advisory letters were issued to 17 domestic and foreign companies suspected of illegally selling 58 kinds of Alzheimer's disease (Alzheimer's) related products.
According to the FDA, these products are sold as dietary supplements, but claim to prevent, treat or cure Alzheimer's and other serious diseases. The commonly used propaganda technique is: reversing the mental decline associated with Alzheimer's disease within a week can reduce the risk of Alzheimer's disease by half...
All kinds of propaganda, even young people can be confused, let alone the elderly. According to a survey by Charity Public Welfare Daily, the annual sales of nutritional health products in the mainland exceed 200 billion yuan, of which the consumption of the elderly accounts for more than 50%.
That is to say, the elderly spend 100 billion yuan a year to buy nutritional health products, but it is likely that 70 billion of them are from false propaganda.
03 The time has come for health care brands to clear their roots
In fact, from the current point of view, the health care product industry has ushered in an unprecedented positive era.
The first is the inherent audience of the health care product industry, and the increase in the size of the elderly group.
The second is the punk regimen of a new generation of young people.
In the face of fast-paced and sub-health, the post-95s and post-00s have long paid attention to the health economy, foot bath massage, SPA health care hall, and even punk health care with goji berries in beer and cola with party ginseng, which has become a hot spot among young people.
According to the "China Beautiful Life Survey (2020-2021)" released by CCTV Finance, in the consumption expectations of 2021, health care ranks second in the consumption list of young people aged 18-25, accounting for 33.27%, and the difference with the first tourism is only 0.75%.
This also boosts the incremental exploration of this industry. In 2021, new health brands such as BuffX, Nelo, Rule, minayo, and Hetian Shuipu have successively obtained financing, and the capital behind them is IDG, Sequoia China and other bigwigs.
Finally, the national health care in the post-epidemic era began.
The sudden outbreak of the new crown epidemic in 2020 has become a national health education. In the past, the general public talked about health care basically just talking, saying that they wanted to be healthy, and the body was still very indulgent.
But the data show that the situation has changed after the epidemic. According to the "2020 China Life Well-off Index" questionnaire survey launched by Qiushi Magazine's "Xiaokang" magazine, only 5.6% of respondents clearly stated that they would not buy health care products, a decrease of 31.5% over the previous year. Among them, 45.6% of the respondents said that they would not only buy health care products for themselves, but also for their parents and elders.
It is not difficult to see that the health care product industry is ushering in a new blue ocean. But the barbaric growth of the health care product market in the early years, the false propaganda in the current health care product field, and the fraud of illegal and criminal gangs through health care products... Various phenomena are deepening people's negative perception of health care products.
Fortunately, at present, China's health care product brands are moving from extreme dispersion to head concentration, and the leading effect of the First Group has begun to appear.
Xianle Health, Tomson By-Health, Alland, Weihai Lily and other manufacturers, including Well-known brands such as Dong'e Ejiao, Herbalife, China Resources, Pfizer, New Era and Johnson & Johnson, have made certain achievements in brand building in recent years.
After the growth of barbarism, there will be chaos, and chaos will surely mature after the shuffling of the regular army. When the market is praising those barbarians who create chaos and harm consumers, they must also give encouragement and confidence to a few leading brands in the industry.
Health product scams are an unsustainable business after all, but health products are a category that can highlight long-term value. In the face of time, the industry will eventually go on the right track; and when it comes to the test of brands, how to shorten this time for consumers.