Image source @ Visual China
The article | CBNData consumer station, the author | Miki, edited by | Backlit
The world of food and beverage has also begun to roll ingredients.
Probiotics, collagen peptides, dietary fiber, sodium hyaluronate, white kidney bean extract, gaba, enzymes, inulin, lutein, curcumin... More and more traditional foods are adding these ingredients as selling points, and more and more emerging categories and brands are telling their stories based on these ingredients.
Throughout the history of the processed food and beverage industry, it can be said that a history of competition on the tip of the tongue, just the change of the ratio of sugar and gas of Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola, there are decades of stories to tell. For these "junk foods" in our mouths, how much sugar, how much salt, how much degree of oil temperature how long to fry is a precisely calculated "optimal formula".
It's not just a lie, according to Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Michael Moss in his book "Salt Sugar Lipids: How The Food Giants Manipulate Us," industry insiders give a formula for real-world application in food companies:
"'P=A1T+A2C+A3U–B1$–B2H–B3Q', P means buying, and the allure of salt and fat easily overwhelms H, which is a public health concern."
In addition to the purpose of making money, in order to make the product bring the ultimate pleasant experience at the moment of entering the mouth, these food and beverage manufacturers and the academic research institutions involved behind them, as well as their "financial fathers", really work hard.
If the food and beverage giants of the last century have continuously tested the "blissful point" of human taste buds through exquisite food industry technology, thus staying in the shopping carts of several generations, then the new consumer brands in The current Chinese food and beverage industry hope to use higher-dimensional technology, ingredients, designs and concepts to occupy a pit in the shopping carts of the next generation.
The demand for health is no longer a slogan, but a real market driver
The courage of new consumer brands to beat the drums of war in the traditional food and beverage industry at this time node is the result of multiple dynamics on the consumer side, supply side and capital side.
On the consumer side, more and more people are aware of the importance of diet for health, whether it is the direction of public opinion or the results of real research data, which are driving consumers to consume less salt and sugar lipids, while consuming more high-quality proteins, high-quality oils and supplementary nutrients.
Image source @ Ipsos
More importantly, unlike the anti-human healthy meal that is difficult to truly stimulate sales in the market, this wave of sugar reduction is not only a fierce marketing offensive, but also truly reflected in the sales data.
Taking carbonated beverages as an example, according to the background data of Nint Intelligence, it can be seen that the sales volume of sugar-free carbonated beverages increased by 301.7% year-on-year, compared with the sales of sugary carbonated beverages in 2021 increased by 236.9% year-on-year, and the sales proportion of sugar-free types in the overall carbonated beverage market increased from 35.05% to 40.74%; and the sales situation is even more impressive, in the case of sugary drinks sales increased by 242.9% year-on-year, the sugar-free classification increased by 366.8% year-on-year. The proportion of sales jumped directly from 34.76% to 44.59%, with an increase of nearly 10 points.
At the moment when the demographic dividend is no longer there, food and beverages as mass consumer goods can no longer hope to let more people eat more, but eating healthy, eating balanced, and the change of each individual's dietary structure is a structural opportunity for the entire food and beverage track.
Ipsos' latest survey results show that consumers' attention to food and beverage ingredients has grown rapidly, and some of the prominent subdivision trends such as improving immunity, refreshing, improving sleep, etc. have also run in the forefront, and some of the effects that have been popular in the past, such as whitening, hair growth, fat burning, and delaying aging, due to the lack of strong theoretical support, but the willingness in the hearts of consumers is not so strong.
Source @2021 Ipsos Quantitative Survey
At the same time, we are facing a different media environment than in the past, consumers need to know what it is through marketing information (knowing that there is this product, knowing its selling point efficacy), but also need to know why it is so (to understand whether the principle behind the action is real and effective).
Exaggerated point of view, now buy a snack also has a review video can be referenced, the most basic to see if the taste will step on the thunder, advanced some to see if the ingredient list is low card and low fat, whether there are too many food additives, whether the efficacy of some functional foods is true, what is the mechanism behind it, whether children and pregnant women are suitable, whether pets are suitable... Competition in the food and beverage industry is no longer just about conquering the taste buds of consumers, but about the mind.
This mind is not 4A to write you a brief, a big idea, from the five senses level to stimulate or emotional resonance so simple, but more emphasis on the real logic and dialogue, because although the information asymmetry between the brand and consumers still exists, but the cost of puncturing this layer of inequality is getting lower and lower, the industry inside and outside the industry cognition is sometimes just a blogger who reveals the secret.
After all, in this day and age, it is profitable to poke through information gaps.
Zuo Hui also once said in a sharing: "Many people say that to make money with unequal information, I think it is all a matter of agricultural society. ”
As a result, we see 0 sugar, 0 fat, 0 calorie, anti-sugar, anti-inflammatory, plant-based, additive-free, clean labels, these new concepts have been the first shot to the old processed foods with the branding of the salt and sugar lipid era in the past, and the innovation or ingredient addition of functional foods has become the second step to add points to the product.
From subtraction to addition, the consumer's heart is not only delicious, but also free of burden, but also to solve the account of physical problems, new and old brands are very clear.
Supply chain and R&D are both strengths and new marketing stories
The addition of innovative ingredients is naturally inseparable from the support of the upstream supply chain, and some in the raw material supplier industry have also received attention from the capital market.
According to Ene Cow data, the upstream subdivision track of sugar substitute producers alone has 15+ financing events in the past two years, and the total amount of financing disclosed is as high as nearly 8 billion yuan, and listed companies such as Sanyuan Bio have also run out. Sanyuan Bio's prospectus indicates that its revenue and net profit in the third quarter of 2021 increased by more than 200% year-on-year, mainly due to the surge in procurement demand from downstream brand manufacturers for its main sugar substitute product erythritol.
Image source @ Sanyuan Bio Listing Prospectus
Some strong upstream enterprises rely on the advantages of raw material composition and processing technology to quickly respond to the launch of C-end brands to seize some markets.
Taking sodium hyaluronate as an example, sodium hyaluronate has been approved by the mainland as a new food raw material as early as 2008, but at that time, the scope of use was only health food raw materials. In January 2021, sodium hyaluronate was approved again as a new food raw material, and the approved scope of use is ordinary foods such as beverages and chocolate.
It can be said that 2021 is the first year that sodium hyaluronate is applied to ordinary food, according to Frost & Sullivan's statistical analysis, the sales volume of the entire sodium hyaluronate global raw material market is expected to reach the level of 1,000 tons in 2025, and the compound growth rate of food-grade raw material applications is the highest.
Image source @ Bloomage Biotech 2021 financial report
As an important raw material supplier of sodium hyaluronate, Bloomage Biotech quickly launched three consumer-oriented consumer brands in 2021, namely hyaluronic acid water brand "Water Muscle Spring", hyaluronic acid food brand "Black Zero" and hyaluronic acid fruit drink brand "Huxiang Corner".
Through the data, we can see that in the past year, in the category of ordinary dietary nutrition foods, sodium hyaluronate has grown against the trend in the case of similar sales decline, and as of now, its sales share has been able to compete with the market share of collagen, the same functional ingredient.
When it comes to functional foods, I have to mention this element of probiotics, and its snack penetration rate is not high.
According to Ipsos' "ProbioTic Category Trend Insights" report released in December 2021, it can be seen that the online sound volume of the entire probiotic has increased significantly in the second half of 2021.
Image source @ Ipsos "Probiotic Category Trend Insights"
In recent years, some research around the intestinal flora has become an explicit science, Fan popular science readings have slowly entered everyone's field of vision, from "Careful Thinking of the Intestine" to "Microbial Brain", the view that probiotics are beneficial to the ecological construction of the intestinal flora has begun to be slowly understood and accepted by consumers.
At present, most of the probiotic products on the market still tell stories around the core strains and activities, and focus on improving constipation and fresh breath at the efficacy level, the principle is that it acts on the intestinal flora, thereby improving the entire system affected by the microbiota from bottom to top. As for many traditional snacks that add these three words to the product name, they may indeed need bloggers to help avoid IQ tax.
Cut into the segmentation of the population, the function just needs to become the first
In terms of crowds, according to the current market selling point publicity, the main focus is on female white-collar workers, fitness people and mother and baby groups.
The reason why women choose to cut into the "hmmm difficulty" scene, in addition to women's own higher willingness to consume, there is still research results to support, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 2005-2015 national outpatient medical service survey (NAMCS), the average age of constipation patients is 58.4 ± 19.5 years old, women are dominant (68.2%), coupled with the impact of contemporary lifestyle - staying up late, eating irregularities, lack of vegetable intake, etc., will make this phenomenon more common; fitness people will naturally take the initiative to pay attention to the knowledge and information of some nutritional supplements, the acceptance of this nutritional supplement that is beneficial to the body is high, and it also has the ability to affect the surrounding population; there are already many probiotic products specifically for children and pregnant women on the market, focusing on improving children's allergies and improving morning sickness symptoms during pregnancy.
When a variety of probiotic products are widely available on the market, as well as other products with probiotics, brands need to pay attention to whether the market has become saturated.
A year or two ago we would have said that niche innovation, or a focused strategy to avoid Red Sea competition, was a common and relatively high success option. Unfortunately, functional food, which was still relatively spacious last year, seems to be a bit of a traffic jam at present, and the functional elements added to food and beverages seem to be as general as fruits for tea drinking, which is not enough, and everyone is back to the same running line.
The essence of food and beverage is still delicious and delicious, which the food giants have seen clearly in the distant past, when Coca-Cola adopted the 3A principle (available, affordable, acceptable) from 1985, they were very clear about what consumers cared about and wanted at that time, and what Coca-Cola could provide. So when it began to push the "Lechuang No Session" platform this year, it has also decided that there will be such a group of people who will pay for creativity, design, and exciting stories, and what he has to do is to reach, leverage and accompany such a wave of people through the Coca-Cola brand and products.
Therefore, in the face of consumer dietary structure and preferences, which are not sudden, hidden, slow and structural changes, seizing the opportunity is not as simple as adding and subtracting product ingredient lists. The product is only the first step, and the addition of functional elements is also a means, not an end.
For enterprises that choose brand strategy, profit margin is still the core indicator of brand value, short-term competitive advantage or moat, which all brands hope to have a "deathless gold medal", in the information gap is constantly being flattened by the rapid situation, the "shelf life" will only become shorter and shorter.
Doing premiums has also become an unwritten tacit understanding in the current vision of new consumer brands, after all, brand nature and premium are good friends. Of course, small profits and high sales are also a strategy to quickly seize the market, but without the support of other high-profit, high-growth business combinations, it is difficult to say that it is not a chronic consumption for enterprises in the long run.
In fact, in the context of symbol consumption, many consumer goods now have a "chain of contempt" such a statement, from entry-level small white to enthusiasts, from the public to the small circle layer, relying on the core circle layer to release the brand "potential energy" and relatively successful cases are not few, the clothing industry has lululemon, allbirds, Burton, Patagonia, which represent a certain lifestyle, hobbies, value choices of the brand; the food and beverage industry has Oatly, daily black coincidence, Yuanqi Forest these brands that make the road wide on narrow roads.
Returning to the functional food trend, new and old players have to think about far more than the arrangement and combination of chemical elements on the ingredient list, but more importantly, the value proposition, hobbies and lifestyles of the people behind these ingredients, and what kind of posture and consumers build trust through honest dialogue.
The consumer world is always full of great uncertainty, which is also its charm, where will the next wind blow? The pre-made dish is already hot, will the frozen dough be far away? Lipton has also begun to make three-dimensional fruit tea, is it time for Kompcha to shine on the scene?
Resources:
Michael Moss, "Salt Sugar Lipids: How The Food Giants Manipulate Us," CITIC Press, 2015
Julia Enders: "Careful Thinking of the Intestines", Jiangsu Phoenix Science and Technology Press, 2016
David Permatt, Christine Loberg: The Microbial Brain, Mechanical Industry Press, 2018
Yufei Cai, Cheng Lu, Lebin Dong, Yanlin Liu, Fengrui Report 25: Food Investment from China's Dietary Structure, Fengrui Capital, 2021
Ipsos: Research on Healthy Eating Trends and Product Innovation, 2022
Ipsos: Probiotic Category Trend Observations, 2021