This article is transferred from: China Business Daily
China Business Daily (reporter Zhou Zijing text/photo) In recent years, the children's snack market has been extremely hot, and various children's snack brands have emerged. However, the China Business Daily reporter found that there are still some problems in the rapid development of the market that cannot be ignored, such as many snacks classified as puffed foods that are declared to be "infant and child supplements", brands that use foundry models, and the lack of unified standards in the market. This not only brings certain troubles to parents, but also affects the healthy development of the industry itself.
Question 1: When to blur publicity
"At present, there are too many children's snacks available on the market, but I don't know how big a specific product is suitable for children, my child is more than 2 years old, when buying a snack product, the shopping guide said that babies over 6 months old can eat, but after buying it back, they found that the packaging is suitable for babies over 3 years old..." Consumer Ms. Lu complained to the China Business Daily reporter.
There are not a few consumers who share the same confusion as Ms. Lu. In the comment area of many children's snack products on social platforms, many parents are confused about how big a baby is suitable for children's snacks.
China Business Daily reporter learned and found that a variety of foods with the concept of "infant and child food" are actually just ordinary snacks. It is understood that the state currently has special standards in the field of infant and young child supplements, including "infant cereal supplementary food", "infant canned supplementary food", "complementary food nutritional supplement" and so on. The above standards show that infants refer to 0-12 months of age, young children refer to 12-36 months of age, and infant supplements are aimed at infants and young children aged 0-3 years.
For example, a fruit bean on the list of baby food supplements on an e-commerce platform, customer service introduced that this product is a supplementary food for babies over 6 months old, but the China Business Daily reporter can see from the outer packaging of this product that its production standard is Q/CR 0003S enterprise standard, not a special infant food supplement standard. For another baby hungry brand hawthorn stick, customer service also recommends that the reporter give the baby more than 12 months to eat, but the product related standard is GB/T 10782 (candied fruit general rule), not the infant food supplement standard.
Yi's brand of embryo carrot rice cake is declared to be a baby food supplement, and the production standard is GB/T22699.
In addition, the germ carrot rice cake of the Yi brand is declared to be a baby food supplement, but the production standard is GB/T22699 (puffed food standard), which is not the infant food supplement standard. At the same time, the details of this product also have content such as "why should you give your baby a complementary food", which is easy for consumers to mistakenly think that this product is a supplementary food for infants and young children. Jiangzhong Yitong's Eight Treasure Cakes are labeled as complementary foods when they are advertised to the outside world, and the product production standard is GB/T 10782 (Candied Fruit General Rules).
Jiangzhong Yitong's Eight Treasure Cakes are labeled as complementary foods when they are advertised to the outside world, and the product production standard is GB/T 10782.
Question two: Are the ingredients really healthy?
In addition to vague publicity, parents are also confused about whether many children's snacks are healthy in ingredients. It is understood that in recent years, many brands that have emerged in the children's snack track have played 0 added preservatives, 0 added food additives, 0 added flavors, 0 added spices and other concepts, and some have also played 0 added sucrose concepts, attracting the attention of parents.
However, the China Business Daily reporter found that in order to maintain the taste of children's snack products with the concept of 0 added sucrose, xylitol, maltitol, polydextrose, aspartame, sucralose and other additives will appear in the ingredient list. In addition, the carbohydrate content of such products is not low, and many children's snack products have a carbohydrate content of 70 or 80 grams per 100 grams.
Are these children's snacks really healthy enough? In this regard, Ruan Guangfeng, director of the Science and Technology Communication Department of the Science and Technology Communication Center of Kexin Food and Health Information Exchange Center, told the China Business Daily reporter that the concept of not adding preservatives, additives, flavors and spices is of little practical use, because regular preservatives, additives, flavors, spices, etc. are safe for the human body, which is actually a marketing strategy adopted by the brand side to use the public's panic about additives.
Zheng Yulong, a registered nutritionist, told the China Business Daily reporter that the long-term consumption of artificial sweeteners such as sucralose and aspartame will cause excess appetite in the human body, which is the brain's compensatory feedback mechanism for energy, and long-term consumption of these sweeteners may cause secondary obesity in the human body. In addition, the key for parents to choose snacks for their children is to look at the total energy, including protein, fat, carbohydrates, minerals, vitamins and other indicators, to control the total intake, rather than just focusing on whether there is sucrose.
In addition, these children's snacks with multiple zeros are much more expensive than regular snacks. For example, a child's sugar-free lollipop (7 sticks, a total of 42 grams) with full scores of Cattle and Cows is priced at 39.9 yuan on a platform, while a regular sugar-free lollipop (12 sticks, a total of 72 grams) is priced at only 24.7 yuan on the same platform.
Consumer goods industry investor Wang Liyao (pseudonym) told the China Business Daily reporter that one of the problems in the current children's snack market is that the pricing is too high, and these children's snacks are not much higher than the quality of adult snacks in addition to the concept of 0 additives, that is, consumers do not have to choose children's snacks for children. And these high-priced children's snacks want to layout the sinking market is also very difficult, which to a certain extent limits the development of the children's snack market,
Question three: Is the OEM model a good choice?
China Business Daily reporter found that many net red children's snack brands on the market currently use the OEM model to produce.
For example, the entrusted producer of cat cat jelly is Fujian Qinqin Co., Ltd., the entrusted producer of a certain type of cereal of Xiaohuangxiang is Wuxi Wugu Food Generation Technology Co., Ltd., and the entrusted producer of full points of cow and cow candy is Fujichen Food Technology Co., Ltd.
In this regard, Zhu Danpeng, an analyst in the FMCG industry, told the China Business Daily reporter that most of the brands in the current children's snack market do not have the ability to operate the whole industry chain. For them, OEM is the best choice, but in the long run, consumers will think that oem products do not have much quality assurance, which will also affect the long-term development of the brand.
Liu Chang, chief analyst of the food and beverage industry at Tianfeng Securities, analyzed the China Business Daily reporter that the common reason for the foundry model of children's snacks is that the technical barriers in the industry are not high, and enterprises can complete the counterattack of the brand through the foundry model. Wang Liyao revealed that enterprises in the food industry are divided into manufacturing enterprises and platform enterprises according to whether they have factories or not, and these two types of enterprises are currently transforming into each other. The production threshold and channel threshold of the children's snack industry are very low, so platform enterprises are more dominant. And when the industry develops to a certain stage, especially when the explosive single product appears, the advantages of manufacturing enterprises will also be highlighted.
Question 4: When will the industry standard system be sounded?
Another major problem in the development of children's snacks is that there is still no perfect standard system in the industry. At present, the industry only has the group standard of "General Requirements for Children's Snacks", and there are many children's snack products that follow corporate standards.
Zhu Danpeng believes that as a segment of the food industry, the current industry wants to highlight the concept of children's snacks, but consumers have not fully recognized this concept. This is related to the fact that brands mostly use the OEM model, but more importantly, it is because of the lack of national standards in the industry. After the introduction of the national standard, the children's snack industry will have mandatory requirements and thresholds, and will better protect consumers, which is actually the key to the development of the industry.
What needs to be paid attention to is, what is the future development potential of the industry and brand? Chen Muli, a researcher at Shenzhen Zhongwei Zhiyan Consulting Co., Ltd., told the China Business Daily reporter that the children's snack market has great prospects, and according to the development law of the industry, the segmentation of children's snacks is the market development trend. With the participation of all parties, with the market waves, there must be some backward products, backward management and backward innovation enterprises are screened out, and the development of the industry will gradually become standardized.
Wang Liyao believes that the industry seems to be very hot, but from the perspective of investors, the development prospects are general, and it is difficult for new brands to open up a place.
The relevant person in charge of the three squirrels told the China Business Daily reporter that the children's snack market has now entered a stable development stage after the rapid development of the early stage, and more and more categories appear in the market, and the price bands are also different, which actually reflects the diversification and personalization of the demand of the children's snack consumption market. As a brand, if you want to survive in this field for a long time, you need to enhance the professionalism of the brand and create a product that can withstand the "magnifying glass" test of consumers.