"The scale of the mainland snack market is expected to exceed 4 trillion yuan in 2025", and the "trillion-level" market described in the China Food Industry Yearbook is actually a "red sea" with extremely fierce competition.
On the one hand, "competition is homogenized, price wars are intensified, cutting-edge brands emerge in an endless stream, and labels participate in competition", on the other hand, "personalized product needs, consumer time fragmentation, attention to appearance, hierarchical grading is obvious", the challenge of multiple dimensions makes Yang Yinfen, CEO of Liangpin Shop, deeply aware that every step of the development of snack companies must do their best.
For a long time, leisure snacks have shown the characteristics of "large industry, small business", although the industry market is still growing, but the snack track has shifted from the incremental market to the stock market, and all brands have felt the anxiety of "small business".
In the stage of the stock market competition, everyone wants to become the head, because the Matthew effect of the strong Hengqiang will become the "boundary river" of the market pattern to differentiate at this stage. Of course, the most important thing is how to break the game in the underlying logic of the operation of the enterprise.
For the good shop, the answer to breaking the game is not complicated: whether it is product, organization or management, iteratively upgrade and break through themselves.
Judging from the latest annual report, in 2021, the good shop achieved revenue of 9.324 billion yuan, an increase of 18.11% year-on-year, and doubled its revenue in the past five years; the net profit attributable to the mother was 282 million yuan, and the net operating cash flow was 412 million yuan, an increase of 24.82% year-on-year.
The epidemic superimposed on the adjustment period of the industry, and it is really reassuring for investors to have such growth data. Against the current, how does the shop cross the homogenization competition and continuously consolidate its position as a leader in the leisure snack industry?
Make a "carrier" of the zero food category
What is the difference between the second and first places?
In 1924, Sloan, the eighth CEO of GM, elaborated on the famous market segmentation strategy of "different wallets, different goals, different models", such as Chevrolet's low-priced focus on low-end customers, up to Pontiac, OzMobil, Buick, and the most expensive cadillac specializing in high-end.
With the price range of the U.S. car market segmentation, each brand of products for different markets, GM with the market segmentation strategy, in-depth to meet the diversified needs of different consumers, to defeat only in a single market to provide a single model of the rival Ford Motor, become the sales champion in the U.S. market.
At that time, Sloan may not have imagined that the classic theory of "market segmentation" would remain the wealth code of the business world a hundred years later.
"As long as you find the right direction, you are not afraid of the long road." As Yang Yinfen said, growing into a category aircraft carrier like Procter & Gamble, Estée Lauder and Nestlé is not an easy task, but the good shop that is moving towards the goal of "becoming an aircraft carrier in the snack industry" is moving towards the future with an infinite closeness to customers.
In addition to the insight into the changes in the industry, the good shop has shown the "bottom card" - deep ploughing market segmentation.
With the introduction of the three-child policy and the refinement of the parenting concept of a new generation of parents, the children's snack market is forming a new blue ocean with broad prospects. Relevant data show that the size of the children's consumption market has reached 39,000-5.9 trillion yuan, and in about 80% of households, child expenditure accounts for 30%-50% of household expenditure.
"The children's snack market is expected to reach nearly 150 billion yuan in 2023, and the compound annual growth rate in the next 5 years will remain at 13.7%", according to Huaying Capital's estimates, children's snacks are highly optimistic as a new blue ocean market with great growth potential.
The children's snack track that has entered the rising period is one of the market segments that the good shop has been optimistic about for a long time.
According to the company's financial report data, in 2021, the omni-channel terminal sales of the children's snack brand "Little Food Fairy" of the good shop were 417 million yuan, an increase of 41.17% year-on-year. Among them, its industry-first nutritional and health lollipop series has become a phenomenon-level explosive product, and the terminal sales have reached 128 million, accounting for more than 30%.
An important premise for children's snacks is to solve the pain points of this market segment, for many years, the concept of "children's snacks" lacks a clear standard definition, and the boundaries between snacks and children's snacks are blurred.
In May 2020, The shop participated in and promoted the release of the first "Children's Snack Group Standard" in China, which put forward detailed requirements for the raw materials, sensory requirements, nutrition and other aspects of children's snacks, filling the gap in domestic children's snack standards, and adding bricks to the standardized development of the industry.
From children, pregnant women, to silver-haired people, fitness families, different groups of people, the needs of the scene are different, in addition to the launch of children's snack sub-brand "small food fairy", with "good shop" as the main brand of fitness meal replacement snack sub-brand "good product flying", tea break brand "T-break", middle-aged and elderly (diabetes) snack series, etc., together to build a brand ecological matrix of good shop.
Under the guidance of subdivision ideas, the differentiation of good shops and the advantages of multiple categories have gradually emerged.
As of the end of the reporting period, the good shop includes 15 major categories such as meat snacks, seafood snacks, vegetarian mountain treasures, preserved plum fruits, dried dates, nut fried goods, bread and pastries, gift boxes, etc., 1555 omni-channel SKUs, and 565 new SKUs in 2021, which are about 47 product varieties per month, far exceeding the industry average.
Seeking a breakthrough in the stock competition, the breaking point of the good shop is to increase the market segment, carry out in-depth research and development and innovation for the needs of the segment, and not only talk about deep ploughing, but also seek speed.
Enter the era of "two wheels"
A bag of pork breast has left more than 500 million imaginary space for capital.
Under the tendency of "no meat, no joy" taste buds, meat snacks sold for 2.1 billion yuan have become the category sales king of the good shop in 2021, of which the upgraded pork rib series has outperformed the market with an increase of 41% year-on-year sales.
Under the background of category research and development and innovation with single products as the anchor point, the large single products with "high protein" selling points have completed the layer-by-layer penetration of the user's mind.
Under the continuous upgrading of consumer demand, high-end snacks on ingredients "do subtraction" and "do addition" in the process are favored by consumers, and carefully consider the deep logic of the detonation of the first 500 million-level large single product of the good shop, and the breakthrough in product technology research and development has become the core kinetic energy.
According to the financial report, in 2021, the R&D investment of the good shop was 39.6656 million yuan, an increase of 17.64% year-on-year, continuing the growth trend of high R&D investment.
With the high-end strategy of the good shop on the subdivision of the category and the high requirements for details, the strict selection of raw materials is strengthened, and it is particularly important to improve the product quality of the good shop.
At present, the R&D team of Liangpin Shop has scientists and R&D experts in many fields such as food science, food nutrition, agricultural product processing and storage engineering, and collaborates with leading universities in domestic food majors, scientific research institutes in the food field, and industry product head suppliers.
During the 2021 period, 34 new patent applications (including authorization) were added by The Shop, and the total number of patents applied for during the reporting period was 121, and 90 patents were granted.
On March 18, 2022, the China Food Industry Association released a message saying that it will work with The Good Shop to build a "China High-end Leisure Food R&D Center", which is the first time that the China Food Industry Association has cooperated with enterprises to build a R&D center, aiming to gather the superior resources of both sides, unite more forces, gather more consensus, and promote the high-quality development of China's high-end leisure food industry at the food industry level.
According to the China Food Industry Association, "the good shop has been building a research and development moat for many years, which can provide favorable support for the work innovation of the leisure food research and development center", and the improvement of the balanced layout of the omni-channel further helps the good shop to win long-term growth on the basis of a solid competitive advantage.
In 2021, the growth rate of the e-commerce economy is gradually declining, and the potential difference between the growth rate of physical stores is gradually narrowing, under the premise that physical store consumption accounts for more than 75% of the total consumption of the mainland, the high cost of online traffic makes the advantages of the traditional channel system begin to appear.
Smell the changes of the good shop, and actively embrace the offline real economy. By the end of 2021, the number of stores in the good shop reached 2978, of which a total of 619 were newly opened, of which 185 were directly operated stores and 434 were franchised, and the number of stores increased by 26% year-on-year.
The expansion of stores is also driving the consumption of members of good shops: in 2021, members contributed 61.16% of sales to good shops, and among more than 62.45 million key maintenance members, store members accounted for more than half.
In fact, in the field of new retail lines, online and offline channels have never been opposed, the expansion of offline stores combined with the refined operation of online users complement each other, and the omni-channel model has a stronger ability to resist risks under the dual factors of offline uncertainties and serious online involution.
At the same time, the new circulation channel of the cooperative third-party platform is also an important path in the omni-channel model of the good shop.
In the first half of 2021, the newly established circulation channel business department will focus on expanding the northeast, northwest and north China, and reach strategic cooperation with Wal-Mart, Hema Xiansheng, Yonghui, Jiajiayue, Wumei, Liqun and other supermarket systems.
The good shops that open up distribution channels are opening up more channels by building the four pillars of "product-business-price-canal". During the reporting period, the number of good shops entered 14,000 sales points in various formats for the first time, and the number of mobile stores in 2021 reached 12,000.
In 2022, the Good Shop plan will achieve global retail. With the combination of omni-channel laying and R&D investment, the "product + channel" two-wheel drive strategy has been built, and after the anti-risk ability is strengthened, an additional calm good shop may be able to run faster.
New race points under the Matthew effect
"The macro situation in 2022 and the future is getting more and more severe, what we can do is to be the best of ourselves, let the company survive, only to survive to qualify for the competition." In an internal sharing on March 22, Yang Yinfen summarized the tone of 2022's work into 12 words: cautious optimism, moderate growth, and solid foundation.
Inside the shop, we firmly believe that snacks are a happy category, a high-frequency, massive, close to the just needed category, and can be made into a community or traffic entrance category.
In 2021, Baicaowei opened its offline stores to join, Qiaqia Food launched an organizational reform project, three squirrels plan to do offline distribution, and good shops are expanding circulation channels... The winds of change have never left the snack industry.
2022 is undoubtedly a year to test the adjustment and improvement results of leisure food enterprises and reshape the competitive landscape. It is worth noting that the rise in raw material costs is catalyzing the optimization of the competitive landscape, and in the industry environment in which food and beverage brands have successively raised prices, the market share of head brands is expected to be further improved, that is, "the strong are strong, and the weak are weak".
Zhiyan Consulting said that as the leisure snack line enters the era of medium-speed growth, the investment threshold of new entrants is raised, and the number of brands is expected to maintain a low level of stability; the leading capital advantage is obvious, the scale effect of brand publicity is enhanced, and the leading effect will be intensified.
After the survival of the fittest, the snack track has entered the final round, the head effect has been strengthened, and two new race points have been spawned: First, for the C-end, the efficient innovation cycle has brought greater growth space for enterprises.
The emergence of new race points may seem unforeseen, but to some extent, accurate insight and prediction of enterprises are often more important than other favorable factors.
In 2021, the good shop has accumulated 49 new products, relying on the blessing of the 35-day rapid new mechanism, the good shop has an average of one new product every week, and this set of fast and unbreakable play has been tried and tested. Recently, the good shop revealed in the conference call that many single products such as rye toast and big wave bread were listed in less than 6 months to achieve omni-channel terminal sales of more than 10 million.
In the environment of industry downgrading and improving quality and intensifying the leading effect, the head snack companies are on a par with each other, and the strength of supply chain capabilities has become another new competition point: for the B-end, a strong supply chain can be exchanged for more bargaining space.
Fudan University Luo Gang postdoctoral in 2009 put forward the "smart supply chain", intelligent, networked, automation and other technical characteristics have become the keywords of this system, after more than ten years of development, technology tends to mature smart supply chain heat soared, more and more enterprises began to transform from manufacturing to "intelligent" manufacturing.
As a member of the supply chain transformation, in 2021, The Shop will promote the transformation of the traditional supply plan to the smart supply chain support system through algorithm research and development platforms and other means, and achieve the improvement of many business indicators.
During the reporting period, the out-of-stock rate of the good shop stores decreased by 1 percentage point, and the inventory turnover days decreased by 3.43 days. At present, the good shop has become the first intelligent digital logistics center in central China to support omni-channel goods-to-person picking in the retail industry, with inventory sharing and integrated delivery sorting, and the B2C and B2B human efficiency have been greatly improved.
After the weight of 2021, the industry has put forward optimistic expectations for the development of the snack track in 2022. The China Commercial Industry Research Institute predicts that the market size of the mainland snack food industry will reach 1,520.4 billion yuan in 2022.
Under the Matthew effect, it is not yet known who will spend the "incremental dividend", but if you want to win a larger share, the enterprise with strong competitive advantage and clear growth logic will obviously lead a position, and the good shop is undoubtedly the strongest competitor.
epilogue
In 2021, the snack jianghu is undergoing exploration and change; in 2022, the market pattern will be reshaped in shocks and competition.
At present, the good shop standing in the center of the stage has become the leader in domestic high-end snack sales for seven consecutive years, and while winning the dividend of the market segment, the effect of the "two-wheel drive" strategy 1+1>2 has emerged.
In the face of the new competition points emerging during the industry's rest period, the trend of the good shop in 2022 is bound to attract more attention from the industry. There are no shortcuts to the top of the mountain, but there are always people who are not afraid of the long way, and a new round of competition for efficiency has begun.