The outer packaging text was accused of vulgar marketing, and Wei Long apologized: stop the production of controversial copywriting packaging

Recently, some netizens have reported that the outer packaging of the well-known food brand Weilong spicy strip is printed with words such as "about it", "thief big" and "tough", which is suspected of vulgar marketing and playing pornography.

In the early morning of March 30, Weilong's official Weibo posted an apology and said that it would stop the production of controversial copywriting packaging.

According to reports, the Advertising Supervision Section of the Luohe Municipal Supervision Bureau responded to the matter and said that it had intervened in the investigation.

Accused of vulgar marketing, Wei Long apologized

Recently, a Weibo blogger found that the three outer packagings of Weilong spicy strips were printed with words such as "about it", "thief big", "tough" and so on, which were very eye-catching.

Image source: Weibo

Subsequently, the blogger reported to the Weilong Food flagship store that these slogans have the problem of "vulgar and edge-skimming". However, Weilong customer service explained that "about" refers to the meaning of "about eating spicy noodles together with small partners to relax", and "big thieves" and "tough" are a kind of label for their product characteristics.

Related topics rushed to Weibo hot search, which aroused the attention of many netizens.

Some netizens said, "These words are indeed quite strange together, I will be uncomfortable" "This copywriting is indeed a bit inappropriate" "Not obscene can not sell goods? But some netizens said, "A little grass and trees are soldiers", "how many years has this packaging been", "there is no dirty stuff in the spicy strips."

According to China News Weekly, lawyer Lan Tianbin, a partner at Jiangsu Fade Dongheng Law Firm, said that Weilong's slogan looks relatively vulgar and bad taste, and it is not highly evaluated aesthetically and morally, but at the same time, it should be noted that vulgar advertising slogans are not necessarily equivalent to illegality.

According to the Advertising Law, advertisements must not obstruct social public order or violate good social customs, and must not contain obscene, pornographic, gambling, superstitious, terrorist, or violent content.

"Whether Wei Long's advertising slogan is obscene and pornographic should be said to be controversial. As for whether it violates the good customs of society, the definition is also relatively vague," Lan Tianbin pointed out.

In the early morning of March 30, Weilong's official Weibo responded:

First of all, thank you very much for your attention and supervision of Weilong, but also thank the majority of consumers for their support and love for Weilong, here we express our sincere thanks.

Recently, some netizens put forward relevant opinions and suggestions on the packaging of the company's products, the content of the product packaging copywriting caused some netizens to dispute, here we apologize, the company attaches great importance to the majority of netizens and consumers' opinions, decided to stop the production of controversial copywriting packaging, while optimizing the layout copywriting and design.

Weilong is a deep processing of agricultural and sideline products, native consumer brand, since its establishment for more than 20 years, has been the companionship and support of the majority of consumers to today, in the future we will continue to listen to consumer feedback, continue to improve the consumer experience, but also ask the majority of consumers to put forward more valuable opinions, with your spur, we will do better, thank you again for your support!

Wei Long, who is in his twenties, must learn to listen, grow in listening, and change in criticism.

Earn 800 million a year,

Has passed the listing hearing of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange

According to public information, Weilong was founded in 1999 by Liu Weiping and Liu Fuyou, and is currently the largest and most well-known spicy noodle products (i.e. spicy strips) brand in China. In 2004, Liu Weiping established Luohe Pingping Food Co., Ltd., which was the first spicy noodle enterprise in China to establish a company.

In May 2021, Weilong submitted a listing application to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, and passed the listing hearing in November of that year, which was called "Spicy First Share" by the market.

According to the Weilong prospectus, Weilong is the largest spicy snack food enterprise in China, with a total market share of 5.7%, which is 3.8 times that of the second-ranked enterprises in terms of retail sales, and its market share of seasoned noodle products and spicy leisure vegetable products ranks first.

According to the prospectus, Weilong earned a profit of 818 million yuan in 2020, much higher than the net profit of 301 million yuan for the three squirrels in 2020 and the 344 million yuan for the good shop.

From 2018 to 2020, the company's operating income increased year by year, reaching 2.751 billion, 3.384 billion and 4.12 billion yuan respectively. The compound annual growth rate from 2018 to 2020 reached 22.4%. Gross profit margin has also steadily increased from 34.7% to 38% in the past three years, achieving a gross profit of RMB1.565 billion in 2020.

The company's revenue comes from three main categories: seasoned noodle products, vegetable products and soy products and other products. Among them, seasoned noodle products account for more than two-thirds, but the proportion has decreased from 78.6% in 2018 to 65.3%. The proportion of vegetable products increased from 10.8% to 28.3%. The proportion of seasoned noodle products and vegetable products is as high as 93.6%, which can be seen that Weilong's products are relatively single and have a high dependence on spicy strips.

Wei Long's spicy strips are no longer the "5 mao" items in the memories of the "post-90s". At present, the price has doubled several times, and the mainstream single product has reached nearly 5 yuan. Moreover, the Weilong spicy strip product package was upgraded to "Bai Fumei", getting rid of the label of low quality and low price. Therefore, high value, high price weilong brought high income.

Editor| He Xiaotao, Du Bo, Wang Jiaqi

Proofreader | Sun Zhicheng

Daily Economic News Synthesis Per App, Zhongxin Jingwei, China News Weekly