According to the official news of the tank brand, because the relevant areas are affected by "force majeure factors", the tank 300 model involves a total of 8 supplier partners to stop work and stop operation, and the tank 300 model is suspended from April 14. The Tank brand also mentioned that the delivery of tank 300 users' vehicles would be delayed as a result.
The author noted that since the launch of the tank 300 model, there have been many suspensions of orders or production.
In March 2021, the Tank 300, which was still under the WEY brand at the time, decided to temporarily stop receiving orders and production due to the accumulation of too many orders, and Great Wall Motors decided to carry out "suspension and production transformation" of its factory.
In June 2021, the tank brand issued the "Announcement on the Tank 300 Explorer Stopping Receiving Orders", the reason for the suspension of production is to optimize the product matrix and production efficiency, it should be noted that the model has not been sold again so far.
In July 2021, due to the impact of "force majeure factors" in overseas markets, some parts suppliers of Tank 300 were out of stock, and The production of Tank 300 was suspended from July 22 to August 1.
In January 2022, many consumers also complained online about the delay in delivery of the Tank 300 Cyberpunk Version (a modified model jointly released by Great Wall Motors and Chaojing Automobile).
Even if the tank 300 is set, the waiting cycle is long, which really makes many prospective car owners "want to wear the car". Many tank 300 off-road version of the prospective owners said that the pick-up cycle takes more than 5 months, and the city version of the prospective owners feedback that the waiting cycle has exceeded half a year, and now with the suspension of the production of the tank 300, the pick-up time of the prospective owners is undoubtedly longer.
In addition to the impact of "force majeure factors" on the supply chain, the Great Wall Yongchuan Factory, which previously mainly produced tank 300 and Great Wall guns, also reduced production due to lack of cores.
The tank 300 new queue number section has exceeded 260,000 number sections, and the official has to stop receiving orders due to production pressure to ensure that the user's pick-up time will not be too long. Affected by chip shortages and supply chain problems, its delivery cycle will be further delayed. According to the data tracked on the tank's official APP, the current tank 300 cumulative undelivered orders are as high as 140,000.
In June 2021, Great Wall Motors released its 2025 strategy. From 2021 to 2023, Great Wall's sales targets are 1.49 million, 1.9 million and 2.8 million, respectively. Great Wall Motor's full-year sales in 2021 reached 1.28 million units, an increase of 15.2% year-on-year. In the downturn of the auto market environment last year, it is not easy to achieve double-digit growth, but it is still far from the sales target of 210,000 vehicles. Affected by this suspension of production, in the long run, Great Wall Motor's sales target of 1.9 million units in 2022 will also be affected.
Strange goods can be lived, new wealth management products?!
With the continuous hot sales of tank 300, the author noticed that there were many phenomenons of mark-up transfer on the Internet: scalpers made a big fuss with the predetermined quota, and the tank brand dealt a strong blow to this phenomenon.
Tank 300 is also popular in the second-hand car market, the author checked many used car websites and found that tank 300 used cars are actually more expensive than new cars. Among them, the limited edition sale of cyber tank 300 is even more scarce, the market guidance price of 308,000, and now it has been speculated to more than 400,000 yuan. Ah this...
Today, the cumulative number of tank 300 users has exceeded 100,000, and the list of self-owned brand compact SUV retention rate of the "2021 China Automobile Preservation Report" released by the Automobile Dealers Chamber of Commerce of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce ranks first in the list of 82% of the three-year retention rate of tanks.
Who would have thought that the Tank 300 activated an increasingly niche, sluggish market, to know that Toyota, Nissan and other brands have not been able to revitalize the hardcore off-road vehicle market in China, and many classic hardcore off-road vehicles have chosen to stop production and stop selling over the years. In 2020, the sales volume of domestic & imported off-road vehicles added up to a mere 200,000 units, and its market penetration rate was only 0.9%.
The R&D of tank 300 spans "seven countries and ten places", gathering more than 1500 high-level engineering, design, intelligence and testing talents. The research and development cost of bicycles exceeded 30 billion yuan, and Great Wall Motors spent 20 billion yuan to spend 5 years to build a new off-road platform that is intelligent and networked for the future, laying the foundation for tank 300. Seeing this, I have to admire the boldness of Great Wall Motors. The sales volume of the Tank 300 has increased steadily, and it has been able to sell more than 10,000 a month in less than a year. Obviously, Great Wall Motors' "excessive" investment in this niche market is worth it.
According to the sales data released by Great Wall Motors on April 10, the tank brand sold 8,922 units in March this year, of which the tank 300 sales increased by 38% month-on-month. In the first three months of this year, the cumulative sales volume of the tank 300 was 25,753 units. It can be seen that the tank 300 is not only the sales of the tank brand, but also a very important source of sales for Great Wall Motors.
Why did the Tank 300 catch fire?
Many netizens believe: Tank 300 is xxx's flat replacement? That's true! But it doesn't hold either!
The hardcore SUV you can think of, whether it's the Wrangler, the Prado, or the Land Ranger, has several similar attributes. Strong off-road performance, can meet the long-distance crossing; the modification potential is large, the playability is extremely high; the price is expensive, dissuading many civilian off-road enthusiasts; its user group generally has more than one car under its name and has money and leisure, such cars for them, the toy attributes are greater.
Although the off-road capability of the tank 300 is not as strong and hardcore as the above models, it has a non-load-bearing body setting, and also has three major off-road weapons such as three locks, tank steering, and creep mode, which can meet the needs of long-distance crossing.
Interior of the 2021 2.0T Cyberspace tank
The tank 300 is more than the above-mentioned hardcore off-road SUV in terms of comfort configuration and intelligent configuration. Similar to the L2 level driver assistance system, 12.3-inch touch screen with voice control system, 12.3-inch full LCD dashboard, front seat heating \ massage and other configurations, can be seen in the tank 300.
Seeing this, there will definitely be netizens who will think that the price of the people is the key to the popularity of the tank 300. That's right! Not all right!
Compared with imported hardcore off-road vehicles, the price of the Tank 300 is really close to the people, but considering the similar price point, you can also choose Haval H9, BJ40 and other models, but looking at their market performance, it can be said that it is far from the Tank 300.
In niche markets, the possibilities of products are infinitely magnified
Tank 300 exploded in large part because of its scarcity and uniqueness. Many affordable hardcore off-road vehicles, their user cool points focused on "off-road performance", I do not rule out a small number of off-road depth users, but to put it bluntly, how many people really yearn for poetry and far away? Do the poetry and distance in their eyes really need very strong off-road hardware support? not necessarily. Daily commuting, road driving, and occasional mild off-roading are their driving needs.
Along the lines of thought, let's take a look at the product label of Tank 300 on the tank's official website. Among them, the label of the off-road version is "smart luxury off-road SUV"; the label of the urban version is "hardcore tide product". You can complain that this is not real enough, just like orthodox rap should not be mixed with mountain songs, and sad people should listen to slow songs. However, the market determines everything, and there is no Real that is not Real in the face of sales.
Next, there is another sentence that describes the tank 300 is also particularly appropriate, that is, "the times make heroes". If, Tank 300 was born 5-10 years ago, consumers' inherent impression of hard-core SUVs is that "rough guys" such as Land Patrol and Bobcats climb rocks, climb mountains, and gaga, then the market situation of Tank 300 can be imagined. It's like if Curry, the NBA three-point king and Warriors star, was born in the era of "Sky Hook" Abdul-Jabbar, "Postman" Malone, and "Big Bug" Rodman, he is estimated to be just a top 3D player.
Compared with the traditional impression of the past, most of the users of hardcore off-road vehicles are rich and idle uncles. In contrast, the user group of the Tank 300 is younger. Among them, the post-80s and post-90s are the main consumer groups of tank 300, accounting for nearly 70% of existing users, 60% of potential users, and 12.3% of post-00 users, which is really unexpected. It is worth mentioning that according to the official data of tanks, the existing orders of tank 300 account for 30% of female users, and Great Wall Motors has also established a tank 300 women's club.
Is the Tank 300 really stable? Is the tank brand really stable?
The word "burst into flames" has appeared many times in the history of Great Wall Motors. As early as 2012, Haval H6 has achieved good results of monthly sales of more than 10,000, but look around, Haval H series so far the hottest is still H6, the previous H series other models have become big dogs, red rabbits, divine beasts, first love, another way of marketing, attacking the market is also a gamble, which does not mean that these models are not selling well. WEY family members are also the same phenomenon, VV5, VV7 at the beginning of the listing have a bright performance, but the follow-up has declined, and now Wei Brand began to attack the mixed market with coffee series, in terms of its current sluggish sales, its prospects are still worrying.
There is no doubt that Great Wall Motors' series of innovative moves are decisive, but this organizational structure of "focusing on categories" and building "one car, one brand and one company" also has risks and resource consumption. As far as the current order data feedback is concerned, the second model of the tank brand, the Tank 500, is still quite hot.
Compared with product thinking, I am more concerned about the user thinking of tank brands and the continuity of explosive models. Just like now that each company has launched a high-end MPV, it is difficult for car companies to establish technical barriers, and the niche market of hardcore off-road may also change from a blue ocean to a red ocean, and I guess the construction and deep cultivation of their own brand power is the key to the continuous development of the tank brand.
Finally, I wish the "tankers" this year to pick up the car.