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Phone cases and phones are finally going to war

Phone cases and phones are finally going to war

Image source @ Visual China

Wen | those things about the Internet

Previously, it was said that "What happened to girls buy some mobile phone cases?" "Video brainwashing, girls threw out stacks of mobile phone cases, counting one of them has more than 60, the style is exquisite and not repetitive, the comment area is a piece of "one person blood book for links", and the topic has been played as high as 28.419 million.

Recently, the Weibo topic of #Why young people are reluctant to change their mobile phones has reached 410 million reads, which is in stark contrast to the mobile phone case. In this regard, I interviewed a home-cooked girlfriend who is still using the "antique" iPhone7: "Because of poverty, let alone the current mobile phones are excessive performance, is it not fragrant to keep the money to change the mobile phone to buy 2 pounds of ribs?" ”

On the one hand, mobile phone manufacturers are anxious to produce new products to "coax" the stubborn young people of this Z era, on the other hand, they are crazy to "lie" to make money mobile phone shell manufacturers and e-commerce shop owners, even Lao Luo predicted a few years ago: selling mobile phones is not as good as selling mobile phone cases to make money.

In 2022, mobile phone cases and mobile phones are finally going to war?

01, the fuselage wrapped in "love"

In 2019, Huawei once sold a mobile phone known as the world's first glass gradient, the next year Samsung sold the world's first folding screen mobile phone under the banner of folding screen is the future, although Apple from beginning to end focused on simple style, but think carefully about its fine thickness and camera crazy position, anyone who looks at it is working the appearance.

In the official store, the "naked running" machine has won the favor of the buyer with its initial skin, and after taking home, the "beautiful back" that exhausts the manufacturer's mind is covered tightly by the small fragrance wind, ins wind, with a mirror shell, etc., leaving only the display screen with a face full of "black lines" barely breathing, and even only when the summer can not survive the high temperature, he will be taken off his coat and breathable.

According to npdd group data, more than 75% of smartphone users will use mobile phone cases, and more than 25% will buy more than two mobile phone cases. From the perspective of consumer user data, more than 50% of the purchase of mobile phone case users are old users, and active buyers have purchased nearly 50 mobile phone cases per capita, and the repurchase rate has reached more than 200%.

The Canalys Global Report shows that in the first quarter of 2022, global smartphone shipments fell by 11% year-on-year. From January to February this year, mobile phone shipments in the domestic market fell by 22.6% year-on-year.

There seems to be no contrasting data, but in some way it creates a connection, and the result is that the phone case wins.

There are also data that shows that more than 10 million users buy more than 12 phone cases every year, of which 87% are Apple users. According to the statistics of the earlier "China Campus Market Development Report", the proportion of Chinese college students using Apple mobile phones has reached the first place, and Apple users are the main force in buying mobile phone cases, and the reason they give is that Apple mobile phones are more worthy of protection.

The notes on the small red book about the mobile phone case reached 1.67 million + posts, 1.47 million + goods, cute style, retro style, simple wind, and even the star Song Yanfei personally went on stage to show her mobile phone case, as a qualified love bean, Zhou Jieqiong every pair of mirror selfie shell is not the same, a large part of the people to the star of the same type of words to consume.

At the same time, there are 10,000 reasons for them to buy shells: warm with furry materials in winter, refreshing transparent shells in summer, buy a small perfume shell as a "background" to do perfect nails, change into bright colors when going out to play, and replace them with airbag shells with anti-fall effects when exercising...

"Buying phone cases is what little girls do, just like they like to buy clothes!" A straight boyfriend couldn't help but complain every time he saw an offline store that sold mobile phone cases, glanced at his mobile phone case, and I had an epiphany:

According to Taobao search, the price of mobile phone cases is the highest sales between 5 and 40 yuan, and such merchants take the "mass production" route, do not participate in picture creation, do not participate in material selection, and do not participate in the reverse mold of the version.

What is the existence of that $300 phone case? CASETiFY has shaken the entire "shell world", the main high-end route has also received tens of millions of dollars in C capital financing, "ball king" Messi, supermodel Kylie Jenner and other well-known people have stood on its stage.

Because its founder is an uncompromising "fruit powder", but also expected that Apple mobile phone will be a long-term big seller, from 2011 began to cultivate the Apple mobile phone shell market, to provide customized services for Instagram users at the same time, and different IP joint name (Disney, BTS, NBA, etc.), and launched ancillary electronic products airPods, iPad and other protective cases, are made of a material called Qitech, known as "from 3 meters high, the mobile phone will not be damaged at all."

The aura of "China's first mobile phone shell stock" fell on the head of Gemmet in 2020, and it has cooperation with many big-name mobile phones, such as the familiar Samsung, Apple, Huawei, ZTE, OPPO, "first foreign, then domestic" play effectively improved the global market share, in 2019, Gemmet's profit margin has exceeded 15%, and at that time, the profit margin of many mobile phone manufacturers was only 5%.

At the beginning, Jiemet did not want to participate in the "price war" of domestic uneven quality mobile phone cases, but paid attention to product quality and quality, "three-level waterproof, five-level anti-fall" are not a problem.

But even so, it has to withstand the onslaught of the "back wave". According to enterprise investigation data, there are currently 10,700 mobile phone shell related enterprises in the mainland. In 2019, there were 1,906 newly registered related enterprises nationwide, an increase of 22.9% year-on-year; that is to say, an average of 5 "houlang" enterprises that make mobile phone shells join this field every day.

Why is the phone case suddenly so sought-after? Think about the button PHS more than ten years ago, at most just paste a small diamond, put a large head sticker, the mobile phone really needs to wear clothes?

02, "With a shell, the face is enough!" ”

Zhihu a big guy has made a definition of the mobile phone case: a kind of mobile phone can provide a change of appearance in addition to the protection of the mobile phone, and provide a different appearance from the original factory to provide personalized replacement accessories.

From the perspective of young people, the phone case is no longer just a protective case, but a new type of social currency. Not only to socialize, but also to reflect their own distinctive personality, to form a unified cognition of "bumping shirts and shells are more terrible".

As a result, many merchants have another way, the manufacturing rights of the mobile phone case to the customer himself, Taobao search for "DIY custom mobile phone case", in addition to the signature "to map customization", there are cream glue homemade materials, hand-drawn films + custom shells, put couple creative photos, etc., some merchants revealed that the net profit of this mobile phone case is as high as 70%-80%, not only saving the design cost, but also avoiding the problem of inventory backlog caused by inappropriate styles.

Such a large market even luxury goods are "coveted", can not afford LV bags, may wish to come to an entry-level luxury single mobile phone case, the lowest price of 1800 yuan, the highest price of custom matte crocodile leather material mobile phone case priced at 41500 yuan.

The shell is several times the price of the mobile phone, and the "second face" has the blessing of luxury goods, and it seems that the whole person is in spirit.

Phone cases and phones are finally going to war

As a mobile phone manufacturer must not let go of the "official production" 4 big words brought by the sticky benefits, last May Huawei P30 Pro limited edition set opened pre-sale, adding 400 pieces to the price of the original mobile phone, but more than a gift box packaging and limited edition star diamond mobile phone case.

Meizu official has limited sales of iPhone 13 Pro / Pro Max "black unicorn" mobile phone case, priced at 129 yuan, and even on the home page shelves the iPhone12 series, selling peer products is a big taboo, the marketing strategy makes fans completely lose confidence in Meizu, while holding Apple's thigh Meizu was denounced: Why not look at the Android phone case market?

Compared with Android, the number of Apple's users has remained ahead for many years, although it was surpassed by Huawei in 2019, but the speed of its update iteration had to convince Android manufacturers, and then Apple's use cycle is long, according to the official statement, it can basically maintain its original performance in 3 years, for merchants, a shell can be sold continuously for more than 2 years is already a "shell world" excellent student.

This does not mean that there is no market for Android phone cases in China. Huawei, OPPO, OnePlus, Xiaomi, Meizu, etc. have their own mobile phone cases, OPPO has developed a fever-reducing mobile phone case with Wuhan University on the heat dissipation performance, and A X Games co-branded skateboard mobile phone case newly sold by ZTE is priced at 199 yuan, and the price includes the copyright IP cost.

Even in 2020, there is news that Xiaomi submitted a mobile phone case patent to realize the charging of wireless headphones, the availability is very strong, but whether the patent can be turned into reality is not easy to say, if it can really be sold, the price will not be low.

Normally, the materials of the mobile phone case are: plastic, pc material, leather, metal material and TPU, waterproof, non-yellowing, anti-fall material does not exist in the low-cost market.

For example, the trend brand PITAKA said that it is more popular in the Tmall store, is aramid fiber, carbon fiber and other new composite materials made of products, the best-selling magnetic aramid fiber mobile phone case retail price of 389 yuan, monthly sales of more than 500 pieces, the repurchaser is mainly looking at the texture.

Apple 329 yuan of solid color liquid silicone soft shell is not all brand premium, according to the official introduction, this shell is made of highly transmittable polycarbonate, combined with flexible TPU material, but also has no glue will not be yellowed black technology, is the highest standard in the plastic protective shell of mobile phones.

Therefore, it is a variety of grass, only for the appearance of the box hoarded low-cost mobile phone cases of the "buyers" are bitter, 9.9 silicone soft shell within two days to turn yellow, the star of the same hard shell mold is not the right version, lightning protection sticker came into being. "The opening key was stuck in the shell, the mobile phone automatically switched on and off one night, and the next day the mobile phone was hot and about to explode."

Phone cases and phones are finally going to war

Some insiders said: "The mobile phone shell industry currently lacks unified standards, and the quality of mobile phone shells on the market is uneven and the gap is huge. ”

At present, the overall shipment volume of the domestic mobile phone market has reached 300 million units a year, and even if a mobile phone case only sells for 10 yuan, it will have a market share of up to 3 billion yuan. Most of the domestic mobile phone cases are still small manufacturers, the price of the entire market terminal will inevitably not be higher than the pricing of the overseas market, the terminal is low, and the cost of raw materials will naturally decline.

This is also one of the reasons why the quality of mobile phone cases is uneven, and there are many tricks and not refined. Most merchants choose to "go volume" instead of creating original IP, which is in stark contrast with foreign countries.

It is reported that there are three types of mobile phone shell manufacturers are driving industry upgrades, one is the original mobile phone shell brand of mobile phone manufacturers, the second is the mobile phone accessory brand, and the third is the emerging original design brand.

Original design is inseparable from the spell of "copyright dispute", whether it is self-created or borrowed, if you do not pay attention, you will lose everything.

Luo Yonghao once said at a hammer nut mobile phone conference that it launched a limited edition backshell for nut mobile phones, which contained the classic image Mario. Soon the copyright holder Nintendo came to him and gave him a blow: he would not do any similar licensing in "China".

I wanted to rely on the method of "feelings + mobile phone case" to let the hammer get rid of the fate of "arcade", but it was helpless to win pleasure through the way of "big money".

"I'm a designer, and what I produce is not a phone case, it's a design work." Mobile phone case designer Wang Peng said. During the few years of his work, his works were plagiarized and abused by countless merchants, selling them at lower prices in other people's stores, but the sales volume was several times that of him.

For designers, the appearance and spirit of the work are not depreciated or appreciated with the objects to which it is attached, as long as your design manuscript is handed over, the vast majority of the proceeds are pirated manufacturers.

In 2012, the U.S. International Trade Commission launched a "337 investigation" into the protective cases of portable electronic devices made by five Chinese companies, thus keeping the Chinese companies with copyright problems out of the U.S. market.

There is a demand for the market, with charging, wallet, multi-functional mobile phone case in the dark sprouted, we do not know the future of the mobile phone case will develop into what, brain hole to imagine: the future can fly the mobile phone case, can dive mobile phone case, can even become a rose in seconds mobile phone case ...

People rely on clothing horses to saddle, mobile phones as people's treasure in the palm naturally become the goal that people need to beautify, the future mobile phone case market has a huge imagination space, but if you want to get long-term growth, you need to work the brand, while increasing the protection of copyright awareness, with really high-quality, attract unlimited repurchase, worthy of collection of mobile phone cases to support the second face of young people!

Resources:

Aesthetic significance exceeds practical value, and personalized mobile phone cases leverage "big business" - Beijing Daily

Mobile phone case, big business - People's Network

How profitable is it to sell mobile phone cases? - Tech Fox

IP co-branding plays well, and mobile phone cases can also make big business - interface news

The copyright war behind a phone case – Zhang Shule

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