Grow vegetables at home. Courtesy of respondents.
Labor class is back?
Since September, primary and secondary school students have been asked to learn to cook rice stew, grow vegetables and raise poultry, and adults have become "farmers" to work hard to reclaim the "high-altitude vegetable field" on the balconies of each house.
Under the epidemic, there are more people who grow vegetables at home and are self-sufficient.
In the early summer morning, the first thing that every day (pseudonym) wakes up is to look at the vegetables he grows, "watching the seeds sprout, pull out the leaves, and slowly grow tall and strong, it is a very fulfilling thing, and planting vegetables makes me very happy every day."
Different from soil cultivation, the intelligent planting machine is purchased every day, with automatic lighting, automatic water replenishment and other functions. This smart planter is 1.7 meters high and has 5 layers. Since then, she has been able to eat fresh vegetables grown by herself at home every day.
It's not just every day that loves to grow vegetables. Taobao recently released the "2022 Balcony Vegetable Planting Report" shows that in the first quarter of this year, the number of vegetable seed purchasers on the Taobao Tmall platform increased by more than 100% for three consecutive years, of which seeds such as coriander and leeks were the most popular. Among the cities that most like to grow vegetables on the balcony, The North, Shanghai and Guangzhou are among the top five.
However, it cost 3580 yuan to buy this smart planting machine every day, and she vowed to continue to grow vegetables and "eat" the cost back. High prices not only plague consumers, but also trouble manufacturers.
A person in charge of a production company who did not want to be named told reporters that the core technology of one of the company's planting machines includes the spectrum used in the light source, the formula of the nutrient solution, the patent, etc., and the cost of getting this part of the core technology, plus the industrial design fee and mold fee of the product appearance and structural design borne by the company in the early stage of development, exceeded 1.5 million.
According to its introduction, this planting machine earns 200 yuan per sale, and it needs to sell 7500 units to recover the upfront cost, which does not include the cost of employees during the sales period, the company's operating costs, and profit margins. For various reasons, this product has not yet been profitable.
Previously, many large companies have entered the industry. In 2015, Haier Group launched the intelligent hydroponic planting box "Caiduoduo", which is regulated according to the light and oxygen required for plant growth. However, according to media reports, the group did not continue to shop after 2016. Xiaomi has also launched a rice field smart planting companion, which can detect temperature and humidity after binding the APP.
You can grow vegetables at home in 10 minutes a day, how cost-effective is the smart vegetable grower?
In the traditional model, if you are cultivating vegetables, you need to buy a flower pot, pour nutrient soil, coconut bran mixed, sow seeds, and then regularly mix nutrient solution according to the proportion of soil and water. In contrast, smart planters offer almost a package of services.
There are 5 layers of planting machines purchased every day, of which the bottom layer is the place where the seeds are cultivated, and the seeds can be moved to the upper 4 layers after germination, and a total of 157 vegetables can be planted on the 5 layers.
Courtesy of respondents.
The grower provides nutrient solutions from A and B formulations, one bag each month, and once a month and a half. The machine is equipped with LED fill light, which is generally used for 16 hours a day every day, and there is no need to buy the fill light separately as in the past soil culture. The planter has a water tank and pipes, no need to water itself, the capacity of the water tank is 40 liters, and it is only necessary to replenish the water regularly every day and clean the water tank occasionally.
With this machine, I prefer to grow vegetables every day. "Tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, beans of the four seasons of these vegetables are very long harvest period, especially cucumbers grow gratifyingly, but in the later stage, how to climb the vine cucumber shelf still needs more research, mint, rosemary and other plants with special aroma can prevent small vegetable seedlings from being invaded by flying insects", talking about planting vegetables, every day can not stop,
Although a lot of vegetables are planted, it only takes almost 10 minutes to observe and sort out vegetables every day, and if the vegetables on the edge are small, they are adjusted to the middle, which saves a lot of time compared with soil cultivation.
Among the vegetables planted every day, lettuce and oil wheat vegetables grow the fastest and can be picked in about 25 days. As long as the roots are not destroyed, the vegetables grow up, and she eats them while picking, so that she can eat fresh vegetables every day.
Previously, I also tried to buy small desktop vegetable growing machines every day, which did not occupy the place, but the output was too small, and only 12 vegetables could be planted at a time. "It is possible to plant some spices, such as mint and lemongrass, but it is far from enough to rely on it to eat vegetables, and although the equipment I buy now occupies a large area, it is more productive and more practical."
However, after 5 months of use, Tiantian also said that the price of this intelligent vegetable grower is relatively high, the cost of nutrient solution, supporting consumables, and electricity costs is not a lot, the water tank is inconvenient to drain, the water tank and pipeline need to be cleaned regularly, and there is no pulley at the bottom of the machine.
The price of intelligent planting machines ranges from 148 yuan to 3881 yuan, and market awareness still needs to be improved
The reporter noted that there are a variety of intelligent planting machines on the market today, including fish and vegetable coexistence mode, fully enclosed intelligent planting machines and open planting machines, etc., with prices ranging from 148 yuan to 3881 yuan.
Open planting machine is the most common planting machine on the market, because the branches and leaves of vegetables can be obliquely out, and there are relatively many places where vegetables can be planted, and most of these products can be stacked, which is more economical in ground space, but the price is also more expensive.
A large planting machine on the market has five layers, a height of up to 1.7 meters, has nearly 400 seedling positions, and claims that if you have one at home, you don't have to buy vegetables from now on, and the price is 3881 yuan.
The price of about 3800 yuan is not the most expensive smart planting machine on the market, and there are still 4681 yuan or even 5070 yuan of smart planting machines currently on sale on Taobao, but there are no customers who have placed orders this month.
"Now smart planting machine products, but also need to improve market awareness", a smart planting machine company in charge of Ms. Liu introduced to reporters, her company's initial production of intelligent planting machine ideas, is to hope that families with children can cultivate safe vegetables for children, use this product for hydroponic planting, you can eat pollution-free vegetables. On this basis, because the equipment is good in appearance, easy to operate, and lazy, it has begun to expand the market for young people to grow vegetables at home and the market for the elderly to grow vegetables in the city.
In the business plan provided by Ms. Liu, the reporter noted that this product provides artificial light, soilless cultivation, automatic water circulation, nutrient liquid cultivation and other modes, through water injection, ratio nutrient solution, breeding and colonization, because of the existence of the above technology, the maturity cycle of vegetables is much faster than that of open soil cultivation. Lettuce, for example, takes only 25-30 days from sowing to maturity, while it may take a month and a half if you grow your own lettuce.
Ms. Liu introduced that at that time, they participated in various exhibitions, because the design of this product is relatively new, some hotels and catering companies hope to be used for decoration and display, highlighting the freshness of their ingredients, so they have gained a lot of business.
After the arrival of the epidemic in Shanghai, Ms. Liu found that the attention of her company's products became higher, "Originally many restaurants were closed after the epidemic, but after the Epidemic in Shanghai, I found that the number of clicks on the company's product promotion articles increased, which may be a new demand point, people hope to grow vegetables at home, so as to achieve vegetable supply."
High price is a hard injury: selling 7500 units of products to return the cost, small smart ecological home appliances or a new trend
Although people are growing vegetables at home in full swing, the high price is still a hard wound of smart planting machines.
A person in charge of a production company who did not want to be named told reporters that the company's products are priced at 600 yuan, 12 vegetables can be planted at a time, the market is generally a wait-and-see and optimistic attitude, and there are not many people who are really willing to pay the bill, "Everyone thinks that instead of spending 600 yuan to buy a device, it is better to spend this money to buy pollution-free vegetables." The company then changed from retail to JD.com, but the sales situation was not very good.
According to the person in charge, the core technology of the planting machine includes the spectrum used in the light source, the formula of the nutrient solution, the patent, etc., and the cost of obtaining this part of the core technology, plus the industrial design fee and mold fee such as product appearance and structural design borne by the company in the early stage of development, exceeds 1.5 million.
"There are some small household appliances on the market that use semi-new materials and semi-recycled materials, but we use new food-grade plastics, so as to ensure that the vegetables grown are of good quality, and the product structure is complex, and the production cost of each machine needs 400 yuan," said the person in charge, the current price of the product is 600 yuan, and there is only 200 yuan of profit space.
According to this calculation, the company needs to sell 7500 products to recover the cost of the upfront investment, and this does not include the cost of employees during the sales period and the company's operating costs.
"Now the company's cost has not been recovered, the ability has not been able to push, has been looking for investors, hoping to acquire the project," the person in charge said.
"Although the price is higher now, but small smart ecological home appliances may become a trend in the future", Yecheng Architectural Firm founder, Researcher of the Ecole Supérieure des Arts Deco in Paris Nogionese (pseudonym) told reporters that after people have experienced more than two years of epidemic, life is relatively inconvenient compared to before, the scope of life is relatively narrow, especially after sealing, the family as a unit, can meet the family's self-sufficiency of smart ecological home appliances has become one of people's appeals, not only that, to the community as a unit, Collectively collaborative ecological farms may also emerge.
In terms of intelligent vegetable growers, Wild City believes that first of all, such machines can not occupy too much living space, but they need to have a certain density to meet the planting efficiency, so the future intelligent vegetable growers may be verticalized, wall-mounted development, not only can become the decoration of the wall, but also to meet the needs of families to eat their own vegetables several times a week. Ornamental aquaponic tanks may not solve the actual problem.
Wild City believes that in the future, smart vegetable growing machines may further replace manual operations, such as having a place to store rapeseed, similar to a printer's cartridge, and the machine can automatically sow seeds without the need for manual sowing. The machine should also be connected to the APP, even if the business trip can also remotely control the temperature, in the fully automatic lighting, sprinkler and other systems under the care, the owner only needs to wait for the harvest every week.
Yecheng also mentioned that at present, people's imagination of smart ecological home appliances, the biggest limitation is the cost. In his view, the reason why the refrigerator is cheap is precisely because the sales volume is large enough, the cost is relatively low after the cost is apportioned, but the sales of smart ecological home appliances are not high, and the cost that needs to be apportioned is too high, which in turn leads to more difficult sales.
In the view of Wild City, the future of intelligent ecological home appliances can have a strong sense of design, with human-computer interaction functions, and take high-end routes. Not only that, the community can also use the intelligent vegetable growing system to build a community farm, call on a group of volunteers in the community, the vacant space such as the roof of the building to develop and utilize, and the vegetables grown can be shared by the residents in the community.
"I'll keep growing vegetables, I'll keep growing vegetables until I get my 3580 yuan cost of buying a machine back," he said jokingly every day, "but I also know that it may be difficult."
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