Halfway through 2023, the liquor industry has also entered the midfield. Reviewing the development status of the liquor industry in the first half of the year, the team of Jiajiu.com found through visits, research and combing information from all parties that new products emerged, industry differentiation intensified, channel destocking and product price inversion became the main keywords.
Keyword 1: new products
In the first half of this year, first- and second-tier famous wine companies and regional strong wine companies launched a total of more than 50 new liquor products, and in the context of market recovery, the intention of major wine companies to seize the market with new products is self-evident.
According to the combing of Jiajiu.com, the new liquor products listed this year are mainly divided into 3 categories:
The first category is new products. The Guoyuan Liukai launched by Jinshi Yuan, the "Yelang Sauce" series launched by Yelang Ancient Distillery, the Sauce Chuan'an Wine series launched by Guizhou Anjiu, the Guotai Guowei launched by Guotai Liquor Industry, the Taiyuan Wine launched by Moutai Group, the Red Xifeng 1978 launched by Xifeng Wine, and the upcoming Jiannanchun high-end new product Royal Jiannanchun are all such products. These new products are not only expected to further improve the product lines of their respective brands, but also hope to drive major wine companies forward.
The second category is cultural and innovative products. At present, cultural and creative wine has become the "battleground for soldiers" of major wine companies, which stems from the fact that such products have traditional Chinese cultural attributes, which not only conform to the "new outlet" of national trend consumption, but also meet the personalized and diversified consumption needs of consumers, and are more conducive to enhancing brand awareness and rejuvenating brand opportunities. In the first half of this year, the spring and summer series of Moutai wine 24 solar terms launched by Kweichow Moutai, the purple gas Donglai launched by Wuliangye, the inner ginseng Shiniu and the drunkard wine Dongfang Bai launched by Drunkard Wine are new cultural and creative wines with distinctive personalities.
The third category is replica new products. In recent years, classic replica products in the liquor industry have emerged one after another, the fundamental reason is that such products have their own consumption memory and market foundation, which can establish warm connections with consumers faster and better, and help enterprises increase revenue and profits. In the first half of this year, Jianzhuang Rongguang launched by Wuliangye, Xufu Classic Baigai launched by Xufu Wines, and Yanghe Daqu (classic version) launched by Yanghe are more typical replica products.
In the view of Jiajiu.com, since the beginning of this year, new liquor products have been released, mainly due to the good prediction of the market development situation by major wine companies. With the gradual recovery of the economy and the recovery of the consumer market, this provides new opportunities for major brands to seize the market, on the one hand, new products can enrich the product structure, enhance the strength of enterprises and industry competitiveness; On the other hand, the new products also provide more options for wine merchants to develop new markets, which is conducive to enhancing market vitality.
Keyword two: differentiation
According to the statistics of Jiajiu.com, in the first quarter of 2023, 19 liquor listed companies achieved a total revenue of 126.857 billion yuan and a total net profit of 53.225 billion yuan. Among them, the top five liquor listed companies such as Moutai, Wuliangye, Yanghe, Fenjiu and Luzhou Laojiao achieved double-digit increases in revenue and net profit from January to March this year, with a total revenue and net profit of 105.2 billion and 47.635 billion respectively, accounting for 82.9% and 89.4% respectively.
Through the above data, it can be seen that liquor consumption is strongly concentrated on the head brand, while under the market differentiation, regional brands are facing a lot of pressure.
Combined with the financial report for the first quarter of 2023, the revenue and net profit of liquor and liquor listed companies such as Drunkard Liquor, Shuijingfang, and Tianyoude Liquor have shown a downward trend to varying degrees. Among them, Shuijingfang's revenue and net profit decreased by 39.69% and 56.02% year-on-year, respectively, while the revenue and net profit of Drunkard Liquor fell by more than 42% year-on-year.
In addition, increasing revenue without increasing profits has also become the development status of many wine companies, such as Hengshui Laobaigan, which reported revenue of 1.003 billion yuan in the first quarter of this year, a year-on-year increase of 10.43%; The net profit was 102 million, a year-on-year decrease of 61.51%.
Obviously, in recent years, the industry has continued the development of several happy and several sad, the growth rate of leading enterprises on the basis of high base continues to maintain steady, and the performance of regional wine enterprises is under pressure, which means that the industry is in a stage of strong differentiation and development.
Previously, the relevant data released by the China Wine Industry Association also showed this. Data show that in 2022, there will be 963 liquor enterprises on the scale, of which 169 are loss-making enterprises, with a loss of 17.6% and a cumulative loss of 1.88 billion yuan.
Keyword three: destocking
The phenomenon of liquor channel inventory can not be ignored, especially in the past three years, affected by the epidemic, offline consumption scenarios have been greatly reduced, and terminal sales have slowed down, resulting in a large backlog of social inventory.
Combined with the financial reports of liquor listed companies, in 2022, the total inventory of 19 A-share liquor listed companies will reach 132.36 billion. Among them, the inventory of most liquor listed companies increased by about 10% over the same period of the previous year, among which the inventory of Luzhou Laojiao, Laobaigan, Gujing Gongjiu, Jinshi Yuan, Yilite and other wine companies increased by more than 20%. If you add the inventory of unlisted liquor companies, the total inventory of the liquor industry is undoubtedly larger.
For the inventory problem of the liquor channel, the industry association also expressed concern. At the fifth (expanded) meeting of the sixth council of the China Liquor Association held in March this year, Song Shuyu, chairman of the China Liquor Association, publicly stated that the first task of the liquor industry in 2023 is to digest inventory.
According to feedback from securities firms in channel surveys, the overall sales of Feitian Maotai, Wuliangye Puwu, and Dream Blue Dream 6+ are relatively stable and less affected by inventory pressure; The channel inventory of other high-end liquor products such as Guojiao 1573 and Qinghualang gradually became benign. However, the main low-end products of other non-famous wines and some light bottle wine products still have high inventories.
Industry experts said that since the second quarter of this year, with the sales expenses of major wine companies focusing more on the consumer side, the banquet market has warmed up significantly, and the "small peak season" of the Dragon Boat Festival is coming, and the pressure on channel inventory is expected to be released to a certain extent.
Keyword 4: price inversion
Product prices are generally inverted, which is another major keyword in the liquor industry in the first half of this year. The fundamental reason for the price inversion is that the market launch far exceeds the market consumption capacity, and the generally high inventory is the best proof. During the visit of the Jiajiu.com team, many wine distributors said that they maintained a relatively cautious optimism about the overall development of this year, and hoped that manufacturers could introduce relevant policies to deal with the problem of channel price inversion.
In fact, since the beginning of this year, many liquor companies have issued strategies to control goods or raise prices in order to stabilize the market price system. According to incomplete statistics, since the beginning of the year, more than 10 mainstream liquor companies such as Luzhou Laojiao, Yanghe, Fenjiu, Jiannanchun, and Guizhou Zhenjiu have announced that they have raised prices or stopped their core products.
In this regard, the person in charge of a number of wine companies said that it is mainly based on market supply and demand and their own inventory, in order to protect the interests of channels. The industry also pointed out that on the one hand, controlling the price of goods can maintain the company's product price system and avoid further aggravating the price inversion; On the other hand, it can also enhance dealer confidence, protect channel profits, and prepare for subsequent benign sales.
Industry experts predict that whoever digests inventory quickly in 2023 and recovers the price inversion quickly will win in the new cycle.
It is worth noting that when the Jiajiu.com team visited the market, they found that the price inversion of this round of liquor was more serious than that of fragrant and fragrant brands. In addition to Moutai, whether it is a high-end soy wine famous enterprise or a sub-high-end soy wine brand, its mainstream products have shown different degrees of price decline, among which non-well-known soy wine brands even show the phenomenon of "price reduction".
However, for most sauce brands, it is not so much the price inversion as the price return. After several years of wild running, the soy wine industry has entered the cycle adjustment from crazy horse racing, and the price recovery quality is that the value of the soy wine category returns to a reasonable range. In this process, with the reshuffle and adjustment of the sauce wine industry, for the sauce wine brand, the future will be more testing of the company's own quality and brand power.