At the beginning of 2024, Moutai will continue to run wild on the road of joint branding!
Taking advantage of the gimmick of the Year of the Dragon to continue the glory, Moutai and Luckin once again teamed up to launch the "Year of the Dragon Sauce Chocolate", killing a horse gun.
But this time, it didn't replicate the myth of last year's sauce latte.
Moutai's return to the pistol, why doesn't it work?
Among the most successful marketing cases in 2023, the sauce latte is sure to occupy a place.
On the first day of the new product in September last year, the sales volume of the single product of the sauce latte exceeded 5.42 million cups, and the sales of the single product exceeded 100 million yuan on the first day.
It was sold out in three days, and a total of 40 million cups were sold.
Taking pictures of sauce-flavored lattes and forwarding them to the circle of friends has become a trend for a while.
Last year's sauce latte was full of beauty, but this year's sauce chocolate seems to be a little cold.
is also co-branded with Luckin Moutai, and the popularity created on social platforms this time is incomparable.
Although the specific data has not yet come out, the phenomenon is still in obvious contrast:
There is no original circle of friends swiping the screen, and there is no hot sales and out-of-stock in various stores, and the response on social media is mediocre.
In the vote of "Are you looking forward to the new joint name of Luckin Moutai", more than half of the more than 4,000 people voted "not interested", and only a quarter actually "look forward to it!
Why is this collaboration not too out of the circle?
On the surface, this joint name is really problematic.
The first co-branding of Moutai and Luckin has created a very high degree of conversation for two very different brands, activated social conversations, and everyone wants to explore the effect of their "integration".
However, there are some things that you feel new the first time, and when you come back a second time, you will feel that you are not enough.
What's more, when the sauce latte is hot, its taste is controversial, and many people taste it after taking photos, and instead focus on whether they have tasted Moutai.
As for the taste, some say it tastes good, and some say it doesn't taste good, such as good, such as good.
Therefore, the criticism of this new sauce chocolate in the same series may also be the "sequelae" of the sauce latte.
At the beginning, anyone who didn't have a cup of sauce-flavored latte in their hands didn't dare to open the circle of friends, but now if anyone has a cup of sauce-flavored chocolate in their hands, everyone will watch who is good at "sweetness".
At this point, I am afraid that Moutai and Luckin also predicted in advance, and you can get a glimpse of the whole leopard from this joint honey operation:
This joint name is obviously "Sauce Chocolate", but the cup is printed with "Sauce Latte".
Yes, it's environmentally friendly.
On the side of Luckin, there is a big meaning of "second child free-range", not only investing less publicity resources than the sauce latte, but also focusing on Yi Yang Qianxi's endorsement of Luckin Coffee.
Therefore, it is not surprising that the sauce chocolate is cold, and it may have been expected by the two families. What's more, explosive models are hard to find, and not every new product can be popular.
As the leader of China's liquor industry, why is Moutai so tossed?
Judging from various indications, Moutai's joint name Luckin this time may not be to create a grand occasion of a sauce-flavored latte, but with a clearer and more direct purpose:
Hit the young with precision!
In fact, from the beginning of the choice of chocolate, it is destined that it will be difficult for this collaboration to replicate the original grand occasion:
Compared with lattes, which do not attract much criticism for coffee or not, chocolate drinks are more niche in the tea market and are more biased towards teenagers.
In the year 2023 that has just passed, Moutai has continued to do so:
On May 25, three different flavors of Moutai ice cream in cooperation with Mengniu were released, and on July 29, the "Small Branch" co-produced with Zhongjie 1946 was launched;
On September 4, it was announced that the sauce latte would be launched, and on September 14, it was officially announced that he and Dove jointly produced wine chocolate and won the title of "scumbag";
In November, it cooperated with MOJT Moqito Cocktail to jointly develop and market the "Taste of Guizhou" series of cocktails, and invited Jay Chou as the spokesperson;
In December, it joined hands with Luckin's nemesis Cudi to embark on a public welfare route and established the Moutai Bulao Liquor Youth Employment Fund and the Maotan Liquor Rural Revitalization Fund.
The price gap between the flagship products of these co-branded parties and Moutai is too big, and it even seems to be "Low" in a literal sense.
Some netizens believe that this is Moutai lowering its price:
However, these co-branders all have one common trait that Moutai does not have: youthfulness.
Through co-branding with ice cream, chocolate, coffee, cocktails, etc., which young people like, Moutai hopes to continue to "break the circle" and accelerate its integration into the young group.
Ding Xiongjun, chairman of Kweichow Moutai, once said that the "Mao Xiaoling" food represented by Moutai ice cream, sauce latte, and Mao Xiaoling wine chocolate is an important strategic product for Moutai to promote the rejuvenation of the brand.
Why is Moutai's sense of crisis so strong in its desire to integrate into young people? The following picture may illustrate the problem.
From the above chart, it is not difficult to find that the low-end liquor market is shrinking, while the high-end liquor market is expanding.
Moutai itself has been a symbol of high-end liquor since its establishment. Nowadays, it is regarded by some people as financial products and investment targets.
But the point is, the young man has no money.
No money means that there is no opportunity to drink high-quality and good baijiu, and then the younger generation loses interest in drinking baijiu.
The liquor brand that was once popular among young people with its copywriting was Jiang Xiaobai, however, today Jiang Xiaobai has long been photographed dead on the beach.
There is no other reason, just selling feelings can't tie young people, and the wine is not good, and it is useless to say that no matter how much feelings you have.
Therefore, for a high-end liquor brand like Moutai, co-branding is not an act of lowering the price, but an initiative that cannot wait.
There used to be such a popular poem in the stock market:
When I was young, I didn't know the aroma of liquor, and I mistakenly filled up the warehouse with technology. When I was young, I didn't know that liquor was good, and I mistook medicine for treasure. When I was young, I didn't know the beauty of liquor, and I mistook the bank for a fortress. When I was young, I didn't know how to get drunk with liquor, and I mistook securities for comfort. When I was young, I didn't know that liquor was strong, and I mistakenly regarded colored as a pillar. When I was young, I didn't know how to use liquor for softness, and I mistook the car for a faucet. When I was young, I didn't know the beauty of liquor, and I mistook coal for pride. When I was young, I didn't know how to make liquor, and I mistook electricity for a new star. When I was young, I didn't know that wine was valuable, and I had a handful of snot and tears. Only when you are old do you know the fragrance of liquor, and you can order a big box in room K; only when you are old do you know that the liquor is good, and the full amount is on the sea castle; only when you are old do you know that the liquor is drunk, and Moutai is not too expensive; only when you are old do you know that the liquor is strong, and the white wall of leeks is left.
According to the meaning of this poem, young people don't drink Moutai and don't know how good liquor stocks are, and they will know the value of liquor when they drink liquor when they are older.
To put it bluntly, it's not that liquor and tea are not favored by young people, but that they haven't lived to unlock the consumption of liquor and tea.
The question is, can drinking or not drinking be directly equated with age?
Looking around, how many hobbies that we used to take for granted have disappeared with the generational shift?
CCTV used to hold programs such as treasure appreciation contests, do you think they still do it now? In the past, my fathers had a collection of philatelic albums in their cabinets, but now many young people may not even have seen stamps. The group of collectors has shrunk by 90 per cent compared to its heyday, and the remaining 10 per cent is also severely aged.
The social needs of young people are changing, and the wine table culture formed in the workplace may not be invincible forever.
Young people who like Hanfu and Guochao may not set off another storm of "Renaissance" to abandon distilled spirits and chase after brewed liquors with a longer history.
Therefore, there is not much time left for China's high-end liquor.
At present, the wealth of society is still mainly in the hands of middle-aged and elderly people, and the post-60s and post-70s are still the main force in the consumer market.
However, under the theme of common prosperity, one of the important directions of future policies is to complete the intergenerational transfer of wealth.
For a high-end liquor manufacturer like Moutai, Moutai must find ways to capture the hearts of young people at the moment, take the initiative to mingle with young people as soon as possible, and lower the threshold for young people to consume Moutai.
Moutai takes the initiative to cater to young people, and its purpose of thinking about danger and looking to the future in times of peace is very clear:
As early as March 31, 2022, Moutai launched the online sales platform "i Moutai" App, and its target users are young consumer groups. By the end of 2023, it has been online for 1 year and 9 months, and the cumulative sales have exceeded 40 billion yuan, and the income is outstanding.
Moutai's series of joint actions in 2023 also seem to be working well: in 2023, 200,000 tons of Moutai ice cream, 700,000+ pieces of Moutai chocolate, and 40 million+ cups of sauce latte, these three products have achieved sales of 430 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of about 50%.
This is not over, as of 16 o'clock on January 25, 30,000+ pieces of 53-degree wine heart chocolate gift boxes have been sold in a platform flagship store, ranking first in the best-selling gift box chocolate list for 180 consecutive hours.
Although these revenues are really insignificant compared with Moutai's total revenue of 149.5 billion, Moutai's co-branding map is not about these small profits, it is about brand marketing value.
Starting from "selling by drop", we will cultivate the "appetite" of young people to adapt to baijiu, strengthen the brand identity of future potential consumer groups for Moutai culture and the flavor identity of Moutai, accumulate their good impression of Moutai baijiu, and help young people complete the transition from soft drinks to hard drinks.
A cold encounter with sauce chocolate is not a big problem, and the real problem is probably how to leave a good impression on young people.
If you can't carry out effective and successful marketing, you will launch disposable "cooking wines" such as sauce-flavored latte and sauce-flavored chocolate, which may push young people to the opposite side of liquor culture.
If you rush it in such a hurry, it will be a bit more than worth the loss.