Wahaha founder Zong Qinghou passed away, Wahaha "younger" is a long-cherished wish?

Cover News Reporter Yao Ruipeng

On February 25, according to Wahaha's official Weibo obituary, Zong Qinghou, founder and chairman of Wahaha Group, passed away at 10:30 on February 25, 2024 at the age of 79 due to ineffective medical treatment. "It's very sad to know this news. Zong Qinghou's close employees said that relevant people in the industry have been organizing condolences.

Obituary published

The death of Zong Qinghou, the founder of Wahaha Group, has not stopped the progress of this beverage empire, and his daughter Zong Fuli has always taken "youth" as the goal of Wahaha, and has continuously launched new products across borders, but the feedback from the market is not satisfactory.

Wahaha completed the handover of the old and the new

In 1987, Zong Qinghou started from a school-run factory selling water and founded Wahaha. Over the past 30 years, Wahaha has gradually grown into a leading food and beverage company in China, bringing a net worth of tens of billions of dollars to Zong Qinghou, and sending him to the throne of China's richest man three times.

As the generation of private enterprises grows older, the successors are gradually growing up to be able to take charge of themselves, and the replacement of the old and the new is also a general trend. Born in December 1945, Zong Qinghou is nearly eighty years old, and although he still serves as the chairman of the Wahaha Group, the successor of the group has already appeared in front of the scene.

In December 2021, Wahaha Group officially announced that Zong Fuli was appointed as the vice chairman and general manager of the group, and his father Zong Qinghou is still the chairman of the group. As for the specific division of functions between the two fathers and daughters, Wahaha did not elaborate too much, but said that Zong Fuli was responsible for daily work.

Zong Fuli

It is worth noting that Zong Qinghou has retired from the second line in Wahaha last year. Tianyancha shows that on April 6, 2023, Hangzhou Wahaha Nutrition Food Co., Ltd. will be changed for industry and commerce, Zong Qinghou will step down as the legal representative and general manager, and Zeng Zhequan will be added as the legal representative and manager. Zong Qinghou is still the chairman of the company. Only four days later, Hangzhou Wahaha Very Cola Beverage Co., Ltd. also underwent industrial and commercial changes, Zong Qinghou stepped down as the legal representative, Cai Lei stepped down as the general manager, Wu Jianlin stepped down as the director, Zeng Zhequan was added as the legal representative and manager, and Zong Fuli was added as the director. Zong Qinghou also still holds the position of chairman.

Wahaha's performance has been declining continuously since 2013

On the list of "Top 500 Chinese Private Enterprises in 2023" released by the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, Wahaha's performance was once again made public, and in 2022, its sales performance reached 51.202 billion yuan, a decrease of more than 30% from the peak in 2013.

In 2013, Wahaha achieved a revenue of 78.28 billion yuan, and Zong Qinghou became the richest man in China. That year was the most unattainable "ceiling" for Wahaha, and since then, Wahaha's performance has declined year by year.

Behind the collapse in revenue is the "failure" of new products. Wahaha has launched more than 300 new products, and almost all of them have been launched with great momentum and quietly disappeared. With the decline in performance, in order to find a new revenue engine, Wahaha has made a series of moves in recent years, and has successively entered the fields of children's clothing, liquor and commercial retail. Zong Qinghou hopes to use the influence of Wahaha's brand and long-term accumulated channel advantages to make the newly entered fields like a tiger with wings and quickly achieve synergy. But the reality is like an autumn wind sweeping away leaves, and Wahaha's cross-border products have disappeared from the market.

"The new generation of consumers like personalized products, and the core of Wahaha's declining performance is at the product level, which does not meet and connect with the consumption needs of the new generation. Xiao Yang, an analyst of China's food industry, said that with the continuous expansion of market products and a wide range of consumer choices, old companies need to pay more attention to consumer preference research, including product packaging, product culture, etc., without personalized products, it is difficult to impress the new generation of consumer groups.

"Rejuvenation" is Wahaha's goal

In previous interviews with the media, Zong Qinghou said many times that Wahaha must embrace young people and continue to move towards "youth". When Zong Fuli was still the head of the public relations department of the Wahaha brand, she launched a number of co-branded products such as Zhongxuegao's co-branded AD calcium milk ice cream, Bubble Mart co-branded PH9.0 soda, and Nutrition Express makeup palette. Wahaha, which is constantly trying new routes, has been working hard towards "rejuvenation".

Wahaha cross-border products

When Zong Fuli attended the 2022 sales work conference of Wahaha Group in the same month as the general manager, she started a huge "reform", and put forward four major measures in one go, planning to launch more than 20 new products, including sugar-free version of Very Coke, "Dianjing" soda, "Into the Tea" low-sugar drinks and other products covering tea, coffee and other subdivisions. In terms of brand promotion, Zong Fuli also replaced Wang Leehom, the spokesperson of Wahaha Pure Water for 20 years, and signed Xu Guanghan, Wang Yibo, Gong Jun and other traffic star spokespersons.

At present, Wahaha's core group is in the third- and fourth-tier markets, and this kind of market does not match the types of products with newer and niche selling points. Looking back at the series of new products launched by Zong Fuli in a hurry, they are not popular in the market. "Mineral water, AD calcium milk, nutrition express, and Shuang Crooked are still the best-selling products in Wahaha's offline market. Sichuan Xichang beverage channel business Yulu told reporters that the continuous production of new products produced by Wahaha in the southern Sichuan market has not been smooth.

In addition to beverages, Wahaha's proud bottled water territory is also gradually losing. According to Euromonitor International's data, between 2017 and 2022, the top five bottled water market shares by sales volume are Nongfu Spring (12.2%), Cestbon (8.3%), Jingtian (5.3%), Master Kong (3.2%), and Wahaha (2.2%). Among them, Wahaha's market share fell from 4.2% in 2017 to 2.2% in 2022.

The new products can't keep up, and the only products recognized on the market are bottled water, AD calcium milk, and nutrition express. Zong Fuli is more complex than the market her father faced back then, but "rejuvenation" is still the street lamp that Zong Qinghou lit for Wahaha, and Zong Fuli's Wahaha needs an all-round and multi-dimensional change, and the market and consumers are looking forward to the performance of Zong Fuli and Wahaha.