Recently, Lin Qingxuan, a domestic cosmetics and skin care brand, announced its results for the first quarter of 2024, with a year-on-year increase of more than 50%, fully demonstrating its steady performance growth momentum and successful practice of innovative strategies. Lin Qingxuan's rapid growth benefits from the comprehensive layout of "new channels + new products + new media".
New channel + new product + new media: innovative strategy activates the growth engine
FMCG understands that in the context of cyclical challenges faced by physical operations, the cosmetics industry has accelerated its online layout and become the main force of online consumption. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the total retail sales of cosmetics in mainland China will reach a new high in 2023, reaching 414.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.1%. The "2023 China Skincare Industry Omni-channel White Paper" further revealed that the sales of beauty and skin care online channels increased by 3.8% year-on-year, of which the Tao platform is firmly in the core position, and Douyin, as an emerging content e-commerce platform, has sprung up, providing a broad stage for the rise of domestic brands.
As a brand model that keenly captures channel changes and takes the lead in making adaptive layouts, Lin Qingxuan was led by founder Sun Laichun as early as the early stage of the epidemic and took the lead in entering the live broadcast platform, building a multi-online matrix such as Douyin, Kuaishou, Xiaohongshu, and WeChat Mini Program, which is deeply integrated with the mature OMO omni-channel marketing model. Under the severe situation in 2020, Lin Qingxuan achieved the feat of 145% increase in performance over the same period of the previous year with the textbook-level "commercial self-help".
At the level of new media marketing, Lin Qingxuan is well versed in the communication of young consumer groups, and actively deploys social platforms such as WeChat video account, official account, Xiaohongshu, Douyin, Weibo, Bilibili, etc., to reach consumers with content such as product planting, skin care skills, brand stories, etc., and vividly presents brand charm and product characteristics through in-depth cooperation with top talents, and successfully detonates its influence in the young consumer circle.
In terms of offline layout, Lin Qingxuan did not ignore the value of physical stores, but regarded them as an important carrier of brand experience. At present, Lin Qingxuan has opened nearly 500 physical stores in shopping malls and department stores in first-tier and new first-tier cities across the country, insisting on high-quality service and shopping experience. In addition, on the basis of long-term adherence to the direct sales model, the brand launched the joint operation strategy last year, which has achieved remarkable results and further broadened the offline market coverage.
Scientific research is king, and product innovation meets the needs of consumption upgrading
On the product side, Lin Qingxuan has always adhered to the concept of scientific research as king, closely focused on consumer needs, closely followed market trends, and continued to optimize the product matrix. With the combination strategy of "classic explosive products + new products", the brand has created a rich product line with the super single camellia repair essence oil as the core to meet the diversified skin care needs of consumers.
Recently, in response to consumers' increasingly advanced demand for sunscreen products, Lin Qingxuan spent 1,500 days and nights overcoming technical difficulties and launched a new generation of "milestone" sunscreen products - "400 Little Golden Umbrella". The product integrates technology and efficacy to achieve a scientific compound of 8 sunscreens, effectively blocking UVB and ultra-longwave ultraviolet UVA, taking into account the dual effects of sunscreen and anti-wrinkle, subverting the traditional sunscreen product experience. Since its debut in March, the "400 Little Golden Umbrella" has won the recommendation of many head experts with its excellent quality, with the first 30,000 pieces sold out in only 6 hours, and 180,000 pieces sold in the first month of listing, with sales of nearly 20 million, successfully filling the gap of the brand in the field of sunscreen and showing a strong market appeal.
Innovation and perseverance go hand in hand to drive the brand to move forward steadily
The continuous growth of Lin Qingxuan's performance is not only due to its innovative use of new channels, new products and new media, but also inseparable from the brand's long-term adherence to product quality, scientific research and innovation and industrial chain construction.
Taking Lin Qingxuan Camellia Repair Essence Oil ("Little Emperor Bottle") as an example, this "super item" in the field of domestic skin care embodies the brand's ingenuity for more than ten years. Lin Qingxuan selected Chinese alpine red camellia at an altitude of more than 800 meters as raw materials, set up a scientific research team composed of more than 40 master's and doctoral scientists, and developed the core patented formula "Qingxuan Cui", which has obtained a total of 81 patents, including 40 invention patents, after many iterations and upgrades. As of April this year, "Little Emperor Bottle" has sold more than 20 million bottles, topped the Tmall facial oil best-selling list for four times, and won the honor of "No. 1 in national sales of essence oil for ten consecutive years".
Lin Qingxuan has always adhered to the layout of the whole industry chain, from the front-end in-depth cooperation with about 20,000 acres of Lin Qingxuan's red camellia planting base, to the mid-end investment of nearly 300 million yuan to build Shanghai's first carbon-neutral scientific research and intelligent manufacturing base, and then to the back-end to build a "direct + joint + franchise" offline chain network and online omni-channel layout, forming a solid industrial chain barrier and providing a solid guarantee for the long-term development of the brand.