"Three links and one reach" may really be "separated".

This time, it was no longer an argument, but a fact -

"Three links and one reach" may really be "separated" next.

Not long ago, after Zhongtong released its "results" in 2023, Lai Meisong, chairman of Zhongtong, specifically mentioned in the conference call: "We hope that Zhongtong can jump out of Tongda and form differentiated competitiveness." ”

It is not difficult to understand that Lai Meisong has such an idea, after all, Zhongtong's business volume, service timeliness, market share, and company market value are enough to "jump out of Tongda" and become a school of its own. However, Zhongtong is not the only one who wants to "jump out of Tongda", Yuantong, Shentong, and Yunda also want to "jump out of Tongda", and they have been making relevant attempts and efforts.

For example, the transformation and transformation of YTO's entire network All in digitalization, for example, Shentong anchored the "economic express" track and adhered to the strategic adjustment of deepening and refinement, and for example, Yunda has always maintained neutrality, not standing in line, and not worshipping the dock......

"It is difficult to distinguish between the two and the middle" for many years, and the Tongda Department has also fought openly and secretly for many years. After a long time, whether it is a bystander or an insider, there has always been such a voice: How to "jump out of Tongda" when reaching the bottom?

In the old ghost's opinion, it is easy to enter the circle, but if you want to break the circle, you must cross three major thresholds:

First, the super large scale, the scale effect is large enough, with the means of small profits and quick turnover, quickly occupy the market, and become the absolute leader of market share.

The second is obvious differentiation, breaking the traditional cognition of consumers, providing differentiated products that are different from peers, and winning their own invincible position.

The third is to dare to step out of the comfort zone, regardless of the gains and losses of one city and one place, in the most fierce stage of price competition, turn to market segments, become stronger and thorough, and break through the bottleneck of growth.

In this context, the answer to how "accessibility" can "jump out of accessibility" is obvious.

01

Jumping out of the "scale trap"

Express delivery is an industry with a very obvious scale effect, and scale is also a necessary condition for the success of the "Tongda Department" giants.

It must be admitted that when the business volume of an express delivery company reaches a certain scale, it has a stronger competitive advantage, the larger the scale, the lower its single ticket cost, and then enjoy the "Matthew effect" dividend, thus forming a "huge single volume - economies of scale - cost reduction - price advantage - continuous expansion of the single volume" positive cycle.

Through this scale effect and positive circulation, while reducing the unit cost, it also gathers the resources of the head. For example, upstream suppliers can have pricing power to minimize procurement costs. For another example, for downstream customers, they begin to have bargaining power, which can release more price space to seize the market.

But it is also undeniable that scale is not omnipotent, scale can be king or slave. When it's the biggest, it's often the most dangerous.

First, the larger the scale, the greater the risk. The core of the scale effect is the single-ticket economy, if each express link can be profitable, the whole will have more profits, and once the cost of a certain link (transit cost, transportation cost, packaging material cost, dispatch cost) is under pressure, the whole will face greater losses.

Second, the larger the scale, the greater the pressure. The manpower, management costs and financial pressure brought about by blind expansion of scale have become "diseconomies of scale", which has dragged down long-term development.

Some data show that when the daily order volume of an express network reaches 60 million, the marginal effect of cost improvement is decreasing.

In addition, and more importantly, the scale effect can easily produce path dependence, ignore potential risks, and gradually lose vitality. As a typical example, looking back at the growth history of the Tongda Department, an obvious main line is the "price war". As long as the price drops, it is a series of brilliant achievements, which is far simpler and more efficient than the effect of "doing a good job in service, doing a good job in delivery, and doing a good job in word of mouth". In this cycle, there are endless troubles.

In recent years, the overall growth rate of China's express delivery industry has slowed down, compared with the business growth rate of more than 30% and 50% in previous years, it is obviously inadequate.

If you understand these, you will understand why Zhongtong began to deliberately dilute the specific goal of "scale increment", and instead pay more attention to and emphasize "value increment". In the short term, this will definitely bring a certain degree of performance pressure, but in the long run, taking this as a starting point, Zhongtong is also entering a benign transformation from "scale increment" to "value increment".

It can be seen that the scale effect is a double-edged sword, which will not only bring "great achievements", but also easily create huge mistakes, and controlling the scale well is a compulsory course for every person at the helm.

02

Jumping out of "homogeneous competition"

The old guys of the "Tongda Department" not only have the same origin, but also "look more and more alike", similar products, similar services, and similar prices..."involution" is everywhere.

To put it mildly, the competition of Tongda express delivery companies has been competing with each other for a long time. If your price is low, then I am lower than you. If you make a new product, then I'll copy it. If you want to play with the ecosystem, then I will "cast a wide net". Anyway, I have what you have, I have it, and I can only "die and die and die".

In such a circular development, it is not difficult to find that the nature of market competition in the Tongda system has changed, and it has evolved into an extremely cruel "price war".

When it comes to homogeneous competition, it is easy to ignore the basic fact that there are more and more opportunities for consumers to choose. As a result, many people habitually equate the "economic parts" and "e-commerce parts" that are the main products of Tongda Express with low prices and low ends. These labels also make "Tongda" form a strong stereotype in the minds of users, which is generally a bit "earthy". In the face of an increasingly strong buyer's market, Tongda's voice is getting weaker and weaker.

In fact, through years of capacity accumulation, technology upgrading and management optimization, Tongda has improved significantly in terms of timeliness in recent years, and the gap between service quality and direct express delivery such as SF Express and Jingdong is also narrowing. After accumulating enough experience and strength in multiple business scenarios, Tongda is also striving to create its own service "business card".

For example, some time ago, "Zhongtong Standard Fast" was upgraded to "Zhongtong Good Fast", intending to break the situation in the mid-to-high-end market. In addition, there are Yuantong's "Yuanzhunda", Yunda's "Zhicheng Network", Shentong's "on-demand distribution", etc., which are all sharp knife products that they jump out of "homogeneous competition".

Everyone knows that the express delivery industry, which relied on low-quality, low-price, scuffle and other rough tactics and savage growth, has reached the stock era of competing value. In the new era, supply exceeds demand, and the initiative is more in the hands of customers (consumers, business customers).

03

Jumping out of the "prisoner's dilemma"

Compared with hand-to-hand combat in the market, the suspicion and indecision in the "prisoner's dilemma" are more frightening and uneasy. It's like being cut with a knife, you can feel the pain, but you can't resist it, and it's getting worse and worse.

It can be used as an example of the "increase in distribution fees": if one or several companies rise and the others do not, then some price-sensitive customers of the enterprises that increase the distribution fee will flow to the enterprises that have not risen, resulting in a decline in the market share of the enterprises that have increased the distribution fee, and fall into the vicious circle of "who rises first and dies first, who does not rise and who waits for death", and the result can only be a dead shoulder, and there is no benefit in the long run.

The so-called unbroken and unbroken, the pattern of the express delivery industry has never been static. Frankly speaking, it is not yet possible to conclude who will be the first to "jump out of access". But one thing is clear, Zhongtong has run ahead on this road.

As the most stable express network in the head camp, especially in the case of obvious leading advantages in business volume (market share) and profits, Zhongtong currently has the largest industry voice in terms of "pricing power". In other words, whether the market fights a price war or not, Zhongtong's decision-making and actions have a "pivotal" role.

From this point of view, we can also say that Zhongtong has the confidence to make adjustments in terms of price, and has grasped the initiative in terms of price leverage adjustment such as dispatch fees, eliminating loss-making parts and customers with low gross profits, etc., and has a very large depth space. In this way, in the face of the strange circle of "who first rises the price and who dies, who does not raise the price, who waits for death", the time to jump out of the "prisoner's dilemma" and break the "price curse" is becoming more and more mature.

The rules of the game have changed, and the "protagonists" certainly have to change.