Lighters are a common item in people's lives, whether it is to light a fire or smokers to smoke, it is a very convenient choice.
But such a small lighter, its development history can be described as ups and downs, invented by German chemists in 1823, it has a history of 200 years.
Many people may say: Isn't it just a gadget, at most it is just a fire, what big secret can there be behind it? But it is precisely this small lighter that, to a certain extent, represents the recent development of science and technology on the mainland in recent years.
And this small lighter, in 2018, the mainland's related enterprises have occupied more than 45% of its market, you must know that in the 90s, most of the mainland's lighters relied on imports.
Behind all this is not only innovation and peaceful competition, but also the benefits brought by such a large proportion are enough for competitors to target in a clever name, and European and American countries are also doing this.
But the result is that the domestic lighter won the victory with a crushing posture, and the competitors have gradually all withdrawn from this field, what is happening behind this, how did the domestic lighter fight out of the encirclement?
Information source: China Daily published a report on March 0, 2023 titled: Lighters are exported first in the country, and Shaoyang products are popular overseas
Small things are worth a lot
Many people think that no matter how much you study the lighter, isn't it just a gadget for a dollar?
In fact, this kind of thinking is wrong, although the single value of the lighter is very small, but when the industrial chain is formed and the vast majority of the market is occupied, the profit brought by it is very large.
Take Hunan Dongyi Electric, a leading lighter enterprise today, for example, his daily lighter output can reach nearly 10 million.
The mainland's lighter enterprises can obtain such a large market in the world, which is inseparable from the efforts of the enterprises at that time, as early as the eighties of the last century, lighters have just begun to flow into the mainland.
Foreign-made lighters were generally high in price because they could not reduce costs, and at that time they were in a situation where they could not afford what they wanted, and those who could afford them did not want them.
At this time, some businessmen in Wenzhou saw the market behind the lighters and began to buy lighters, and they did not buy them for use, but to disassemble them to observe the structure inside.
Lighters seemed to be a rare thing at the time, but the real thing was how to control the cost, so that they could compete with lighters from other countries.
This was a big challenge at that time, after all, most of the lighters imported from the mainland at that time came from Japan and Germany, and compared with these two countries, there was no industrial advantage.
How to sell the most suitable price at the lowest cost was the most important thing for domestic enterprises to consider at that time.
Overtaking in corners
If you want to do a good job, you must understand the supply and demand relationship of this item, and at this time, there were not many people who were suitable for expensive reusable lighters.
People use disposable lighters the most, the design of this lighter is simpler, the cost is lower, but even in the 90s, the mainland's lighters are mostly produced from Japan and even the United States.
These people set their sights on this simple lighter, and after continuous attempts, the manufacture of lighters is no longer a problem, the problem is how to reduce the cost of parts used in lighters.
No one did this in foreign countries, after all, there were matches in the low-end market at that time, so there was a very broad market in the country on the disposable.
So Wenzhou businessmen began to get together to discuss how to reduce costs, in fact, this is very simple for mainland enterprises.
Japan and other Western countries can't control costs because most of their parts have to be imported from abroad, unlike the mainland, where factories are very well developed.
Therefore, many enterprises in the mainland can generally find the source of relevant factories no matter how unpopular, in order to be afraid of being stuck, so the manufacturing and cost reduction of disposable lighters by this group of entrepreneurs in Wenzhou are very smooth.
How cheap could it be at the time? Almost one-tenth of Japan's, without any difference in appearance and service life.
After such lighters entered the market, it was completely a dimensionality reduction attack, and soon began to encroach on the lighter market monopolized by Japan and Western countries.
By 2001, the mainland had occupied 80% of the global market and achieved the first "monopoly" feat, of course, other countries naturally did not let us develop like this, and their best game was used once: sanctions.
Nirvana during sanctions
The United States and the European Union took the lead in passing various bills to begin to target disposable lighters on the mainland, restricting lighters on the mainland for various strange reasons.
But the other party is an importing country, and they stuck on the threshold and did not let us enter, so they could no longer export to the West, and the reduction in exports made many enterprises begin to close, which was also the end of the first wave of lighters on the mainland.
One by one, the real events show that the mainland enterprises are tenacious, and when the first batch of lighter factories in Wenzhou were slowly closed, a large number of people with lofty ideals from Shaodong took over the baton of lighter development.
For a while, many factories sprung up, and this time what they wanted to do was not only to reduce the cost of lighters, but to develop various black technologies.
And with the progress of science and technology, lighter factories that used to require a lot of labor began to be updated, and the cost of lighters was reduced again by the entry of a large number of machines.
Source: A report published on the portal of the Hunan Provincial People's Government about: [Shaoyang City] A lighter, "igniting" the global market
This is also the reason why such a convenient and fast gadget only sells for one dollar, and it has not increased in price for more than ten years.
By 2022, Shaodong will be able to manufacture tens of billions of lighters every year, and the export volume will reach a terrifying 3.5 billion, which is already a very terrifying data, and lighters have also become Shaodong's i pillar industry, bringing huge economic development.
Source: Published in Hunan Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology The annual export volume of Hunan Shaodong lighters exceeds 3.5 billion, which are sold in hundreds of countries and regions - making a 1 yuan business a pillar industry May 26, 2023
Don't look at this as just a small lighter, from the fact that the factory can overwhelm the price of all kinds of parts so cheaply, you can see how solid the mainland's industrial strength is.
Technically, others can't catch up, and our cost is lower than theirs, so it's no wonder that they are conquered by the mainland's lighters, and there are no other countries to compete with us.
In fact, other industries are the same, in the past, the mainland was called the world's factory, because we have certain disadvantages in R&D and creation, but in the industrial chain and manufacturing continent can be said to be incomparable. i
When the mainland began its industrial transformation, the experience of the world's factories in the past could save us many detours and make the mainland's industrial industry more perfect.
This is something that neither Japan nor those Western countries can do, they rely on imports and re-exports, while the mainland has a complete and huge industrial chain, and can be completely self-sufficient, setting prices and reducing costs by itself.
This is something that no other country can do, and not all countries have a very complete industrial chain like the mainland, so they can't control costs from the source.