Written by Li Jinlin
Editor/ Li Wenjie
排版/ Annalee
Recently, CCTV Finance released the "China Better Life Survey" to uncover a phenomenon, that is, in the ranking of young people aged 18 to 35 in the consumption list, healthy consumption has ranked third among young people's consumption intentions. Perhaps because of lifestyle habits such as staying up late and lack of exercise, or perhaps because of high mental pressure, young people are stretching their health bills longer and longer.
Due to the high concern about their own health, "crispy young people" usually choose to change from both sports and catering, so the popularity of national tide sports such as Baduanjin and Tai Chi once exceeded that of aerobics, and "workers" also began to abandon takeout and carefully prepare food for one person.
One obvious market change is that appliances are becoming smaller and more functional. For young consumer groups with clear needs, choosing small household appliances is like looking for an electronic nanny, which emphasizes the ability to reach their needs.
Small household appliances that young people want: strong function, good looks, and social skills
The homes of contemporary young people are far more dependent on small household appliances than they imagined.
"I have three small appliances in my house almost all year round, which can be called my electronic nanny. The air fryer is responsible for rebaking my bread in the morning, and sometimes I need to use it for lunch and dinner. The capsule coffee machine is also a machine that I turn on every morning, which is not only a must-have brain-revitalizing artifact for migrant workers, but also cost-effective. There is also a wall breaker, which makes it very easy to squeeze soy milk and various health pastes. Sun Ang, who was born in 1999, chose to stay in Wuhan to work after graduation, and although the rented house was not high-end, he took good care of himself as his top priority.
The large appliances that are necessary in the family are important, but for people like Sun Ang who are wandering away, it is really troublesome to buy. First, there are many uncertainties about renting, and moving around is just commonplace, so light enough appliances will be the first choice; Second, migrant workers who are adrift often have a more direct demand for household appliances, and small household appliances with more focused functionality are more suitable.
"Relatively speaking, the cost performance of small household appliances is also quite high, and in the case that I don't need any cool functions, small household appliances are completely sufficient. And even if there is a more desired model later, it will not hurt to change it. Sun Ang continued to talk about the zinc scale.
As more and more young people choose to wander and live alone, the number of consumers who share the same needs as Sun Ang has skyrocketed. On station B, "A Mei Man's Time", "Toast is taking pictures", "Don't call me Brother Dog", "Wild Qi _zozo", "Huang Xiaoxie is not in a hurry", "Ssshui Xiaohui" and many other UP masters have shared their love for small household appliances in the video, some will list the advantages and disadvantages of small household appliances in detail, and some purely share love products, no matter what, the number of views and interaction rate are not low.
Many bloggers will do the theme planning of sharing small household appliances
In addition to improving the sense of well-being in life, young people have also developed more ways to play with small household appliances. For example, the fascia gun, which was once listed as one of the "Top Ten Small Household Appliances for Eating Soil", is now called a "ticket-grabbing artifact" by young people. The young man who regarded the fascia gun as a "physical plug-in" finally took the fascia gun to a high position after grabbing the concert tickets.
At the same time, the social attributes of small household appliances are also increasing day by day, and factors such as strong practicality, high appearance, and high cost performance make small household appliances a gift that young consumer groups are willing to choose. Whether it's a friend's birthday or a housewarming, small household appliances can be a decent gift. There are even bloggers who have combed a series of "small household appliances that I am reluctant to buy, but my friends will be super happy to send them" for reference.
So far, the label of small household appliances has finally changed from chicken ribs to treasures, and young people with various ways of playing are still continuing to give more value to small household appliances.
Technology and going overseas to solve the "impossible triangle"
Every small problem that everyone encounters in life is an opportunity for small household appliance brands in the future.
In the past, profit, sales and quality were called the "impossible triangle" of the small household appliance track, that is to say, small household appliances were considered by the public to be unable to achieve profit, sales and quality at the same time, and this is also the "curse" that restricted the development of the entire industry and brand in the past.
However, after several years of rapid development, the small home market has now begun to gradually show two ways of internal repair products and external channels.
First of all, let's talk about internal repair products, Joyoung, Little Bear, Mofei, Xiaomi and other brands have regarded technological development as the first priority of development in recent years. For example, Joyoung has accumulated 13,181 technical patents in the past 30 years, and among the several new products recently released, the rice cooker adopts the newly upgraded "rice grain activation suspension cabin technology", and the water purifier adopts the "three-in-one" full-link antibacterial system of filter element, pipeline and pasteurization cycle sterilization;
Xiaoxiong Electric has built more than 10 elite R&D teams, including nearly 400 professional R&D personnel, and Xiaoxiong Electric is still increasing R&D investment, according to Xiaoxiong Electric's 2023 annual report, in 2023, Xiaoxiong Electric's R&D expenses will increase by 3.93% year-on-year;
Xiaomi pays attention to the personalized intelligent development of "thousands of people and thousands of faces", and its thermostatic electric kettle not only solves many problems of traditional electric kettles, but also realizes the temperature control function and multi-stage temperature setting at one touch.
Technological change and upgrading has become a new fulcrum for small household appliance brands to leverage the market, but it is not a single direction of development, the competition in the domestic market is intensifying, and if you want to seize the younger market, the price involution is also essential, so the brands will also look at the broader market.
According to the "China Business Daily" report, in addition to traditional white electricity and black electricity, small household appliances are becoming a major attraction for household appliances to go overseas. According to a report by the international data analysis agency JFK, by the end of 2022, continental sweepers have accounted for more than 50% of the overseas market share. Among them, in the Southeast Asian and European markets, the market share of domestic sweepers reached 68% and 55% respectively. Sweeper companies represented by Roborock and Ecovacs are actively expanding overseas markets by establishing overseas factories, signing agency agreements, and expanding overseas offices.
Small household appliance manufacturers are actively going overseas
渠道方面,如投影仪品牌极米除入驻亚马逊、日本乐天外,还进入了包括BestBuy、Media Markt、Saturn、Fnac、Darty、EI Corte Ingles、Bic Camera、茑屋家电、友都八喜等在内的海外零售渠道。
Combining the differentiation of different countries and regions with the way of domestic involution is the "big move" of domestic small household appliance brands.
In the era of small household appliances 2.0, more than just making household appliances smaller
Small household appliances, which were once not favored, have achieved steady growth in scale in recent years. According to the "2024-2030 China Smart Small Household Appliance Industry Chain Panorama Research and Market Trend Forecast Report", in 2023, the market size of smart small household appliances in mainland China will reach about 192.4 billion yuan, and it is expected that the market size of smart small household appliances will reach 228.5 billion yuan in 2025; In the future, smart homes will be connected to more small household appliances, forming a smart life ecology and driving the expansion of the smart small household appliances industry.
As for how to expand? For example, when the "home economy" prevailed in the past three years, retail e-commerce and live-streaming e-commerce broadened the channels for small household appliances, making small household appliance brands such as ovens, coffee machines, and air fryers grow rapidly.
Later, the "camping economy" took off, and the core market size of China's camping economy will reach 113.47 billion yuan in 2022, and small household appliances will also get a share of it. Camping electric fans, portable juicers, frying machines and other products have become essential small household appliances for camping enthusiasts.
It is not difficult to see that because there are more functions, small household appliances with more adaptation scenarios will gain space from a variety of economic growth. Coupled with the continuous iteration within the industry and the extension of overseas channels, the scale of the small household appliance market will continue to expand.
A group of surveys by Quest Mobile also mentioned that one of the reasons for the development of the small home appliance industry is that the miniaturization of household size has become a trend. For the new generation of consumers who live alone in new structured families and alone, their living concepts show a great difference compared with traditional families. The space is not new, but has style; The object is not big, but beautiful.
Therefore, in the face of the diversified needs of the younger generation of consumers, small household appliances should not only make household appliances smaller, but also upgrade from appearance, function, quality-price ratio, channels and other aspects to create a sense of life atmosphere, which is the key to always standing on the tuyere.