In Chinese mainland, there are countless brands of melon seeds, but to talk about the highest comprehensive popularity, it is none other than Qiaqia, Qiaqia, which occupies the top of the list of major brands all year round, is naturally not a waste of fame, Qiaqia melon seeds have a perennial share of more than 50% in the domestic packaged melon seed market, ranking firmly in the industry leader, and the sunflower seed business sector once contributed more than 60% of the revenue to Qiaqia Food, but at present, this "melon seed leader" has encountered unprecedented thorny problems:
The melon seed business, the largest main business, fell into an unfavorable situation of declining revenue and net profit; The growth rate of the nut business, known as the "second growth pole", has also fallen into a downward trend; After the company raised prices twice, the gross profit margin and profit margin fell to a historical low, which also caused investors to question the ability to control the cost of Qiaqia food, and more frequent food safety problems are further consuming the trust of the public......
It will not be easy for Qiaqia Food to return to growth!
01, melon seed faucet, it is difficult to hide anxiety
As early as 2020, the chairman of Qiaqia Food put forward the goal of "breaking 10 billion revenue in 2023", however, with the disclosure of Qiaqia Food's 2023 financial report, an indisputable fact is placed in front of netizens, Qiaqia Food not only failed to achieve the goal of 10 billion revenue, but also has a gap of more than 3 billion.
According to the performance report of Qiaqia Food, in 2023, the company will achieve revenue of 6.806 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 1.13%, a net profit attributable to the parent company of 803 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 17.77% (the largest decrease since listing), basic earnings per share of 1.584 yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 18.01%, and a net cash flow generated by the company's operating activities of 419 million yuan during the reporting period, a year-on-year decrease of 72.64%.
Last year, the leisure snack industry as a whole was not prosperous, and it became one of the consensus of the industry, so the decline in key financial data seems to have a last resort, of course, the general environment is only an objective reason, for the first time in the 13 years since the listing of Qiaqia Food, there was a decline in revenue, but to find the fundamental internal causes, in order to prescribe the right medicine.
Qiaqia Food's fist product is undoubtedly the sunflower seed business, and the decline in the gross profit of the sunflower seed business is enough to arouse vigilance.
In 2023, the revenue of Qiaqia Food sunflower seeds will be 4.27 billion yuan, accounting for 62.75% of the company's total revenue, a year-on-year decrease of 5.36%, and the gross profit margin of sunflower seed products in 2023 will be 25.23%, a decrease of 7.92% from 2022, because the decline in the profit margin of this main business also affects the company's overall revenue and profit changes.
In fact, Qiaqia melon seeds raised the price of sunflower seed products twice in October 2021 and August 2022, with price increases of 8%~18% and 3.8% respectively for each category; After the price increase, revenue and profit are still declining, and the reason may only be attributed to the fact that melon seeds are becoming more and more difficult to sell
At the same time, the revenue growth rate of the nut business, which is regarded as the company's second growth curve, has also begun to decline, and in 2021~2023, the revenue growth rate of Qiaqia Food's nut products will be 43.82%, 18.78%, and 8.0% respectively.
Coincidentally, shortly after the release of Qiaqia Food's annual report, a number of brokerages, including Bank of China Securities, Guosen Securities, Huaxin Securities, Haitong Securities, etc., all implemented downward revision of profit forecasts for Qiaqia Food.
How to break out of many unfavorable predicaments has become the key to breaking the situation of Qiaqia Food!
02, is there a play in self-help?
For a snack leader like Qiaqia Food, how can we not know the reason why the ship is difficult to turn around, and behind the failure to boost the performance of the price increase, it first reflects the company's "weakness" at the cost control level, and how to improve the cost control ability has naturally become the first major grasp of Qiaqia self-help.
As a pivotal leader in the industry, Qiaqia has always been based on order agricultural procurement, in an earlier research report, Qiaqia Food pointed out that "the company's sunflower seed procurement of about 50% of the purchase volume is through the order agriculture model", this model is to put it bluntly with farmers to sign a contract, the other party is responsible for planting, the rest of the amount to agents and cooperatives to purchase.
Although this will reduce the initial input cost of self-built production areas, but the uncontrollable risk will increase, and the bargaining power of sunflower seed raw materials needs to be improved, and if the layout of self-construction and self-operation as soon as possible, at least in the procurement of core raw materials sunflower seeds, Qiaqia Food will have the advantage of price control, but obviously, now if you want to build from scratch, it is difficult to climb to the sky.
In 2022, the R&D expenses of Qiaqia Food will be 53.56 million yuan, accounting for only 0.78% of revenue, and the R&D expenses will increase in 2023, but the total amount will be 65 million, accounting for less than 1% of revenue.
Figure: Financial Reporting
How to improve the rate of research and development and the output efficiency of the results determines the competitiveness of the food in the nut track where big names gather, so the horse is not paste, if you don't pay attention to research and development just because of the low threshold, then in the long run, without the exclusive black technology blessing, want consumers to pay for the premium, it is tantamount to a fantasy.
Considering that the source of the supply chain and the output of R&D investment in the short and medium term, it is still very difficult to fundamentally change, and there is a priority for the current Qiaqia Food, how to do a good job in food safety has become a key to recovering the reputation.
On the black cat platform, there have been many complaints about the food safety of Qiaqia melon seeds, and on the Xiaohongshu platform, there are also many netizens who have initiated complaints about Qiaqia melon seeds, just in recent months, there have been many complaints, if the time scale is extended, the complaints are numerous, which is enough to attract the attention of Qiaqia Food.
Of course, for Qiaqia, although there are some thorny problems, it has also ushered in long-lost good news, and the first quarter report of 2024 disclosed as scheduled at the end of last month has brought some confidence to Qiaqia Food:
During the reporting period, Qiaqia achieved revenue of 1.822 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 36.39%, and a net profit attributable to the parent company of 240 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 35.15%.
Can the "good start" in the first quarter continue for the whole year of 2024? See!