The prefabricated food in the former tuyere industry is now being avoided by many people, and some local governments that regard it as a leading industry have also begun to have an ambiguous attitude.
"Now it's just about doing and not talking." In early October, Feng Zhen (pseudonym), a local official in a county in central China, told the CBN reporter that although the local prefabricated vegetable has been included in the leading industry and more than 5,000 acres of prefabricated vegetable industrial park has been newly planned, the government now does not dare to publicize it.
Two years ago, in order to promote the prefabricated vegetable industry, the county invited experts and scholars such as academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, researchers of the Institute of Agricultural Products Processing of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and hundreds of entrepreneurs to organize a conference on the prefabricated vegetable industry. At present, the prefabricated food industry here has gradually developed into a leading industry with nearly 200 prefabricated food deep processing enterprises and a total operating income of more than 20 billion yuan in the whole prefabricated food industry chain in the county.
In the past two years, the local government's attitude towards the prefabricated food industry has changed 180 degrees.
The wind has taken a sharp turn
Feng Zhen still remembers the grand occasion two years ago. "After the prefabricated food conference, people from all over the country come here to visit, and there are several observation points (enterprises), and they have to receive six or seven hundred people a day on average." He said that the local area of more than 3,000 acres of central kitchen industrial park has been built, and later saw that the whole industry is so hot, the local leaders made a decision, and in the east of the county, planning and construction of more than 5,000 acres of prefabricated vegetable industrial park, divided into A, B, C, D and innovation incubation park 5 parks, began to attract investment nationwide.
The market development manager of a local prefabricated food company also said that when the prefabricated food was hot in the first two years, people came to talk about the cooperation of prefabricated food almost every day, and some customers were confused about what goods they should buy and what channels they should do, so they felt that this was an opportunity to make a fortune and did not want to miss it.
Looking at the whole country, the entire industry is showing a steaming atmosphere.
Lu Zhengyao, the founder of UCAR and Luckin Coffee, founded the prefabricated food brand "Tongue Hero" in January 2022 and signed 6,000 franchised stores in 3 months; Subsequently, Luo Min, the founder of Qudian, also announced his entry into prefabricated dishes, and a "Boss Luo of Qudian Please eat sauerkraut fish for 1 penny" attracted the attention of the industry.
In addition, many listed companies such as Guolian, Anjing, Sanquan, New Hope, Delisi, Dahu, and Zhangzidao have also proposed to build a prefabricated food industry.
In 2023, prefabricated vegetables will be written into the No. 1 document of the central government for the first time, and some local governments will immediately propose to build prefabricated vegetable industrial parks based on local industrial advantages.
Laiyang, Shandong Province, said that it would become "the first city of prefabricated food in China"; Liangping District of Chongqing Municipality proposed to build a "prefabricated food capital in western China"; Jingzhou, Hubei Province, has advertised the "Capital of Prefabricated Dishes in Central China" to Wuhan Railway Station.
According to the "2023 Blue Book on the Development of China's Prefabricated Food Industry" jointly compiled by iiMedia Consulting and Southern Rural Daily, the size of China's prefabricated food market in 2023 will be 516.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 23.1%. Correspondingly, in 2019, the size of the mainland prefabricated vegetable market was 244.5 billion yuan.
However, from 2023 onwards, the market's evaluation of this "outlet" has suddenly taken a sharp turn, and some catering companies have begun to emphasize the need not to use prefabricated dishes, and try their best to "dissociate" themselves from prefabricated dishes. Some places that once made a lot of fanfare about making prefabricated food into a characteristic industry have also begun to have an ambiguous attitude, "do it without saying it".
It is difficult to attract investment in the prefabricated vegetable industrial park
Feng Zhen said that one of the reasons for the market change is that some schools have been exposed to food quality and hygiene problems after using prefabricated dishes and central kitchens for meals, and some schools have problems such as untimely delivery of meals and poor taste of meals. The second reason is that some of the prefabricated dishes sold live broadcast plum cabbage button meat are involved in the controversy of bad meat, especially this year's CCTV "3·15" party exposed that individual companies use substandard bad head meat to make plum cabbage button meat, which has intensified the public's disgust and doubts about prefabricated dishes.
Feng Zhen told reporters that the current predicament of prefabricated vegetables has brought challenges to the investment of the county's prefabricated vegetable industrial park.
An investment manager told reporters that according to the plan, the C area where it is located will be completed and put into operation in the second half of this year, but at present, no company has confirmed to settle in, and some enterprises that have already settled in are also in a state of shutdown.
A similar investment dilemma also occurred in Shandong. The person in charge of a prefabricated vegetable industrial park in Jinan said that they have recently connected with many enterprises, and they have consulted more and invested less money.
However, as a beneficiary of the industry, Feng Zhen said that the local government has lowered a lot of light in the promotion of prefabricated dishes, but it is still full of confidence in the prospects of the industry, such as a duck neck enterprise that has attracted investment, and the market sales are booming, which can contribute 70 million or 80 million yuan in tax revenue to the county every year.
Therefore, the local government has not relaxed its support for the prefabricated food industry, and supported local prefabricated food enterprises to tide over the difficulties through the "one cold, one hot and one fund": one cold, one cold, one cold is to build hundreds of thousands of tons of cold storage; "One heat" is to give priority to the supply of water vapor and other heat energy generated by thermal power generation to prefabricated vegetable enterprises; "One fund" is to help enterprises solve financial problems through financial means.
"From the perspective of food safety, the prefabricated dishes of large factories, the entry of food raw materials, the inspection of product processing, including the transportation of cold chain logistics, are relatively scientific and standardized." Feng Zhen said that at present, prefabricated dishes are indeed questioned due to preservatives, additives and other issues, but these problems can be solved through higher-tech freezing technology and cold chain logistics in the future.
Falling vs. rising
It seems that consumers' awareness and acceptance of pre-made dishes is not high, but multiple data show that the market size of pre-made dishes is still expanding in the first half of 2024 and is expected to increase year-on-year throughout the year. In fact, the number of prefabricated food enterprises is also increasing, and the data of enterprise investigation shows that in the first eight months of this year, the number of domestic prefabricated food-related enterprises continued to rise, more than 2,000 more than the same period last year.
The market size is growing potentially, but the market fragmentation is intensifying, which is a significant feature of the current domestic prefabricated vegetable market. A number of professional investment institutions confirmed this situation to Yicai, and the operation of some enterprises also fully demonstrated this characteristic.
Xinxiang Yuxuan Halal Food Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Yuxuan Company") was originally an enterprise focusing on agricultural breeding, fresh slaughtering and deep processing of beef and mutton, a sales manager of the company said that around 2022, when the prefabricated vegetable market was hot, Yuxuan Company successively developed prefabricated vegetable products such as haggis soup, red stewed mutton, and mutton scorpions, and in just 4 months, these prefabricated dishes brought 50 million yuan in sales to the enterprise. However, since the beginning of this year, Yuxuan's prefabricated food sales have begun to become difficult, and the company's e-commerce department established to expand the sales of prefabricated dishes has experienced a sharp decline in performance.
The sales manager of Henan Sanwei Zhenchu Food Sales Co., Ltd. also said that the company's prefabricated food products are rarely sold to retail customers, but focus on group buying customers, and develop holiday gift packages such as the Spring Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival.
Once known as the "first stock of prefabricated dishes", Michika (605089. SH) 2024 semi-annual report also shows that in the first half of this year, the company achieved operating income of about 327 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 21.53%; The net profit was about 42.2891 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 43.37%. Wei Zhixiang explained in the financial report that the decline in revenue was mainly due to the market environment.
In the view of many investors, although the market scale is quietly expanding, investors will no longer "close their eyes" to the prefabricated food industry, however, some enterprises with high market concentration and large single product scale are still fragrant in the eyes of investors.
(This article is from Yicai)