Text: South Wind
Editor|Pioneer Valley Film and Television Entertainment Review
Daphne can be seen wherever there are women, and this is the glory of Daphne at its peak.
The achievement of 26 years of painstaking work in exchange for it was lost, and it took Daphne only 6 years.
The loss was more than 4 billion, the market value plummeted by more than 95%, and more than 6,000 stores were not left.
Some people say that the reason why Daphne fell from the top was because of a woman.
The rise of the "generation of shoe kings".
In 1980, when the financial turmoil swept through Taiwan, two people named Chang Wenyi and Chen Xianmin became unemployed and were forced to start a business in shoe making.
After opening up to visit relatives, Zhang and Chen immediately went to Hong Kong to found Yongen Group, and came to Putian, Fujian Province to set up a shoe factory to expand the industry to the mainland.
This Yongen Group is the predecessor of the later famous Daphne.
Zhang Wenyi
At that time, Yongen Group did not have its own brand, and it only did OEM processing.
In the long run, Zhang and Chen felt more and more that they were too passive, and could only obey Party A's arrangement for production, and they did the most work and took the least money.
To break this situation, they decided to create their own brand: Daphne.
Just five years later, in 1995, Yongen was successfully listed in Hong Kong, and Daphne became the No. 1 women's shoe brand in China.
Daphne's sales model has changed from wholesale to direct management, and the number of stores has steadily increased every year, with more than 1,000 sales outlets such as specialty stores and directly managed stores.
At that time, Daphne claimed that one out of every five pairs of women's shoes in China had a pair of Daphne.
What people didn't expect was that Zhang Wenyi began to carry out illegal financial operations after making money.
He bought and sold land falsely, absconded with money, and was finally imprisoned in 2007.
In 2011, Daphne ushered in the second generation of her own family: Chen Yingjie.
Chen Yingjie is Chen Xianmin's nephew, and he also formed a band called "Red Snake" with superstar Ren Xianqi, which was also famous in Taiwan at that time.
Therefore, Chen Yingjie not only has connections in the business world, but also has a lot of influence in the entertainment industry.
Chen Yingjie
If you have resources, you have to use them, and almost all of the people Daphne can invite are popular superstars.
Tao Zhe, S.H.E. group, Liu Ruoying, Liu Shishi and others have all become Daphne's brand spokespersons.
S.H.E.'s "Laurel Goddess" written by Fang Wenshan is Daphne's advertising song.
The highly sung "Good Mood" was also tailor-made by Tao Zhe for Daphne.
Even Daphne's corporate song "Proud of Yourself" was sung by Ren Xianqi.
Coupled with the endorsements of Nicholas Tse and Jun Ji-hyun, the brand influence of Daphne has reached a terrifying height.
In 2012, Daphne had more than 6,000 stores in China, and its operating income exceeded 10 billion yuan.
Unstoppable downhill
But after the peak, Daphne ushered in her own downhill road.
Since 2013, this women's shoe leader has been losing money year after year.
In the past, new specialty stores opened every day, but now they are constantly closing.
In order to salvage the decline, Daphne decided to sell discounts, and some items were even sold below cost at one point.
But not only did consumers not buy it, but they didn't know why they were even less interested in Daphne.
And Chen Yingjie, who led Daphne to the top, also completely lost control of the situation.
In 2017, the Zhang brothers, the third-generation helmsman of Daphne, took office, and Chen Yingjie also handed over the company that he had been in charge of for six years.
At this time, there were only more than 2,000 stores left in the country.
But after the change, Daphne did not usher in the imaginary resurrection, but accelerated the process of death.
On August 26, 2020, Daphne was unable to recover and finally announced that it would withdraw from the retail business of all mid-to-high-end brands in mainland China and Taiwan.
More than 6,000 stores that once spread all over the country were closed, and the "generation of shoe kings" fell.
Some people say that Daphne's decline is all because of a woman named Han Yuqin.
She is Zhang Guoli's beloved apprentice, a famous actress at the time, and Chen Yingjie's wife who spent hundreds of millions of dollars to propose.
At that time, Chen Yingjie was fascinated by her, as Daphne's boss, he was only full of Han Yuqin.
At that time, it was at a critical stage of the transformation of the physical industry to e-commerce, but Chen Yingjie frequently made wrong decisions because of his unwillingness to work, and even ignored the commercial value of the hot Taobao Double 11.
So Daphne's decline is to blame for this Han Yuqin.
This statement seems to make sense, but it is actually full of nonsense.
The power is in the hands of Chen Yingjie, why blame a powerless woman?
This is no different from the king of the Emperor who overthrew the country and finally blamed Daji for being too charming.
It's really like the saying goes: Prosperous times need beauties to embellish, and troubled times need beauties to take the blame.
Causes of decline
Daphne's decline was never because of a woman, and it was never for a single reason.
Its demise was foreshadowed from the moment it began to expand blindly.
First of all, as a mid-to-high-end brand, it is not wise to expand stores frantically because of profits.
What's more, Daphne is still a direct store model, and the company's manpower, rent, water and electricity for the store are all borne by the company.
In addition, in order to meet the needs of consumers, a lot of stock will be kept in stock for all kinds of shoe samples.
Then once a certain style is outdated, tens of thousands of pairs of shoes in thousands of stores may have to be smashed in your hands.
Secondly, although Daphne is positioned as a high-end, many people who wear Daphne have a common feedback, that is, it is difficult to wear.
As a shoe, especially a shoe that is not cheap, it is not only uncomfortable but also wears the foot, which will invisibly ruin the popularity of passers-by.
At first, consumers will comfort themselves with "high-end are like this", but once the brand reputation is in turmoil, the same group of people will quickly defect.
Third, as a brand, Daphne not only does not have a clear audience, but also chooses discount promotion, which directly leads to a large damage to the brand value.
When a young female white-collar worker in a high-end office building sees a middle-aged aunt selling vegetables in the vegetable market wearing the same shoes as herself, then the sense of superiority in her heart will disappear, and her trust in the brand will also disappear.
One of the meanings of a brand is to show that the brand owner is different.
But once everyone can afford to wear the brand, the brand will no longer be high-end.
The core audience is lost, and the rest are consumers who are only willing to buy discounted goods, forming a vicious circle.
In addition, Daphne's design concept is far from keeping up with the pace of the times.
In the pursuit of minimalist and light luxury, Daphne's shoes are still all kinds of lace, diamonds, and sequins.
This design style more than ten years ago may have shown a kind of prosperity and luxury at the time, but now, it only reveals messy and old-fashioned.
As a fashion item, it can't keep up with the pace of the times, so being eliminated is a doomed fate.
epilogue
Daphne's decline is not only the result of the changing times, but also the inevitable result of his own strategic mistakes.
Problems such as blind expansion, unclear positioning, and backward design eventually led to the decline of this former industry giant.
If brands want to be invincible in the fierce market competition, they must keep up with the trend of the times, constantly innovate and adjust their strategies.
Otherwise, even the former "shoe king" will not escape the fate of being abandoned by the times.
Some references:
Jun Ji-hyun received the endorsement of domestic women's shoes, and Nicholas Tse directed a new advertisement - CCTV
Once the shoe king "Daphne" collapsed, the most regrettable thing!! ——Zhang Qi Business Lecture
They are endorsed - Daphne official website