Wahaha Nutrition Express "dressing upgrade": the former "performance responsibility" is gradually declining, the positioning is vague, and the rebirth is more "new bottle of new drugs"

Wahaha made a big move on the road to reform.

A few days ago, Blue Whale financial reporter learned that Wahaha's Nutrition Express launched two new joint products and greatly upgraded the packaging that has been used for more than 10 years.

Since its birth in 2005, Wahaha has launched the Nutrition Express line with the image of an innovative category, becoming the iconic finished product of Wahaha's "conquering big cities", with a cumulative sales of more than 50 billion bottles in 15 years and an output value of more than 160 billion yuan. In 2011 alone, the revenue of this single product exceeded 20 billion yuan.

However, with the increase of competitors and the lack of innovation in Wahaha, the product and brand aging, the nutrition express line is outdated, and the current revenue has been less than 10 billion yuan.

In the eyes of industry insiders, although the income brought by Nutrition Express to Wahaha has decreased significantly, it is still its core product. This adjustment of packaging shows that wahaha's rejuvenation reform is becoming more urgent. However, Wahaha innovation does not have a large breakthrough and originality, and the positioning is vague, and this adjustment may only be an itch for Wahaha. Wahaha wants to regain its vitality on big items, not only to change the "bottle" but also to change the "new drug".

The price of the replacement is higher

On Wahaha's "Habao Amusement Park" online platform, a new version of the Nutrition Express low-sugar flavored yogurt drink is already on sale.

According to the platform information, the new products of Nutrition Express are fermented from New Zealand milk sources, and specially add real juice, pulp, low-sugar formula, and collagen peptides, including two flavors of soft dance fairy honey plum and Qingti Xuan ice grass. Each case is priced at 60 yuan, and the price of a single bottle is 6 yuan, and the specification is 200ml.

It is worth noting that compared with the old products, the content of the new products is reduced, but the unit price is higher than that of the original products. It is understood that the original products of Nutrition Express include original flavor, vanilla ice cream flavor, milk pineapple flavor and other flavors, and the current price of 500ml products is only about 5 yuan. However, the packaging of the new product is very different from the "round and thick" packaging of the original product, and the slim packaging design is suitable for holding the bottle with one hand.

In this regard, Xu Xiongjun, a strategic positioning expert and founder of Jiude Positioning Consulting Company, believes that the 200ml product packaging and the slender bottle body are more high-end, which is conducive to breaking the "old, old, ugly" image of Wahaha products. Raising prices through product upgrades is also a common practice in the industry to increase unit prices.

For the upgrade, the relevant person in charge of Wahaha told the Blue Whale financial reporter: "This event is a product upgrade carried out by Wahaha under the framework of the brand strategy of "circle marketing". "In fact, Wahaha has tried to adjust the nutrition express, but the adjustment is not strong. In 2018, Wahaha launched wahaha new nutrition express packaging in the form of chairman Zong Qinghou and his daughter Zong Fuli interacting on Weibo, launched the "colorful express", and launched a joint makeup plate. But in the industry to see the pull, the colorful express bottle type follows the traditional shape and does not bring too many surprises.

Xu Xiongjun said: "Wahaha has been optimizing products and upgrading brand image in the past two years, hoping to achieve a breakthrough, but the effect is average. Nutrition Express, as a large single product under Wahaha, was once the main product of its income, but it is still not a completely healthy product compared with natural pure milk drinks, and this time in order to meet the needs of young consumers, the product strength will be improved. “

Once a performance responsibility

In addition to packaging and taste upgrades, Nutrition Express has also co-branded the popular IP "Douluo Continent".

The above-mentioned person in charge of Wahaha told Blue Whale Finance: "At present, the two-dimensional circle layer is constantly generalizing in the young consumer group, and the joint cooperation with Guoman IP has laid the foundation for Wahaha to accurately enter the two-dimensional circle layer and harvest more young consumers, which makes Wahaha have more possibilities in brand rejuvenation and brand innovation." ”

It is reported that Douluo Continent is a cross-fantasy novel created by Tang Jiasanshao, which was first published in May 2009. At present, the TV series of the same name is also in the process of intense filming.

In 2009, published in Douluo Continent, Nutrition Express entered a high-light moment and became the well-deserved pillar of Wahaha's tens of billions of beverage empire.

It is understood that in 2005, the price of each bottle was 3.5-4.5 yuan, which was much higher than the price of other beverages on the market. Wahaha also used the product to sound the clarion call of "rural encirclement of cities, capture of large cities, and liberation of all China", and development has once again entered the "fast lane".

In 2009, Wahaha Nutrition Express sold 13 billion yuan, catching up with Wang Laoji to become one of the largest beverage products sold in China. In 2011, the revenue of Nutrition Express exceeded 20 billion yuan, becoming a wahaha super large single product, providing one-third of the annual operating income of wahaha company. Wahaha's performance also entered its peak period, with revenue of nearly 68 billion yuan in the same year.

For the rapid development of the nutrition express, dairy expert Song Liang believes that "in the first few years of Wahaha's launch of the nutrition express, there was a lack of high-end fashion milk-containing beverages on the market. It is reported that the milk-containing beverages of brands such as Bright Dairy, Want Want, Prince Milk, and Coca-Cola appeared later than Wahaha.

After the peak, the nutrition express line has entered the downward channel. In 2014, nutrition express sales fell to 14 billion yuan. It has been reported that in 2016, the revenue of nutrition express fell into 10 billion yuan. Wahaha's revenue also fell from 78.3 billion yuan in 2013 to less than 47 billion yuan in 2019.

In Zong Qinghou's view, the direct reason for the decline in nutrition express revenue is that in 2015, it was affected by the "botulinum toxin" network rumors, and the brand loss reached 12.5 billion yuan. However, in the eyes of industry insiders, the fundamental reason for the decline in the income of Nutrition Express is the aging of products, the lack of new products to take over the baton, the aging of marketing models, and the increase in competitive products. And some people in the industry questioned whether milk-containing beverages are not milk products.

The positioning is blurry

With the breakfast cut positioning of "drink a bottle in the morning, a morning of spirit", Nutrition Express completes the myth of super large items. Although it has fallen from the throne of super large items, Wahaha still has a dream of "nutrition express" and hopes that it will continue to be brilliant. This time Wahaha played a "low sugar" card for the Nutrition Express.

However, in the view of Zhu Danpeng, an analyst in the Chinese food industry, the market of nutrition express is mainly concentrated in third- and fourth-tier cities and township markets, and relatively speaking, whether consumers in these markets can accept the "not sweet" nutrition express line is also a question mark. Moreover, the concept of "low sugar" has been used many times in the products of many enterprises, and the effect of "low sugar" of Wahaha Nutrition Express is unpredictable.

At present, there are many low-sugar and zero-sugar drinks in the market, and the competition is becoming increasingly fierce. Yili owns Yiran Light Drink, which focuses on low sugar and zero fat. Mengniu also launched a new yogurt brand "Subtractive Life", and Guangming's truthful pure yogurt also does not add sucrose.

It is worth noting that the positioning of the new nutrition express products to the target customers is also vague.

Industry insiders told the Blue Whale reporter: "Although there are many young readers in The Douluo Continent, the IP was launched earlier, and most readers have passed the year of establishment. It is difficult to establish an emotional connection with the original readers. In addition, the packaging color of the new product is slightly immature, although it can attract young consumers and online game users, but the original consumers are likely to give up buying because of the packaging style. ”

In fact, what Wahaha lacks most is a breakthrough. Zhu Danpeng believes that although Wahaha has continuously optimized its product portfolio in the past two years, embraced online channels, and sought to go public, its overall performance was lackluster, and it was difficult to make a breakthrough in performance. The most fundamental reason is that product innovation is superficial and has not achieved originality.

Xu Xiongjun believes that Wahaha's performance is now maintained at about 50 billion yuan, and there is little room for growth, and it can be tried in some non-beverage fields while upgrading the main products.

This article originated from Blue Whale Finance