In the era of shrinking volumes, business model innovation, channel restructuring, and diversified consumer demands have brought unprecedented chill to the entire industry. According to relevant data, about 57% of distributors saw their sales decline compared to the same period last year, while 17% remained unchanged. It is an indisputable fact that distributors are finding it increasingly difficult to do business. However, while most distributors feel the pressure, we noticed that about 26% of distributors still achieved counter-trend sales growth. How did they do it? The 26% share three common traits After a comprehensive analysis of these distributors who achieved counter-trend growth, we found they all share these three traits: 1. Larger business scale. Over one-third have a business scale of 50 million RMB or more. 2. Lower costs. Generally, their inventory costs, sales costs, and fulfillment costs are lower. 3. Better service. Accurate supply: Most distributors have an order fulfillment rate exceeding 99% and lower return rates; Rich marketing: Most distributors run marketing activities for over 50% of their stores; Timely delivery: Most distributors have a T+1 delivery success rate exceeding 80%. These distributors achieve advantages in cost and service not by relying on manpower, but through technology empowerment. Their business growth is not driven by aggressive strategies like subsidies, but by efficient store services, steadily promoting business development. We call such distributors "next-generation distributors." They differ significantly from traditional distributors in multiple aspects, including sales, product integration, warehousing, logistics, capital management, and refined operations. For example, traditional distributors often focus on brands and tend to adopt a small-scale but quality-oriented business strategy. When expanding, they usually need to add manpower to support growth. In contrast, "next-generation distributors" tend to prioritize channels, focusing on providing better services to terminals through refined operations to build their core competitiveness. At the same time, they are adept at using technology to enhance business capabilities, reducing reliance on manpower, and forming regional advantages by increasing scale and efficiency. In the era of shrinking volumes, Are you forging ahead or stepping aside? In our exchanges with these distributors who achieved counter-trend growth, we found they adopted different transformation strategies to cope with market changes: Mr. Yuan of Ningbo Huihui Food Company, with over 20 years of experience in the snack food industry, has tried various paths in exploring corporate transformation, from traditional trading to a combination model of convenience stores + supply chain + cloud warehousing. He firmly believes that if a company cannot keep up with changes in market and consumer demand, it will be difficult to sustain. Today, Huihui is already the largest snack food distributor in the local area, with annual sales approaching 100 million RMB. Ms. Wang, General Manager of Henan Xinxiang Zhihua Changwang, after taking over in 2019, carried out bold reforms to the traditional trading business model, shifting the company from a "people-oriented" approach to a "tools + systems" management style, forming professional sales, delivery, and warehousing teams. She also proactively tested e-commerce online development, creating a professional platform where online and offline channels go hand in hand, and customers, employees, and manufacturers are integrated in three dimensions. In just four years, she drove the company to achieve scaled development. Mr. Liu of Hefei Aiwei Trading, unlike ordinary snack food distributors, his trading company mainly sells high-end snack foods and current trending hot products. Facing market trends, he quickly laid out in the market, using established plans, forward thinking, and effective planning to convert information into corporate strategy, adjusting channels and products one step ahead, targeting the high-end food track, and deeply cultivating it, giving the company the initiative in the market. Now, he represents over a thousand products, serves more than three thousand terminal customers, and has total sales exceeding 200 million RMB. At the Zhoupu closed-door meeting, there were many similar distributor friends actively transforming, which we won't list one by one here. Final Thoughts On the afternoon of August 21, the "Next-Generation Distributor" Zhoupu Data closed-door seminar will be held in Shanghai. This closed-door seminar brings together top regional distributors from various categories, with a luxurious lineup and exciting content not to be missed! If you are troubled by difficult business and lack direction for breakthroughs, we sincerely invite you to attend in person, exchange ideas face-to-face with industry experts, and jointly explore new industry trends.