---
title: "From 100,000 to 3 Million: The Miracle of a Half-Jin Low-End Liquor in a County-Level Market"
description: "In a county-level market with a population of less than 400,000, an agent whose initial shipment was less than 20,000 yuan managed to achieve annual sales of 3 million yuan for a half-jin low-end liquor within just two years. This article analyzes the market background, identifies the crux of the problem, and details the breakthrough strategies, including cash promotions, township network development, and community tasting events."
author: "New Distribution"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
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published: "2014-07-05"
language: "en"
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original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/EGl3BCRa1YIitPOwKFALEw"
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# From 100,000 to 3 Million: The Miracle of a Half-Jin Low-End Liquor in a County-Level Market

> In a county-level market with a population of less than 400,000, an agent whose initial shipment was less than 20,000 yuan managed to achieve annual sales of 3 million yuan for a half-jin low-end liquor within just two years. This article analyzes the market background, identifies the crux of the problem, and details the breakthrough strategies, including cash promotions, township network development, and community tasting events.

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In a county-level market with a population of less than 400,000, an agent whose initial shipment was less than 20,000 yuan managed to achieve annual sales of 3 million yuan for a half-jin low-end liquor within just two years...

**Market Background**

S City in Jilin Province is located on the edge of the Horqin Grassland in Northeast China, at the junction of Jilin Province, Liaoning Province, and Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. The city covers an area of 3,121.2 square kilometers, with the East and West Liao Rivers flowing through it, and a total population of 400,400. At the end of 2002, a customer surnamed Wang in S City became an agent for Longquanchun series liquor, with an initial shipment of 20,000 yuan. (Note: At that time, Longquanchun liquor typically recruited agents at the prefecture-level city, with an initial payment of no less than 200,000 yuan. As a result, the factory was reluctant to let Mr. Wang become an agent. However, Mr. Wang's sincere attitude, coupled with the fact that the enterprise had just completed restructuring and had few agents, led the factory to sign an agency contract with him as a "special favor.")

Since Mr. Wang's company was a state-owned supply and marketing company with limited scale and insufficient funds, despite the company's large-scale brand enhancement in 2003, Longquanchun liquor's performance in the S market remained lackluster, with total annual sales of all products only slightly over 100,000 yuan.

**Identifying the Crux of the Market Problem**

Where was the crux of the market problem? This was the first question the company's sales representative stationed in the S market needed to consider.

From the agent's perspective, this agent had previously operated a local low-end liquor—T liquor—and within one year had achieved sales of over 1 million yuan, making it the local number one brand. It could be said that the agent's operational experience and execution capability were beyond doubt.

From the perspective of market investment, the product was superior in terms of image, taste, and quality, and the company had also carried out large-scale brand enhancement and invested heavily in the market.

To find the problem, one must ask the market. After several days of market visits and terminal interviews by the sales representative, the problem gradually surfaced:

Due to the product's initial launch, the agent believed that Longquanchun liquor was a new brand in the S market, so he set a low-price policy to make it easier for terminals to accept, resulting in Longquanchun liquor being priced much lower than same-grade white spirits in hotels. In the local market, mid-range liquors all had promotional items priced at 2–5 yuan each. Based on market conditions, Mr. Wang also placed promotional items in the one-star and three-star products. However, due to the low supply price and insufficient price operation space, he could only invest 0.5–2 yuan per promotional item in the one-star and three-star products, far below the level of competitors' promotional items at the same price point. In county-level markets in Northeast China, white spirit consumption is rational, and promotions remain the focus of consumer attention. Therefore, when customers received the rough, low-priced promotional items in the main products (one-star and three-star), they expressed great dissatisfaction, and the click-through rate naturally declined. More alarmingly, after deducting the bottle cap fees for waiters, Mr. Wang had virtually no room for further investment.

It seemed the crux of the problem was that the market's main products (one-star and three-star) had no market operation space due to improper terminal pricing.

**How to Break Through**

White spirits generally die in the channel when prices hit rock bottom, and then they can be declared out of the market. Longquanchun liquor encountered this dilemma shortly after its launch. To change this situation, there was only one method: re-establish the market's main product. The company had no possibility of developing a dedicated product for him, so that path was closed. After careful analysis, attention finally settled on the half-jin bare bottle liquor "Long Half-Jin."

Why choose it? Let's start from the beginning. Mr. Wang had made T liquor the local number one brand, but later, due to conflicts between the manufacturer and the distributor, the cooperation broke down, and T liquor revoked Mr. Wang's agency rights. This left Mr. Wang, who had worked hard for a year and was about to reap big rewards, both sad and angry. He then did two things: first, he decided to drive T liquor out of the market; second, he had to find a new white spirit brand to maintain his existing personnel and network. This led to the cooperation with Longquanchun. T liquor's main product in the local market was also a bare bottle liquor, with a terminal price similar to that of "Long Half-Jin." Mr. Wang purchased a large quantity of T liquor from other places and delivered it directly to terminals at prices below the purchase cost. Before long, T liquor's prices fell into chaos, and second-tier distributors were forced to lower prices until they had no profit. Within less than two months, T liquor's sales plummeted, creating a huge negative effect in the market that could not be recovered in a short time. The decline of T liquor naturally freed up market space for "Long Half-Jin," and that was the opportunity.

Therefore, establishing "Long Half-Jin" as the main product and driving the sales of one-star and three-star products through the operation of the half-jin product became an urgent priority.

**Cash Promotion—Prying Open the Market's Mouth**

Through careful analysis of the market, most low-end liquors at the time adopted purchase incentives for B and C class hotels, with few consumer promotions and no cash promotions. Therefore, "Long Half-Jin" adopted three main measures:

1. **Cash Promotion**: The agent reduced the gross profit of the half-jin liquor to 3–4 yuan per case (most agents' gross profit for similar products was 8–10 yuan per case) and allocated 15 yuan per case (1x20) for consumer cash promotions. That is, 15 bottles in each case had 1 yuan stuffed inside the bottle cap (customers could get it directly upon opening), while the other 5 bottles had no prize. The winning rate was very high, and the effect was even better than expected, with hotel sales gradually rising.

2. **Actively Develop Township Networks and Eliminate Network Blind Spots**: While developing the county town, actions were also taken in township markets. Initially, direct delivery to terminals was adopted, increasing from a few cases per delivery to dozens of cases. As the terminal network expanded, second-tier distributors were set up in townships, with a profit of 2 yuan per case and additional rewards at year-end based on performance. Although the profit for second-tier distributors was smaller than that of similar products, the market was mature, so they were happy to distribute.

3. **Long-term Community Free Tasting Activities**: To address the issue of insufficient publicity, Mr. Wang set up four Longquanchun display tables in major communities, vegetable markets, and other public places. Starting at 5 p.m. each day, he led employees to conduct free tastings at the display tables, allowing consumers to taste Longquanchun liquor while promoting it. This low-cost promotion method directly reached the target consumer group of low-end liquor, and the effect was also very obvious.

Through several months of solid market operations, without any advertising, sales rose sharply. The company's finance department once had to run around all banks and savings offices in the city to get 1-yuan coins to meet the needs of the promotion. A single product saved a market.

**It's Harder to Defend a Kingdom Than to Conquer It**

After

1. **Collecting "Price Guarantee Deposits"**: To prevent price chaos, Mr. Wang began collecting "price guarantee deposits" from second-tier distributors. If anyone sold at low prices, they would face two consequences: first, cancellation of the second-tier distribution rights; second, deduction of the "price guarantee deposit." The agent was the first in the market to collect "price guarantee deposits" from second-tier distributors, but because Longquanchun was selling well and there was money to be made, they all paid. This measure fundamentally ensured the further development of the market. Many brands suddenly died in very good sales situations, mostly due to price chaos.

2. **Making Competitors Cry at Home**: The performance of "Long Half-Jin" attracted the attention of more competitors, who successively launched half-jin products in the market. Although the half-jin liquor was selling well and had become the number one brand in the low-end liquor segment, the agent did not dare to relax at all. Because the white spirit market was highly competitive, if they could not maintain absolute leadership in market share, the market foundation would be unstable. They had to take the initiative to eliminate competitors, maintain low profits for themselves, increase terminal profits, expand market share, and raise the entry barrier for competitors. The manufacturer and distributor negotiated to each contribute some market resources to carry out a large-scale "terminal inventory pressure, expand market" promotion activity. The main promotion method was gifts, with five-plus-one and ten-plus-one offers depending on the situation, and cash promotions of 12–15 yuan per case (the cash promotion in half-jin bottle caps never stopped, only the intensity changed according to actual conditions).

Due to good network maintenance, the agent could get information before any new half-jin competitor entered the market. Before competitors could make a move, Longquanchun quickly pressed inventory into hotels at favorable terms. By operating this way, competitors were driven out of the market before they could even attack, leaving no opportunity for them.

3. **Launching Empty Bottle Recycling Promotions**: Popular products naturally attract counterfeiters. When the factory learned that scrap stations had started recycling empty bottles in large quantities, they immediately suspected a counterfeit liquor operation behind it. After careful planning, they acted on two fronts: first, tracking the scrap stations to destroy the counterfeit liquor dens; second, immediately launching empty bottle recycling activities at terminal hotels. This had three benefits: it increased hotel promotion intensity, reduced production costs, and effectively prevented counterfeit liquor—truly "killing three birds with one stone."

After nearly two years of operation, by the end of 2004, sales of "Long Half-Jin" exceeded 3 million yuan, and its market share exceeded 50% of the liquor market in that segment. This was a considerable miracle in a county-level market and also bought time for the replacement of Longquanchun's one-star and three-star products.

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