• Why did Meituan Youxuan upgrade its brand positioning to "Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket"?
  • What changes will occur after the upgrade?
  • What challenges and opportunities lie behind the positioning upgrade? Recently, Meituan Youxuan's official Weibo account published an article titled "Today, Let Me Reintroduce Myself," officially announcing its new positioning as "a supermarket that arrives tomorrow," with the brand slogan becoming "Really, really saves." Previously, Meituan Youxuan's slogan was "Cheap and good." Before this, people's perception of Meituan Youxuan was still limited to community group buying e-commerce. Even under the anti-monopoly backdrop, the State Administration for Market Regulation fined Meituan Youxuan, Chengxin Youxuan, and other community group buying platforms 1.5 million yuan for unfair competition, but this did not stop Meituan from investing in the Youxuan business. Wang Xing also stated publicly, "Community group buying is a once-in-five-year or even once-in-ten-year opportunity that can create new infrastructure for e-commerce. Meituan will do its utmost to seize this opportunity." Does this brand upgrade signal a major strategic adjustment for Meituan's community group buying business? After firmly occupying the top tier in community group buying, what changes are happening at Meituan Youxuan? Under the guidance of the "Retail + Technology" strategy, how will Meituan redefine the "Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket"? 01 Meituan Youxuan's High Opening and Low Walk: From a "War That Must Be Won" to Retreating from Several Cities In 2018, community group buying was all the rage in the capital market, with total financing in the sector reaching as high as 4 billion yuan. The pandemic further fueled the development of community group buying. In July 2020, Meituan officially entered the community group buying arena, establishing the Youxuan business unit to operate Meituan Youxuan independently, focusing on lower-tier markets with a "pre-order + self-pickup" model to meet differentiated consumer demands and accelerate the integration of fresh food retail online and offline. With heavy investment, Meituan Youxuan expanded its business to over 20 provinces within a few months, overtaking early entrants like Xingsheng Youxuan and Shihui Tuan, leaving them far behind. Of course, the community group buying business did not disappoint Meituan. After launching Meituan Youxuan, Meituan's annual transaction user growth rate returned to double digits. Specifically, in Q4 2020, Meituan's transaction users increased to 510 million, a year-on-year growth of 13.3%. Previously, Meituan's transaction user growth was only single-digit (Q2 2020 saw a quarter-on-quarter growth of 8.2%), with a clear downward trend. Given that internet traffic dividends are nearly exhausted, such rapid growth is truly commendable. This explains why Wang Xing regarded community group buying as a strategic business. The traffic depression in lower-tier markets was not only noticed by Wang Xing; Pinduoduo, Didi, Alibaba, and other giants also sensed potential opportunities and successively began laying out community group buying businesses around the second half of 2020. The track became crowded, and who could break out depended not only on the courage of the brave but also on the strategic determination of these giants to endure continuous losses from heavy investment amid future uncertainties. Clearly, Meituan Youxuan's strategic determination was sufficient, at least until this year. In 2020, within less than half a year of entering community group buying, Meituan Youxuan's GMV reached the tens of billions level. In 2021, despite policy pressure and fierce competition among giants, Meituan Youxuan's GMV still reached 120 billion yuan. Public data shows that as of April this year, Meituan Youxuan's market share reached 38%, covering over 2,000 counties and cities nationwide, firmly holding the top position in the community group buying industry. Even the richest landlord will eventually run out of grain. Even a strong company like Meituan needs to stock up for the winter under uncertainty. Public data shows that since 2020, losses from Meituan's new businesses, including Meituan Youxuan, have expanded from 10.9 billion yuan to 38.4 billion yuan in 2021, with the operating loss rate expanding by 36.6 percentage points year-on-year. Nationwide, although some regional community group buying platforms like Youjingyoutian and Zhihuazhiguo have achieved profitability, this does not prove that the community group buying business model is viable nationwide, especially under the control of giants, where upfront costs for technology, talent, and supply chain are orders of magnitude higher than regional platforms. This implies that after three to five years of development, whether the community group buying business model can succeed on the backs of internet giants still needs market validation. Against this backdrop, facing a nationwide market that has yet to turn profitable, Meituan Youxuan finally began to retract its frontlines. In April this year, Meituan Youxuan started personnel adjustments and gradually withdrew from provinces including Beijing, Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia, and Xinjiang. The contraction and adjustment reflect that Meituan is now moving from the "hot-headed" phase of indiscriminate investment to a phase of measuring ROI and rethinking its approach to community group buying. Alternatively, the first phase of Meituan Youxuan's mission may have been initially accomplished, and with the business model and team stabilizing, it is now moving toward synergy with Meituan's overall business. When a borderless Meituan begins to touch boundaries, under the guidance of the "Retail + Technology" strategy, what new stories can Meituan tell? 02 From Community Group Buying to Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket Although it started with group buying, in recent years, food delivery has become an unavoidable label for Meituan. According to Meituan's financial reports, food delivery revenue accounts for as much as 52.27% of Meituan's total revenue, underscoring its importance. But as the market reaches its peak, where are Meituan's new growth possibilities? We might see some clues from Meituan's latest financial reports and business layout. The financial report shows that Meituan has reorganized its business segments. Shared user groups, instant delivery networks, Meituan Instashopping, food delivery, hotel and travel, and in-store businesses all have mature business models, collectively forming the "Core Local Commerce" segment. New businesses like Meituan Youxuan, Meituan Maicai, food supply chain, and ride-hailing still need business model iteration and more resources, and are grouped under the "New Businesses" segment. Clearly, Meituan is betting on new businesses represented by Meituan Youxuan to support future long-term rapid growth. The contradiction lies in whether the long-term investment and loss-making Meituan Youxuan can meet the requirements of Meituan's new business blueprint. If the current business model and structure cannot support it, how should Meituan Youxuan adjust? With the "Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket" positioning, what changes will Meituan Youxuan undergo? 1. Expand SKU Count, Curate Product Quality Different retail formats have distinct SKU counts. Due to limited store area, traditional convenience stores typically operate within 100 square meters and carry 800-1,500 SKUs. Supermarkets, with larger areas, usually have 1,500-4,000 SKUs, and some hypermarkets even have tens of thousands. General community group buying platforms typically operate no more than 1,000 SKUs. Upgrading Meituan Youxuan's positioning to "Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket" implies a significant expansion in SKU count. For an internet company with an unlimited online shelf, this is not difficult; the challenge lies in precisely operating different products based on regional consumption behaviors and habits to improve overall efficiency. Public data shows that Meituan Youxuan has already achieved 1,500 SKUs in most regions nationwide and is moving toward 3,000 SKUs. 2. Expand Product Categories, Enhance Product Richness As is well known, community group buying primarily focuses on fresh produce, with relatively fewer categories like fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), daily chemicals, and household goods. With the positioning upgrade, the proportion of FMCG, rice, flour, oil, daily chemicals, household goods, and bulk packaging will inevitably increase. For today's Meituan Youxuan, this is not difficult either. On one hand, after two years of development, community group buying has become an unavoidable platform for many brand owners in channel construction, and they are eager to cooperate. As a top-3 platform, Meituan Youxuan has always been in a buyer's market with high bargaining power in supplier cooperation. On the other hand, Meituan has been experimenting with private label products, actively cooperating with factories in certain categories to produce own-brand products and improve profit margins. 3. Strengthen Warehouse and Distribution Systems, Improve Operational Efficiency Community group buying attracted capital market attention and heavy investment in previous years not only because it could capture community traffic, reduce transaction costs, and restructure product distribution chains, but also because it played a significant role in supplementing infrastructure like warehousing and distribution logistics. Since its inception, Meituan's basic warehousing and distribution system—central warehouse, grid warehouse, and pickup points—has been a crucial support for Meituan Youxuan's rapid development. With the expansion of product categories and SKU counts, this undoubtedly places higher demands on the three-tier warehousing and distribution system, making product management, inventory management, and logistics management essential courses for Meituan Youxuan in the new phase. 03 Opportunities and Challenges Born in 2020, Meituan Youxuan has entered the "three-year-old" new phase. With the economic downturn, Meituan has also begun to impose new requirements on new businesses: nationwide validation of the business model and profitability. After achieving scale in market coverage, expanding product categories and increasing average order value have become inevitable choices for Meituan Youxuan. From a supply-demand perspective, although third- and fourth-tier markets, represented by rural areas, have seen severe hollowing out in recent years, the weakening of demand does not mean its disappearance. There remain significant gaps in commercial infrastructure in third- and fourth-tier markets, and there is a huge contradiction between consumers' pursuit of diverse consumption and lifestyles and the limited supply. Meituan Youxuan's positioning upgrade to "Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket" may precisely recognize this. At the same time, the brand positioning upgrade has brought Meituan Youxuan into a new track—internet supermarkets—where competition is no less fierce than community group buying. With Tmall Supermarket and JD Supermarket ahead, what advantages does Meituan Youxuan have? In my view, there are three main points: 1. Deep cultivation of lower-tier markets with huge potential. Both JD Supermarket and Tmall Supermarket target first- and second-tier markets, with limited coverage in third-tier and below. After three years of community group buying development, Meituan Youxuan has built a strong user base in lower-tier markets, and the market potential is enormous. 2. Production based on sales, direct sourcing from origins. Because community group buying inherently adopts a sales-driven procurement model, Meituan Youxuan has strong supply chain advantages in certain products. Additionally, Meituan's "Meituan Tuanhaohuo" has accumulated a large number of factory-brand products, helping Meituan Youxuan achieve "really, really saves." 3. Backed by group leaders, low last-mile logistics costs. As a platform-based community group buying platform, although Meituan Youxuan's order conversion no longer relies entirely on group leaders' traffic, group leaders play an important role in "last mile" delivery. Using community stores as carriers and group leaders as links, this further reduces Meituan Youxuan's logistics fulfillment costs. Upgrading Meituan Youxuan to "Tomorrow-Arrival Supermarket" does not mean Meituan is completely abandoning community group buying, but it has taken a development path distinct from other community group buying platforms. This path still holds significant uncertainty, and whether it can succeed will only be proven by time. _-END-_