In the era of rapid development of prepared dishes, is there still a market for instant noodles? Let's first look at two sets of data. According to data from China Business Industry Research Institute, the scale of the instant convenience food industry is expected to exceed 500 billion yuan in 2022, with a year-on-year growth rate of about 4.2%. The sustained growth momentum of the instant convenience food track comes from the huge consumption scale and the main consumer force represented by Generation Z, and it will still be in a period of rapid growth in the next 5-10 years. As the veteran category in the instant convenience food industry, instant noodles still maintain a surprising growth rate. In 2022, the sales revenue of the entire instant noodle industry exceeded 65 billion yuan, with an average monthly growth rate of 12.5% compared to 2021. At the same time, driven by huge consumer demand, instant noodles are developing towards healthier, more nutritious, more convenient, and stronger brand trends. It is true that the instant noodle track still maintains strong growth momentum, but it also faces greater challenges. On the one hand, consumer demand continues to upgrade; on the other hand, the entry of multiple brands makes competition among brands more intense. So whoever can control the channels and continuously launch high-quality products will usher in new growth in the next decade. Recently, during market research, New Distribution found that many instant noodle distributors choose to cooperate with Baixiang and make its product matrix their main push products. Why is that? After chatting with several Baixiang instant noodle distributors, New Distribution found the reasons.
Advantages of Baixiang Instant Noodles Baixiang, with 26 years of development, has become a national instant noodle brand in China. Over the years, Baixiang has been committed to promoting the transformation of the traditional food industry to high-end through food industry technology, thereby meeting consumers' diversified product needs. According to New Distribution, "promoting the transformation from Made in China to Created in China," "promoting the transformation from Chinese speed to Chinese quality," and "promoting the transformation from Chinese products to Chinese brands" have become the three standards for Baixiang's development in recent years. Under the strategic guidance of emphasizing innovation, quality, and brand, Baixiang has made important contributions to the high-end transformation of Chinese instant noodles. So how exactly does Baixiang innovate? New Distribution reviewed Baixiang's 26-year development history and found the reasons why it is one of the favorite instant noodle brands among consumers.
First, product advantages. Currently, Baixiang instant noodles have created a product matrix suitable for different scenarios and different consumer groups, bringing diversified choices to consumers. For example, "Tang Hao He" (Good Soup) targets college students, new white-collar workers, and young mothers; "Da La Jiao" (Big Spicy) targets students and young people who love spicy food; "Da Gu Mian" (Big Bone Noodles) targets refined mothers aged 28-45 who pursue quality; "Fen Mian Cai Dan" (Noodles with Vegetables and Egg) targets college students and white-collar workers who have just entered society; "Duo Yi Ban" (More Than Half) targets small-town youth in lower-tier markets; "Jing Dun" (Slow-cooked) targets working people; as well as best-selling brands like "Duo Ban," "Ka Zhi Cui," and "Jing Dian" (Classic). Unlike single-product instant noodles, Baixiang caters to different consumer groups and different consumption needs by creating a multi-level product matrix, maximizing consumer satisfaction and providing distributors with one-stop product selection opportunities.
Second, quality advantages. With consumption upgrading, consumers have higher demands for instant noodles. From the earliest non-fried to today's "Tang Hao He," instant noodles no longer seem to be a substitute for relieving hunger but a convenient convenience food for tasting flavor. Over the years, Baixiang has always been consistent in product quality and has brought new experiences to consumers through R&D innovation. For example, after gaining insight that instant noodle soup tastes greasy and has seasoning residue at the bottom, Baixiang leveraged its years of advantage in making bone soup noodles, selected real ingredients, inherited ancient slow-cooking methods, crafted with six meticulous steps, and insisted on simmering for 6 hours to restore a pot of good soup for consumers. It became the pioneer of the "high-soup" instant noodle subcategory. During the 618 shopping festival in 2022, Baixiang Tang Hao He continued to sell well on JD.com and Tmall, repeatedly topping the JD convenience food bestseller list and Tmall instant noodle bestseller list. Its signature pork bone noodles ranked first during JD 618 with sales exceeding 30,000 units, nearly three times that of the second place on the convenience food list. For 26 years, Baixiang has adhered to product quality first, never having a food safety or quality accident, always repaying customers and consumers with safe and reliable products.
Third, national brand reputation advantages. As a best-selling instant noodle brand nationwide, Baixiang has become a representative of Chinese instant convenience food brands, accompanying the growth of a generation of consumers. In addition to focusing on product innovation and quality development, it also fulfills social responsibilities through earthquake relief, education donations, flood and epidemic prevention, poverty alleviation, and other means, engaging in social welfare and never forgetting its social responsibility and commitment as a national enterprise. It has accumulated a good reputation among consumers, and this reputation has enhanced Baixiang's brand favorability. In terms of channels, Baixiang has completed the layout and expansion in first-tier cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, and its international trade territory is also expanding. With instant noodles as the core export, it also covers multiple categories such as noodles and beverages. Currently, Baixiang products are exported to 66 countries and regions, with coverage of over 80% in Chinese chain supermarkets in Europe, North America, Oceania, etc., completing the transformation from a Chinese brand to a global brand. In New Distribution's view, Baixiang's achievements are inseparable from its continuous insight into consumer needs, craftsmanship pursuit of quality, building an ultimate supply chain, and providing high-quality after-sales service. Diversified product advantages, strong brand influence, and a complete supply chain system have also become the key to empowering Baixiang distributors.
Manufacturer-Distributor Alliance to Empower Distributors Recently, New Distribution interviewed several distributors who have cooperated with Baixiang for many years and learned that Baixiang is an enterprise that grows together with distributors. In other words, Baixiang hopes that its cooperating distributors not only sell products but also grow stronger through time accumulation and become excellent distributors. Growing together with distributors is the core of Baixiang's enterprise development. Unlike some brands that only pursue distributors' task growth and payment pressure, Baixiang hopes to empower distributors to transform from traditional brand "porters" into comprehensive service providers with management awareness. So how does Baixiang empower distributors?
First, help distributors build a high-quality sales team. According to New Distribution, in 2022, Baixiang assisted distributors in recruiting 2,210 distributor sales representatives, helping distributors find high-level talents through group and regional assistance.
Second, conduct systematic training for distributor teams. As is well known, most distributor sales representatives have not received systematic training, which means distributor teams may not adapt to diversified channel changes. By helping distributor sales representatives undergo systematic training, it can scientifically improve personnel efficiency, ultimately helping distributors increase market coverage and solve customer feedback problems.
Third, flexible policy support. The group or regional level provides product promotion policies for distributors according to different market needs, ensuring both healthy inventory turnover and improving product sell-through rates at distributor customer stores. At the same time, advanced digital management software is used for scientific business management for distributors.
Finally, strengthen ties with distributors. For example, regularly organize distributor symposiums, listen to distributor opinions in a timely manner, and provide timely feedback on issues faced by distributors. It can be said that the cooperation between Baixiang and distributors is not just business dealings, but also provides distributors with opportunities to make money, develop, and grow, truly realizing manufacturer-distributor integration and building a community of shared destiny. For distributors, once they cooperate with Baixiang, they can not only obtain sustained profit growth but also greatly benefit their own development.
Choosing Baixiang in 2023 Will Not Be Wrong In 2023, with economic recovery and the rapid rebound of various industries, the instant convenience food industry will surely usher in better development, and high-quality instant noodles will become a rigid demand product for consumers to repurchase frequently. It is foreseeable that in the next 10 years, instant noodles will still have strong market growth potential. To this end, Baixiang has brought distributors dozens of products across 9 series, providing comprehensive one-stop procurement satisfaction for distributors. In 2023, Baixiang is accelerating the start of national recruitment. In order to better serve distributors and help Baixiang grow together with distributors, the company has launched multiple distributor incentive policies, such as:
1. Strengthen multi-brand promotion, insist on holding large, medium, and small tasting activities, and help distributors push products to more consumers; 2. Through systematic training and product promotion policies, help customers quickly become familiar with the market and grow together with distributors; 3. Provide professional guidance from market managers, with one person per household focusing on assisting distributors in market management; 4. Through sufficient production capacity, strong logistics, and a complete customer service system, escort distributors in market operations.
Schedule of "Investment Consultation Meetings" in various cities (times are for reference, subject to actual implementation) 📍 March 18 Hangzhou 📍 March 18 Guangzhou 📍 March 21 Kunming 📍 March 25 Nanning 📍 March 27 Guiyang 📍 April 09 Wuhan 📍 Time to be determined Fuzhou
At the same time, Baixiang has pioneered the industry's first "Baixiang Instant Noodle Factory Immersive Theme Store," which is another innovative move after pioneering the "slow live broadcast" marketing format, moving the "factory" directly into business districts to directly show consumers how Baixiang's "a bowl of good noodles" is born. This not only allows consumers to see the production process more intuitively, demonstrating Baixiang's quality confidence and brand influence, but also becomes a powerful tool to help distributors promote products.
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More importantly, in order to ensure the interests of distributors, Baixiang will insist on maintaining market order, zero tolerance for low prices and cross-region sales, and solve distributors' worries. Therefore, as long as they are distributors in the FMCG industry, whether they have done instant convenience food products or not, they can become partners of Baixiang and create win-win results with a brand with 26 years of accumulation. Facing a market with both opportunities and challenges, distributors not only need products that can bring continuous sales and profits, but also need brands that can empower them.
Baixiang Food Group Investment Contact: Manager Tan