Within just 15 days of its launch, the new brand "Huamian" surged to the top spot in sales for "noodles"/"ramen"/"quick-boiled noodles" on Tmall. Seeing this data, one can't help but marvel: What's the story behind "Huamian"? How does this quick-boiled noodle differ from other instant noodles? Who is behind its unique artistic style? Driven by curiosity and doubt, the author conducted an in-depth study of the "Huamian" brand, and this article will take you through the findings. Breaking Out in an Old Track, Born for New Consumer Groups China is a major noodle country with a thousand-year history of noodle culture. In the past, eating noodles required handmade preparation, but with technological and era advancements, people discovered more methods to preserve noodles, such as sun-drying, oven-drying, and frying to extend shelf life. This led to the creation of dried noodles, instant noodles, and other quick noodle products. Traditional quick noodle products, like dried noodles, require additional preparation of side dishes at home, which is inconvenient. Alternatively, instant noodles come with overly simple seasonings, lack nutrition, and the fried noodle cakes are unhealthy. As people's demands for "delicious" and "nutritious" food become increasingly stringent, traditional quick noodle product concepts can no longer stimulate the needs of new consumer groups. In today's market with severe product homogenization, finding incremental growth in a stagnant market is the opportunity for new brands. However, the noodle market is crowded with players, and carving out a blue ocean in a red sea is no easy task. New noodle brands need fresh thinking to rethink product logic. Beyond the noodles themselves, the key to a good bowl of noodles lies in the soup base and toppings. Chinese people love to drink soup and eat large chunks of meat when having noodles, enjoying the slurping pleasure, or eating dry noodles with sesame paste and meat sauce toppings, which are visually appealing and delicious. Without these, a bowl of noodles loses its soul. Previously, Uni-President's Tang Daren achieved great success by focusing on "soup." In contrast, the "Huamian" brand identified the most challenging part of a bowl of noodles—the "toppings." Different from traditional quick-boiled noodles, "Huamian" uses "toppings" as its product entry point, featuring real, oversized meat chunks that deliver exactly what you see, capturing the hearts of young "refined lazy homebodies." Authentic and Natural Brand Personality, Engaging Contemporary National Pride There's factual basis for the idea that all products deserve a redo. The birth of the "Huamian" brand coincided with the rise of innovative consumer brands amid China's consumption upgrade, a period of flourishing diversity. In the consumer market, the supply-demand relationship has shifted from "supply falling short of demand" to "supply exceeding demand." Previously, it was "people looking for goods," now it's "goods looking for people." However, brands must face the reality that contemporary young consumers' mindsets have undergone earth-shaking changes, especially with the rise of China's 260 million Gen Z individuals, who have become a formidable new force. This group values self-expression, has diverse aesthetics, uses interests as social guides, and follows the principle of self-pleasure in consumption. In the FMCG industry, their attitudes toward food—whether functional needs like health, quality, and satiety, or emotional needs like reward, nostalgia, and healing—every consumption choice is a carrier of their values and personality statements. Growing up in an environment of material abundance, they no longer blindly worship foreign brands and products, show high acceptance of local and ethnic elements, and exhibit strong national pride and cultural confidence. Against this backdrop, with reverence and pride for Chinese noodle culture, the "Huamian" brand came into being. It is reported that "Huamian" was born from 11 post-00s youths who love Chinese noodle culture. To help contemporary young people better enjoy the deliciousness of Chinese noodles and export Chinese noodle culture to the world, they established the Chinese Noodle Cuisine Research Institute. Here, they brought together the best of noodle cuisines from across China and drew inspiration from the designs of emerging Chinese artists, ultimately giving birth to the "Huamian" brand. Facing the young consumer group, "Huamian" uses its understanding and attitude toward Chinese noodle culture, engaging with today's youth through its authentic and natural brand personality and products. 1. Flavors: A Diverse Collection of Regional Delicacies Chinese noodle culture has a long history and regional characteristics. Examples include Henan braised noodles, Sichuan dan dan noodles, Chongqing small noodles, Shanxi knife-cut noodles, Taiwan beef noodles, and Hong Kong wonton noodles, but few brands have brought together the best of regional noodle cuisines. These regional noodles each have their uniqueness, and their scarcity and differences are essentially locked in the "toppings." For instance, "chicken gizzard noodles" and "tripe noodles" owe their deliciousness to the "chicken gizzards" and "tripe." Additionally, some local delicacies like "kidney beans," "goji berries," and "Chengdu Bobo chicken" feature ingredients with Chinese regional characteristics that follow local traditional practices to restore authentic flavors. To achieve this, the "Huamian" brand put in significant effort. Sourcing ingredients from various regions and meticulously preparing them, the meat is genuinely "large chunks," and the tripe is genuinely "large pieces of tripe." Generous toppings are the quality promise of the "Huamian" brand, eliminating the hassle of preparing additional ingredients and side dishes, truly delivering the satisfaction of a restaurant bowl of noodles and the convenience of eating whenever you want. From the current products sold by "Huamian," it's evident that "Huamian" aims to explore noodle cuisines from all over the country, conveying the deliciousness and culture of Chinese noodles to China and the world. Another noteworthy point is that, unlike most innovative consumer brands, "Huamian" took the first step of abandoning the OEM model and instead built its own factory. The factory location is also interesting—it chose Henan, the birthplace of Chinese noodle cuisine. The investment in building its own factory, whether in terms of cost or risk management, far exceeds OEM. In the short term, building a factory may require significant investment, but in the long run, it plays a crucial role in strict quality control and cost reduction and efficiency improvement in the supply chain. This shows that "Huamian" was never aiming to be a fleeting internet-famous brand but has long-term plans for its development. 2. Packaging Design: Discovering Emerging Designers, Enhancing Chinese Cultural Confidence Born in the new era, "Huamian"'s brand tone is very close to the younger generation of consumers. Among these groups that value aesthetics and self-expression, "Huamian" discovered a group of very emerging young designers dedicated to promoting Chinese culture into people's daily lives and to the world. To prevent these designers' talents from being buried and to provide them with a larger stage, the "Huamian" brand discovers and supports these young emerging designers, printing their works on product packaging while retaining the designers' names. This is a pioneering move in the industry, as "Huamian" is the first brand in China to print designers' names on packaging. With "Huamian"'s support, these designers' creations have broken through their circles for the first time, appearing in the lives of countless ordinary people, allowing more to feel the power of Chinese aesthetics. "Huamian" embodies the concept of "painting within noodles, noodles within painting." Upon closer inspection of "Huamian"'s packaging, it completely overturns traditional noodle industry packaging design. At first glance, you're drawn to the design on the packaging, and only then does your attention shift to the product name. This creative approach is both bold and avant-garde, very eye-catching. This is likely "Huamian"'s "little trick"—using packaging to complete the first communication with consumers. Produced by Zihaiguo, Empowering the "Huamian" Brand to Go Further While researching, the author found that behind the new brand "Huamian" is actually "Zihaiguo." Although "Huamian" has its own independent brand and team, with the backing of "Zihaiguo," all its supply chain links gain double the energy. On one hand, "Zihaiguo," as a relatively mature new consumer brand, has established its own supply chain support system nationwide. For "Huamian"'s products, the endorsement and support of "Zihaiguo"'s brand power naturally narrows the distance with consumers, and the overlap in consumer profiles between the two is relatively high. Zihaiguo can bring a portion of seed users to the "Huamian" brand. With its solid supply chain and financial strength, "Zihaiguo" can naturally empower the continuous building of the "Huamian" brand and its ongoing product R&D capabilities. On the other hand, by checking the trademark registration time of "Huamian," the author found that not only "Huamian" but also "Xiaoqi Kitchen," "Chouchou Luo," "Wanzheng De," "Newton's Law," and other trademarks have been registered early under "Zihaiguo"'s business map. It's evident that "Zihaiguo" is not satisfied with just succeeding in the self-heating food track. From these trademark names, it can be inferred that in other food sectors, "Zihaiguo" will take action and will continue to increase investment and empowerment in these new brands. It seems that "Zihaiguo" has always benchmarked against world-class consumer goods groups like Nestlé, P&G, and Unilever. "Zihaiguo" has formed a firm brand pursuit, with the stars and the sea as its future. In the current business environment, the author believes it's commendable for an innovative consumer brand like "Zihaiguo" to have such lofty ideals and pursuits. It's suggested that distributor friends interested in such products pay more attention to the offline expansion of "Zihaiguo," "Huamian," and other multi-brands, as it's only a matter of time before new brands like "Huamian" penetrate offline channels. Their growth is worth accompanying and witnessing. Are you "watching" me?