---
title: "The Catering Channel in the New Era Deserves a Fresh Approach"
description: "Once hailed as 'those who win the catering channel win the market' 15 years ago, the catering channel is now fiercely contested by numerous liquor brands. It's time to reassess its value. With changing consumer behavior and the rise of group-buying channels, the catering channel has evolved significantly, and brands must adapt to new dynamics."
author: "牛恩坤"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2017-12-23"
language: "en"
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# The Catering Channel in the New Era Deserves a Fresh Approach

> Once hailed as 'those who win the catering channel win the market' 15 years ago, the catering channel is now fiercely contested by numerous liquor brands. It's time to reassess its value. With changing consumer behavior and the rise of group-buying channels, the catering channel has evolved significantly, and brands must adapt to new dynamics.

Once hailed as 'those who win the catering channel win the market' 15 years ago, the catering channel is now fiercely contested by numerous liquor brands. It's time to reassess its value.

Reunderstanding the Catering Channel
Around 2000, the 'plate-in-plate' theory, represented by Anhui liquor, began to prevail in the liquor industry. This model continuously raised the entry barriers for hotel channels, with one Nanjing hotel charging an entry fee as high as 3 million yuan, causing many competing brands to suffer.

Later, as consumers became more rational and group-buying channels emerged, the catering channel became a dilemma: 'Doing catering channels leads to death; not doing them also leads to death.' It was once considered a chicken-rib channel for liquor brands, serving only as a price benchmark and a window for promotional activities.

With over 90% of diners bringing their own alcohol, the unwritten rule that 'people bring their own drinks, and hotels don't sell alcohol' became an industry puzzle that seemed reasonable. The underlying reason was the excessive price gap between hotels and distribution channels.

The reason for revisiting this history is to understand the competitive environment and marketing context of that time. Today, revisiting the catering channel is about not forgetting history, and not forgetting history is to more clearly understand the development and changes in the catering channel over the past 15 years. What are the differences between today's hotel channel and the past?

According to the 2017 'China Catering Report White Paper', China's catering industry has reached a scale of 14 trillion yuan. In terms of category popularity, snacks and hotpot have higher growth rates and proportions, with hotpot alone accounting for 22%. The explosion of food delivery has become an integral part of catering, and 74% of catering consumption is contributed by young people aged 20-35.

There are about 100 catering enterprises with revenues exceeding 1 billion yuan, more than in the liquor industry. Capital giants are frequently making waves in the catering industry. From the above development trends, the scale, structure, and consumer base of catering have changed significantly compared to before, which requires liquor brands that have long been away from the catering channel to reacquaint themselves with it.

Why Rebuild the Catering Channel?
Although today's baijiu distribution channels have become diversified and fragmented, baijiu brands are highly concentrated. Apart from Moutai and Wuliangye, which sell well across all channels, few brands are popular.

Whether online or offline, whether in distribution or group-buying channels, the options are not as wide as before. On one hand, this is a result of consumer rationality; on the other hand, it shows that competitive methods are converging, with a rush to distribution channels, leading to the strange phenomenon where tobacco and liquor stores don't sell liquor but rely on manufacturer policies for support.

The persistence and emphasis on the catering channel by brands like Jingjiu and Jiangxiaobai are worth reconsidering the value of the catering channel. The catering channel is not only the foundation for guidance and consumer experience but also a venue for continuous brand building, and a gateway for new brand breakthroughs and baijiu expansion into new regions.

Observing a baijiu brand's persistence in catering is also the consumer foundation for long-term occupation of a market. Baijiu brands originally treated the catering channel with short-term utilization, with only a few brands operating long-term.

Today, the function of distribution channels has fundamentally changed, from being sales channels to gradually becoming product display windows. Coupled with the difficulty in controlling prices in distribution channels, managing distribution channels has become a common problem in baijiu marketing. Reassessing the value of distribution channels has become a new topic for many baijiu brands. From a dialectical perspective and the latest catering trends, the catering channel is an experience venue for baijiu promotion and deepening relationships. Some forward-thinking manufacturers like Langjiu, Shede, and Wuliangchun have already begun to lay out catering channels.

How to Operate the Catering Channel in the New Era?
From the above analysis, the structure and consumption logic of the catering channel have fundamentally changed. How should baijiu brands operate the catering channel? Based on my experience in beverage catering channel operations, I have summarized a methodology for the catering channel for baijiu enterprises to reference. Although there are differences in specific stores, the methods—methodology—and underlying logic are extremely similar. Looking at the entire operation system from the aspects of Dao, Fa, Shu, Qi, Ju, and Yun, it is extremely effective for channel operation implementation.

**See Through the Value of the Catering Channel (Dao)**
> Doing the catering channel is to find a breakthrough in the market.
>
> Doing the catering channel focuses on overall layout, with the goal of occupation.
>
> Doing the catering channel is to reach catering consumers through the catering channel.

**The Law of Doing Catering (Fa), which is also the basic logic of the methodology, knowing what to do and what not to do**
> General principle: After a quick attack, do fine work (after rapid occupation, refine and detail).
>
> When concentrating resources, break through one by one. The standard for breakthrough: first in sales, first in atmosphere, and maintain first place.
>
> Do not count other costs, only count time costs.
>
> Scene, communication, and push power are all indispensable.

**Upgrade to Win, Core Priority, Quantity Concentration (Shu)**
With a strategy, you can act with a clear goal. Beverages are mass consumer goods with a natural connection to the catering channel. It's best not to make disruptive innovations in channel innovation, as the possibility of failure is high. For example, the wedding banquet wine that opened wedding photo studio channels a few years ago is basically no longer mentioned.

Consumer habits are hard to change. Even in today's internet age, there is a trend of returning offline. Therefore, the significance of upgrading to win is to upgrade tactics on the original basis, achieving micro-innovation where 'we have what others have, but better.'

This micro-innovation includes a series of changes in marketing methods. For example, previously, POP was posted at catering terminals, but now catering owners generally do not accept this low-end practice because young people's aesthetic standards have improved.

Core priority means first classifying catering, and based on product characteristics, determining the order of breakthrough in the catering channel. If the order is chaotic, it not only wastes time but may also give competitors an opportunity.

We divide the catering channel into four categories: image, promotion, push, and display catering channels. For each type, we adopt a one-store-one-policy approach for orderly advancement. Finding the rules and solving individual problems is the cognition after practicing in the catering channel.

> The purpose of doing image catering is to enhance the product's value perception. Our approach to this type of catering is to leverage to improve image, without excessive investment. This type of catering is only an image channel, not a sales channel.
>
> Doing promotion catering is our top priority for breakthrough. The purpose of promotion is long-term occupation, and after occupation, establish a long-term strategic cooperative relationship with the catering. One is to set barriers for competitors, and the other is to implement scenarios. Just like Wanglaoji did with hotpot restaurants back then. This type of catering has both sales and influence. The principle for this type is to not count costs, only count success, until a strategic cooperation is reached.
>
> The third type is push catering, which generally focuses on specialty restaurants. Our principle for this type is to exchange policies for scenarios and achieve category occupation. Since specialty restaurants have many regulars and are very familiar with the owners, these owners value profits highly. Our principle for this type is to exchange policies for space, such as the best position for display and product placement on tables.
>
> The fourth type is display catering, which includes snack shops. Our approach is to exchange policies for display, maintain visibility, and expand influence, but be careful to control the rate of unpaid orders.

Therefore, in the new era, reassessing the value of the catering channel is particularly important for baijiu brands to return to catering. In today's context of shrinking distribution channels and weakened e-commerce channels, the catering channel may be a blue ocean for baijiu brand promotion.

What do you think about redoing the catering channel? Leave a comment below to share!
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