---
title: "Wandashan, the \"Left Behind\" Dairy Giant, Heads South by Tapping into Convenience Store Chains"
description: "Wandashan, a veteran state-owned dairy company from Northeast China that has lagged behind for years, is striving to expand beyond its home market. Recently, its customized fresh milk for Guangdong's 7-Eleven stores hit the market, with the first batch entering over 1,800 outlets in the region."
author: "陈泽旋"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2026-01-26"
categories: "Retail Formats"
language: "en"
canonical: "https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/wandashan-the-left-behind-dairy-giant-heads-south-by-tapping-into-conven-52fc2a7f/"
markdown: "https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/wandashan-the-left-behind-dairy-giant-heads-south-by-tapping-into-conven-52fc2a7f.md"
original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/m6n0sgKAULqq3XFdLrUSHg"
translation: "https://xinjignxiao.com/zh/articles/%E5%82%8D%E4%B8%8A%E4%BE%BF%E5%88%A9%E5%BA%97%E5%B7%A8%E5%A4%B4-%E6%8E%89%E9%98%9F-%E7%9A%84%E5%AE%8C%E8%BE%BE%E5%B1%B1%E5%8D%97%E4%B8%8B-52fc2a7f.md"
attribution: "New Distribution — https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/wandashan-the-left-behind-dairy-giant-heads-south-by-tapping-into-conven-52fc2a7f/"
citation: "陈泽旋. “Wandashan, the \"Left Behind\" Dairy Giant, Heads South by Tapping into Convenience Store Chains.” New Distribution, 2026-01-26. https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/wandashan-the-left-behind-dairy-giant-heads-south-by-tapping-into-conven-52fc2a7f/"
usage_policy: "https://xinjignxiao.com/ai-policy.txt"
---

# Wandashan, the "Left Behind" Dairy Giant, Heads South by Tapping into Convenience Store Chains

> Wandashan, a veteran state-owned dairy company from Northeast China that has lagged behind for years, is striving to expand beyond its home market. Recently, its customized fresh milk for Guangdong's 7-Eleven stores hit the market, with the first batch entering over 1,800 outlets in the region.

**Source** | 19th Business Research Institute
Wandashan, a dairy giant that has lagged behind for years, is striving to expand beyond the Northeast China market.
Recently, Beidahuang Wandashan Dairy Co., Ltd. (hereinafter "Wandashan"), a veteran state-owned dairy enterprise from the Northeast, launched a customized fresh milk product for 7-Eleven convenience stores in Guangdong. It is reported that the first batch of products has entered over 1,800 7-Eleven stores in the Guangdong region.
According to a visit by Times Finance to multiple 7-Eleven stores in Guangzhou, the customized low-temperature fresh milk is available in 300ml bottles at a retail price of 6.90 yuan each. The front of the bottle only features the 7-Eleven brand logo, while the back label indicates that the product is commissioned by Heilongjiang Wandashan Linhai Liquid Milk Co., Ltd. and manufactured by Tianjin Wandashan Dairy Products Co., Ltd.
According to Tianyancha information, the controlling shareholder of both the commissioning and manufacturing companies is Wandashan. Among them, the manufacturer, Tianjin Wandashan Dairy Products Co., Ltd., is the actual production facility for this customized fresh milk, located in Wuqing Development Area, Tianjin.
Wandashan was founded in 1958 and is affiliated with Beidahuang Agricultural Reclamation Group Co., Ltd. The company primarily produces and sells milk powder, liquid milk, and nutritional food. According to media reports, as early as 2004, Wandashan Dairy ranked fourth among national dairy enterprises with sales revenue of 1.35 billion yuan. However, as competition in the dairy market intensified, Wandashan, which had long been rooted in the Northeast, gradually faded into obscurity.
Now, this former dairy leader is attempting to turn its attention to the southern market. Over the past two months, Wandashan Chairman Dong Yongzhong has frequently traveled south, visiting the Sichuan-Chongqing region and the Hunan-Hubei area, followed by trips to Jiangsu and Shanghai. This year, Wandashan also partnered with Yonghui Superstores to complete the layout of nearly 400 offline stores in the southern market.
However, in the highly competitive southern dairy market, Wandashan faces significant challenges in truly breaking through.
Wandashan's Low-Temperature Fresh Milk "Enters" Guangdong
Currently, the low-temperature fresh milk track in South China is already crowded with various players.
A visit by Times Finance to multiple 7-Eleven stores in Guangzhou revealed that the low-temperature fresh milk shelves are filled with numerous brands, ranging from national leaders like Mengniu and Yili, to expanding regional brands from outside such as Junlebao and New Hope, as well as local brands like Fengxing, Yantang, and Xiangmanlou, each offering more than one low-temperature milk product.
In terms of display, products from well-known national brands often occupy the most prominent positions on the shelves and account for the largest share.
Low-temperature fresh milk cabinet at 7-Eleven convenience store (Photo by Times Finance)
Whether in convenience stores or large supermarkets, low-temperature fresh milk with good sales performance in the market is mainly concentrated among national leading brands or local brands. A supermarket milk cabinet salesperson told Times Finance that some consumers pay special attention to the milk source. "Our store sells Tianrun fresh milk quite well; consumers generally think Xinjiang's milk source is of high quality, and some customers prefer local old brands."
In terms of positioning, Wandashan's low-temperature fresh milk at 7-Eleven stores is not considered high-end (300ml at 6.9 yuan). In comparison, 235ml of Yili Jindian sells for 12.5 yuan, 250ml of Mengniu Daily Fresh Language sells for 10.5 yuan, 255ml of New Hope's Today Fresh Milk Shop sells for 8.5 yuan, and 260ml of Junlebao Yuexianhuo sells for 8.5 yuan.
To promote sales, Wandashan fresh milk has also been included in 7-Eleven's meal deal system, and it is the only milk category included. Store staff told Times Finance that, driven by the meal deals, this fresh milk has been "selling quite well" recently.
Missed 10-Billion-Yuan Target
Chairman Leads Multiple Trips South
As a leading dairy enterprise from the Northeast, Wandashan once ranked among the first tier of the domestic dairy industry. Now, the industry landscape has evolved into a pattern of "two superpowers and multiple strong players," with Yili and Mengniu leading other dairy companies by a wide margin due to their revenue scale exceeding 100 billion yuan.
Even Feihe, which is also based in Heilongjiang like Wandashan, exceeded 9.1 billion yuan in revenue in the first half of this year, while Wandashan's self-set target of 10 billion yuan in revenue has been postponed from 2025 to 2028.
This dairy company, which has attempted to go public four times, is still striving to catch up. In 2019, Wandashan launched its fourth IPO plan, and as of 2023, it was still publicly stating its intention to "enter the capital market as soon as possible and continuously grow and strengthen the enterprise."
Going public is an important goal for Wandashan, and achieving scale breakthrough is another core task. In 2021, Wandashan proposed a "Double 10 Billion" goal during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, aiming to exceed 10 billion yuan in revenue by 2025 and achieve a market value of 10 billion yuan after listing. However, Wandashan's development pace has not been as strong as expected, with revenue only surpassing 5 billion yuan in 2021.
Wandashan products at Yonghui Superstore (Photo by Times Finance)
To promote the national layout of its liquid milk business, Wandashan has played the "Ruci Xinxian" (So Fresh) card.
Times Finance learned that "Ruci Xinxian" initially started as a single low-temperature pasteurized fresh milk product and gradually developed into a sub-brand covering multiple products. In 2020, the first "Ruci Xinxian" tea drink store opened; in 2023, Wandashan intensified its new retail efforts, accelerating the construction of "Ruci Xinxian" chain brand stores, adopting a "direct-operated + franchise" model, focusing on making various ice products with Wandashan milk and yogurt. As of February 2024, the brand had opened over 60 stores in Heilongjiang, Beijing, Shanghai, and other places.
Among them, the first Beijing store opened in 2023. At that time, Cai Xiaona, general manager of Beidahuang Wandashan's New Retail Division, said in a media interview that "Ruci Xinxian" planned to open 11 chain store model stores in first-tier and super first-tier cities, simultaneously laying out the Northeast and North China markets, and gradually expanding to prosperous commercial areas in key southern markets, with a scale of 2,000 stores within five years. In the Beijing market, the goal for "Ruci Xinxian" was to open more than 100 franchise chain stores within two years.
However, after more than a year of operation, the Beijing store closed in October 2024. According to Wandashan's official website, the number of "Ruci Xinxian" stores has now been reduced to 18.
With offline store development in North China not going smoothly, Wandashan has turned its attention to the southern market. Over the past two months, Wandashan Chairman Dong Yongzhong has led multiple trips south, visiting markets in Sichuan-Chongqing, Hunan-Hubei, Jiangsu, and Shanghai. In August this year, Wandashan also announced cooperation with local offline retail enterprises in Hunan and Guangdong to jointly expand the South China market.
This year, Wandashan also partnered with Yonghui Superstores nationwide to achieve the layout of nearly 400 stores in the southern market. A visit by Times Finance to Yonghui Superstores in Guangzhou found that the Wandashan products currently on sale are mainly low-temperature flavored milk products, including strawberry milk, banana milk, dark chocolate milk, and coffee milk.
Wandashan coffee milk at Yonghui Superstore (Photo by Times Finance)
In terms of online channels, the Yonghui mini-program offers two Wandashan ambient milk products, and products under Wandashan's "Ruci Xinxian" brand are also available. It is worth noting that "Ruci Xinxian" fresh milk was once sold online but has now been removed from Yonghui's online mini-program.
Regional Dairy Enterprises Face Difficulties in National Expansion
In fact, as a veteran dairy company, Wandashan started with its milk powder business, with infant formula milk powder long serving as the core pillar of its milk powder segment. However, Times Finance learned that in many markets, consumers find it difficult to purchase Wandashan infant formula in offline stores.
Although Wandashan has established cooperation with maternal and infant retail brands Kidswant and Mazzaigu, when Times Finance inquired at two Mazzaigu stores in Guangzhou, one store did not sell Wandashan products, while the other said the store's inventory was incomplete and consumers would need to place an order. At two Kidswant stores, staff said the brand was not currently available, with one store mentioning that it could be purchased through Kidswant's online platform, but only one infant formula product was available on Kidswant's online channel.
Meanwhile, regional dairy enterprises are facing difficulties. In particular, the infant formula market shows a clear brand preference, with consumers generally favoring imported brands and large national brands, leaving regional brands in a state of "surviving in a narrow gap" in external markets.
Taking Guangzhou as an example, Times Finance found that the infant formula brands available in various channel stores, whether domestic or imported, are mainly large national brands, including a2 to C, Friso, Feihe, Yili, and Junlebao. In some smaller stores, shelves even display only imported brands. Regional brands, relying on historical accumulation and local reputation, have a stable customer base in their home markets, but when expanding into new markets, they often face the problem of insufficient brand awareness.
Infant formula shelf (Photo by Times Finance)
A merchant operating a maternal and infant store in Hunan told Times Finance that when consumers choose infant formula, safety and formula remain the overwhelming primary concerns, with brand reputation, price, and cost-effectiveness also being key decision factors.
A staff member at a maternal and infant store in Guangzhou told Times Finance that in their daily work, almost no consumers proactively ask about Wandashan products, but this is a common dilemma for regional brands, and Wandashan is not an exception.
"For terminal stores, the first choice for stocking is brands with fast turnover, reasonable profit margins, and their own customer traffic. National brands have more advertising, more consumers actively seek them out, and naturally turn over faster. If regional brands lack strong consumer pull efforts (advertising, ground promotion), products will sell slowly after stocking, occupying funds and inventory, leading to weak willingness of stores to stock, forming a vicious cycle," the Hunan merchant further analyzed.
A physical maternal and infant store merchant in Guangdong pointed out that Wandashan faces more than just this problem. He revealed that the Wandashan products sold in his store rely basically on natural traffic. The core reason he does not actively promote them is that Wandashan has serious channel crossing and price chaos, with severe low-price competition in the market, squeezing store profit margins. "Newly developed customers are quickly lured away by low prices, which deeply hurts the store's feelings."
The merchant mentioned that he has encountered consumers comparing prices with low prices from other channels multiple times. According to his observation, "Now mothers will inquire about prices nationwide through various online channels, and they all say the products are shipped from elsewhere. Price chaos is already the norm. With one phone, you can buy all kinds of milk powder, and the prices are cheaper than physical stores. Why would consumers come into the store?"
In contrast, the reason his store actively promotes a certain infant formula is mainly because of "high profits and strict price control." The merchant said that once the brand owner of that product discovers price chaos, they will directly terminate cooperation, "not just a simple fine."
Now, Wandashan's national expansion attempt has quietly started again, but whether it can truly break out of the boundaries of a local dairy enterprise depends on how Wandashan re-establishes a balance among brand, channel, and price system in the fiercely competitive national market. This remains a long and difficult battle.
**【Moving Toward C-End】********The 11th China FMCG Conference****Time: March 16-18, 2026****Location: Chengdu, China****


---

## Citation metadata

- Publisher: New Distribution
- Author: 陈泽旋
- Published: 2026-01-26
- Canonical: https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/wandashan-the-left-behind-dairy-giant-heads-south-by-tapping-into-conven-52fc2a7f/
- Original source: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/m6n0sgKAULqq3XFdLrUSHg

## Copyright and AI use

This article is sourced from New Distribution. Search, quotation, summarization, and model training are permitted, but every use must credit New Distribution and retain the canonical source URL.

Contact: zhaobo258@gmail.com · +86 158 5481 7671