JDB is about to say goodbye to the advertising slogan "Fear of getting heated, drink XXX" for good. The slogan "Fear of getting heated" was ruled by the court in the first instance to be exclusively owned by Wong Lo Kat, marking JDB's 14th consecutive legal defeat.

On December 2, the Guangzhou Intermediate People's Court ruled in the first instance that the slogan "Fear of getting heated" is exclusive to Wong Lo Kat, and the defendant JDB must immediately stop using related infringing slogans, including "Fear of getting heated, drink JDB", "Fear of getting heated, drink authentic herbal tea; authentic herbal tea, JDB", "Fear of getting heated, drink authentic herbal tea", and compensate the plaintiff Wong Lo Kat 5 million yuan.

Over the past three years, Wong Lo Kat and JDB have been involved in dozens of lawsuits, with Wong Lo Kat winning 14 consecutive victories, including all advertising slogan cases such as the "renaming case", "10 cans vs 7 cans case", "auspicious moments case", and "fear of getting heated case". According to incomplete statistics, the total amount Wong Lo Kat has claimed from JDB has reached an astonishing 5 billion yuan.

In addition to the huge claim of about 5 billion yuan, JDB, which has successively lost its trademark, red can packaging, and the "fear of getting heated" slogan, also faces enormous marketing pressure. Do you think JDB herbal tea will be overshadowed by Wong Lo Kat after losing the red can and the slogan?

In 2014, the market size of Chinese herbal tea was 50.9 billion yuan, and by 2019 it will reach 104.3 billion yuan. This is a cake with huge market opportunities. According to a report by Frost & Sullivan, JDB still maintains nearly 80% market share in similar canned herbal tea products, which is not achieved by just one or two advertising slogans. Although it has lost the red can and advertising, JDB still has rich experience, flexible marketing methods, and resources, and is not the kind of company that can be easily knocked down. Famous marketing expert Chen Haichao said: Wong Lo Kat is trying to kill JDB! In marketing, JDB's special old, Wong Lo Kat's Ries, JDB has the advantage; in law, Wong Lo Kat is pressing hard. Of course, JDB can counter-sue to delay time. Playing like this, they keep fighting, getting free advertising and attention. The more they fight, the more popular the herbal tea category becomes, and the higher the brand concentration. One can't help but suspect that JDB and Wong Lo Kat are playing with us, performing a double act!

A quick search on Weibo for #王老吉加多宝# shows that most public opinion still tends to sympathize with JDB:

I also invited Nalan Zuitian, who works at JDB, to share his views as a JDB person. Although the content is somewhat biased towards JDB, it also indirectly explains JDB's true strength.

Nalan Zuitian:

(Long press the QR code below to follow the official account: Nalan Zuitian)

In 2012, after Guangzhou Pharmaceutical took back the Wang Laoji brand, its slogan became "Fear of getting heated, drink Wang Laoji". To show the difference, they added the character "就" to the original slogan, meaning that consumers who get heated "still" choose Wang Laoji. The character "就" sounds like "旧" (old), implying that Wang Laoji still uses the old slogan, while JDB's slogan was "Fear of getting heated, drink JDB". After several lawsuits, Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Wang Laoji shamelessly fully restored the slogan to "Fear of getting heated, drink Wang Laoji". At that time, JDB had sued Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Wang Laoji for infringement, because initially they only borrowed the three characters "王老吉". Everything that followed, whether it was brand packaging, font design, or advertising slogans, was created by JDB at great expense. Any advertising company that has worked on JDB materials knows that JDB has a strict visual specification, from font to color to font position. Any slight error requires redesign, showing their craftsmanship. However, it was useless; the First People's Court of Chongqing rejected their lawsuit and did not accept it. Meanwhile, Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Wang Laoji immediately sued JDB for infringement in Guangzhou.

Counting on fingers, this is already the 14th consecutive victory for Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Wang Laoji. Since the split in 2012, Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Wang Laoji has gradually taken away the three core assets from JDB: brand, packaging, and advertising slogans. Except for the brand, which is settled, the red can packaging and advertising slogans may still be subject to final appeal. However, despite this series of blows, JDB remains resilient. Its market sales have not declined but have been rising steadily, and it seems to be getting stronger with each fight. So what exactly keeps JDB's fire burning?

1) Dual Iron Army of Marketing and Channels

Marketing is the mouth, channels are the legs. JDB's channel iron army is the key to victory. Without legs, the mouth is weak; without mouth, the legs have no direction. Sales have no shortcuts; JDB's sales volume relies on these iron-blooded soldiers moving boxes one by one.

Delivering goods in heavy snow, advertising is the mouth, sales are the legs. Marketing has no shortcuts.

Let's talk about marketing: JDB's marketing has always been praised. As the saying goes, falling is easy, getting up is hard. After losing the Wang Laoji brand, JDB people rebuilt the "JDB" brand from the ruins. Its sponsorship of "The Voice of China" has lasted four years without decline, and each season's ratings won the championship.

Before JDB launched the gold can to commemorate its sales gold medal, it engaged in spy warfare, sparking various discussions among consumers.

Its "sorry" series and "lawyer" series copy touched the hearts of countless entrepreneurs and workers. JDB's marketing team's efficient execution ensures the implementation of all policies. JDB's marketing approach requires controlling channels as much as possible, providing better services to distributors. Unlike many companies that ship whatever they have after distributors pay, sometimes even pushing slow-moving products, JDB ships exactly according to the product items paid for by distributors. Sales personnel run orders for distributors, relieving them of sales pressure. Therefore, JDB's distributors are relatively stable and loyal.

2) Product Upgrade, the Trend of the Times

Every product has its own life cycle. It has been 20 years since JDB produced the first canned Wang Laoji, and the slogan "Fear of getting heated" has been around for 13 years. In terms of product life cycle, the "Wang Laoji" product has entered the decline stage. As a comparison, let's look at the life cycles of several well-known products: Wahaha Nutrition Express launched in 2005, sales declined in 2013, life cycle 8 years; Yangyuan Six Walnuts launched in 2005, sales began to hit a bottleneck in 2015, life cycle 10 years; Master Kong Iced Black Tea launched in 1999, although still a main product for Master Kong, it is clearly showing weak growth; Want Want Milk launched in 1996, sales began to decline in 2014. In the beverage industry, except for Coca-Cola and Pepsi, few products have a life cycle exceeding 20 years. When the post-90s generation comes, they don't want to use P&G products their parents used, nor drink the beverages their parents drank. This leads to shorter life cycles for beverages and faster innovation. JDB's beverage brand life cycle is actually only 3 years. In 2015, to commemorate the sales gold medal, the gold can JDB was launched, and with President Xi's visits to the US and UK, the concept of the "Golden Age" was recognized by more consumers, also opening the era of herbal tea 2.0. After brand rebuilding and packaging upgrade, does JDB need to continue its advertising slogan? Red Bull's initial slogan was "Tired and sleepy, drink Red Bull", now it's "Your energy exceeds your imagination". Dongpeng Special Drink started using "Tired and sleepy, drink Dongpeng Special Drink". Although Dongpeng's differentiated packaging has formed its own market, it still cannot shake Red Bull's leading position.

3) Can Low Price Defeat High Price?

Since Guangzhou Pharmaceutical took back the Wang Laoji brand in 2012, it has adopted a follow-and-copy strategy, closely monitoring JDB's marketing. If you launch gift packs, I also launch gift packs; if you do auspicious years, I also do auspicious years. But one principle remains unchanged: I always keep my price 3-5 yuan cheaper than yours. However, Wang Laoji forgot that there is an immutable law in marketing: high price will defeat low price. But economics also has a principle called "bad money drives out good". In the herbal tea market, many terminal customers and consumers don't understand why JDB must be more expensive than Wang Laoji. Same packaging, same advertising, same display. Don't tell me JDB is self-produced while Wang Laoji is OEM; consumers can't perceive that. When buying a product, consumers might just glance at the production date. Who cares whether Wang Laoji is produced by Yinlu or Huierkang? So in consumers' eyes, these two products are the same, both herbal tea, so they should sell at the same price. It is precisely because of this consumer perception that Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Wang Laoji can say every day, "Wang Laoji donated 100 million yuan for the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake". That is a fact, but the donor was JDB. So for JDB to support its high price, it must completely differentiate itself from Wang Laoji. Currently, although the packaging no longer confuses consumers, the psychological positioning is still the same. To truly break free from its shadow, JDB must undergo a comprehensive upgrade in brand, packaging, and positioning language.

4) Wang Laoji's Brand Dilution

Before Guangzhou Pharmaceutical took back Wang Laoji, it began to loudly publicize the brand value of Wang Laoji as "108 billion yuan". Even JDB, the operator at the time, dared not say such a thing, but Guangzhou Pharmaceutical bragged about it. It was precisely because of this that after taking back the "golden rice bowl" of "Wang Laoji", Guangzhou Pharmaceutical people began to think of ways to scrape off some gold dust from this golden rice bowl to exchange for money. So they developed the Wang Laoji brand without restraint. Currently, the use of the Wang Laoji brand is divided into four categories. The first is Wang Laoji Great Health Industry, mainly responsible for the operation of canned and bottled Wang Laoji herbal tea, with most employees signing contracts with a third party, Tongsheng. The second is Wang Laoji Pharmaceutical Line, mainly responsible for operating green box Wang Laoji and Wang Laoji gum. The third is manufacturers who license the Wang Laoji brand, only needing to pay 8% of annual sales as advertising usage fee. Wang Laoji does not interfere in any operation, completely acting as a hands-off boss. Such products are represented by Wang Laoji Mung Bean Cool. The fourth is that Wang Laoji is responsible for finding manufacturers to produce, then outsourcing to third-party operation teams. Wang Laoji is responsible for VICI design, product positioning, and price control, with no market support. The operation team can only be responsible for sales and inventory pressure. They can use the same distributors as herbal tea, but not the same marketing team. Products like Wang Laoji Ji Dongli, Xia Sang Ju, Da Hong Qi, and Cordyceps Drink all operate this way. Since the operation teams have no decision-making power, they often recruit a batch of distributors and then the team dies. After these teams die, no one handles the terminal customers' products. Although the herbal tea team is stable, when terminal customers find them to handle these products, the herbal tea team says they are not responsible for these products. In the end, the problem is passed on to distributors.

5) How Will Wang Laoji Do Without Copying?

Although Wang Laoji's marketing approach has improved slightly in its struggle with JDB, its overall strength is still far behind. For example, their positioning for Da Hong Qi is "Replenish qi and blood, add vitality, drink Da Hong Qi". Seriously, seeing that the slogan "Fear of getting heated, drink XXX" is popular, but you can't be so shameless. For the sake of that bit of gold dust, they are really trying hard. You yourself said in court that "Wang Laoji" and "Fear of getting heated" are inseparable. When it comes to herbal tea, it's all about reducing heat. What do you mean by producing a warming product that replenishes qi and blood and causes heat? Are you trying to tell everyone that you are omnipotent, can cause heat and also remove heat?

For so many years, JDB has adhered to one positioning, one product, and a craftsmanship mindset. There is no need to worry about winning or losing lawsuits. What all marketers need to do now is watch how JDB stages more exciting marketing and how JDB's team executes with more iron-blooded determination!