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Profit Soars 312%: Jierou's Three-Year AI Transformation Offers the FMCG Industry an Answer
In 2025, C&S Jierou's annual profit surged 312% year-on-year, and in Q1 2026, profit continued to rise 53%. Behind this counter-trend growth lies a complete AI-driven growth system honed over three years, which will be publicly detailed by Vice President Yang Senlin at a closed-door session of the 2026 China FMCG Conference AI Application Forum.
陈思廷The Era of Manufacturers Relying on Blockbuster Products Is Over!
As I've been researching private labels and talking with retailers, brands, and factories, I've felt increasingly that the era of relying on a single blockbuster product and a one-size-fits-all assortment is over. Retailers are now asking not just about fees and margins, but whether a product truly fits their customers and stores, signaling the arrival of a 'one channel, one product' era.
袁来How Distributors Can Use AI to Manage Business, Read the Market, and Lead Teams
Many distributors have been experimenting with AI, initially using it for writing copy. However, the real value of AI for distributors lies not in content generation but in helping owners identify business problems earlier and decide what to manage first. By exposing hidden wastes in resources, manpower, inventory, and opportunities, AI can transform from a content tool into a business management tool that improves revenue, profit, and efficiency.
赵波Breaking | Chaohesuan NB Enters Beijing for the First Time, Store Location Confirmed
Chaohesuan NB is set to re-enter Beijing. According to 'Innovation Retail News', confirmed with insiders at Chaohesuan NB, the first store will be located at the Shangpin Zhekou Huilongguan store. This marks the official entry of Hema's budget community supermarket into Beijing. Notably, this is not Hema's first attempt at community stores in Beijing, but this time, Chaohesuan NB is not the fresh food outlet store it was before.
汪海The Era of Distribution is Over: Old Channel Organizations in FMCG Can No Longer Hold Up
FMCG companies' channel organizations are at a point where change is imperative. This feeling has grown increasingly strong recently. I shared this judgment in articles in late 2023 and early 2024, when many readers dismissed it as alarmist. At that time, the industry hadn't reached today's urgency, but now, with the impact of overcapacity and AI, traditional channel organizations must transform. This article proposes a shift from distribution-oriented to matching-oriented organizations.
任文青Self-Hotpot, "Can't Get Excited" Anymore
In May 2026, Hangzhou Golden Antelope Enterprise Management Consulting Co., Ltd., affiliated with the self-heating food brand Self-Hotpot, entered bankruptcy liquidation. Once a viral brand that sold 5 million cups in 10 minutes and was valued at 7.5 billion yuan, it now faces over 140 million yuan in enforced payments, with founder Cai Hongliang subject to 17 consumption restriction orders. From its launch in 2018 to its decline in 2026, Self-Hotpot lasted only eight years. The era of "half the entertainment industry eating Self-Hotpot" seems like yesterday, yet now the Taobao flagship store offers clearance prices of 24 yuan for 3 boxes, and the comment sections are filled with complaints about "bad taste," "small portions," and "foreign objects."
葛畅Snow King Goes Global: Winning by Selling Ingredients, Struggling to Go Too Far
According to Mixue Group's latest financial report, as of December 31, 2025, Mixue Bingcheng had 59,823 stores globally, including 55,356 in mainland China and 4,467 overseas, covering 13 countries. By store count, it surpasses Starbucks and McDonald's to become the world's largest freshly made beverage chain. Stores are the carrier, but the supply chain is the real business. Understanding Mixue's overseas expansion requires a key premise: Mixue is not a company that makes money by selling milk tea; over 90% of its revenue comes from selling ingredients, packaging, and equipment to franchisees.
王军Annual Reports of 16 Snack Food Companies Including Weilong and Three Squirrels: 60% See Revenue and Profit Declines
Recently, listed snack food companies have released their 2025 annual reports, revealing that many are struggling. While some like Weilong and Yanjinpu have grown through categories like konjac, and Youyou Foods relies on pickled chicken feet, others such as Qiaqia and Ganyuan face pressure in mature categories, and Liangpinpuzi and Three Squirrels deal with store adjustments, online traffic changes, and pricing strategies.
王一杰While Physical Stores Struggle, This Community Store Achieves a Counter-Trend Growth of 1030%!
In recent years, mom-and-pop stores have faced tough times. In 2020, there were about 6.6 million such stores nationwide, but now industry experts predict only about 4.2 million remain. However, in Shijiazhuang, Hebei, we observed an anomaly: multiple community stores doubled their revenue and saw customer traffic surge within just one month, with some stores even achieving growth exceeding 1030%. New Distribution went to the front lines to investigate...
田静From Leading Standard-Setting to Medicine-Food Homology: Baixiang Gives Distributors Real Confidence for Long-Term Business
Distributors face the challenge of homogeneous products, but Baixiang's release of the 'Old Hen Chicken Soup' group standard provides a quality benchmark and a basis for trust. Baixiang's commitment to genuine ingredients and long-term innovation, including the new Medicine-Food Homology series, offers distributors a reliable path to sustainable growth.
冯瑶FMCG AI: A Severely Underrated Sector
The FMCG industry is often perceived as traditional, low-tech, and digitally lagging, but this impression is only partially correct. While many distribution channels remain analog, giants like P&G and Coca-Cola have invested billions in digitalization, and the sector's complex decision chains and high trial-and-error costs present a massive, underappreciated opportunity for AI.
戚特Sam's Club Surges, Costco Jogs, Metro Calls in Reinforcements, Hema Exits: The Membership Store Battle Enters the Second Half
By 2026, the warehouse membership store sector is increasingly diverging. Sam's Club opens over a dozen new stores a year, surpasses ten million members, and generates more than half its orders online; Costco, nearly seven years in China, has only opened seven stores and remains unhurried; Metro has hired former Sam's Club China president Andrew Miles at a high salary to lead a turnaround; Hema has completely shut down its X Membership stores, pivoting to the 'Hema NB' discount format and achieving profitability. Four companies, four paces, reflecting four different answers on growth, trust, and strategic choice. The membership store battle has entered its second half.
张淑婷Blindly Visiting Stores Won't Work for Frontline Sales!
Recently, while preparing for the AI Application Forum at the CFC conference at the end of the month, I've been engaging in intensive discussions with brand owners about AI applications. The feedback I've received can be roughly divided into three stages. The initial stage involves administrative tasks like meeting minutes, customer service replies, contract review, and bid document generation. The intermediate stage includes applications like internal knowledge bases, image recognition for store inspections, consumer demand insights, and sales report analysis, where some small business scenarios start to be addressed. From my interactions, most companies are still in these first two stages.
袁来Deep Dive into Indonesia's Convenience Store Duopoly: Indomaret and Alfamart
In Indonesia, Indomaret and Alfamart together control about 92% of the convenience store market, with over 45,000 outlets. This article explores how these two giants built their retail empires through unique strategies, including supply chain advantages, franchising models, and localization, and why competitors like 7-Eleven failed to break their dominance.
戚特Shisheng's “Live Soy Sauce” and the Search for a New Premium Standard
After zero-additive and organic claims became crowded, Shisheng used long fermentation, membrane filtration, measured enzyme activity, and export credentials to propose a differentiated premium soy sauce category.
New DistributionDon't Rush into AI: Dealers Should First Get These Three Steps Right
In the past two years, AI has become an unavoidable topic across industries, but for FMCG dealers, the real question isn't whether to adopt AI, but whether it can solve their most pressing operational problems. Before jumping in, dealers should assess their digital maturity, focus on core issues like inventory, cash flow, and people, and run a 30-day pilot to validate value.
WendySupermarket Giants: A Five-Year Life-or-Death Struggle!
In 2021, Walmart China, RT-Mart (Gaoxin Retail), and Yonghui Superstores had sales of 99.04 billion, 98.01 billion, and 98.97 billion yuan respectively, nearly identical. By 2024, Walmart surged to 158.8 billion, while RT-Mart and Yonghui fell to 76.4 billion and 73.2 billion, showing a stark divergence.
老张First-Tier Brands Should Step Out of Their Comfort Zone!
The mediocrity of first-tier brands is highlighted by two abnormal phenomena: the popularity of private brands (PB) without a corresponding rise in national brands (NB), and the fact that Pangdonglai's private brand quality surpasses that of first-tier brands. This reflects the overall mediocrity of first-tier brands, which have failed to upgrade quality and lead the industry, instead focusing on maintaining volume, leading to consumer dissatisfaction and a decline in brand affinity.
刘春雄Forget 0 Sugar, 0 Fat—This Generation of Consumers Prefers 'Floral-Scented Bottles' That Please the Eyes, Palate, and Nose
From '0 sugar' to 'smells good,' water substitutes are quietly upgrading. In recent years, '0 sugar' water has been the most sought-after category on beverage shelves, appealing to consumers' obsession with health through clean labels and low-calorie promises. But this generation of young people wants more: they want it to look good, taste good, and smell good, ideally offering a moment of healing when they twist off the cap. This spring's market response confirms the shift: Hema's Morning Dew Sakura Water and Jasmine Water sold out within two days of launch, and sakura water remains the top new beverage on Hema's charts with over 5x month-on-month sales growth.
LabuManufacturers Seeking Growth Cannot Do Without Distributors!
A beer distributor worries about being bypassed as manufacturers experiment with direct supply to chains. However, distributors will not disappear; manufacturers need competitive distributors to win market share, and those who adapt will thrive.
金名Elephant Supermarket officially enters the era of rapid expansion
At 8 a.m. on April 24, the green sign of Elephant Supermarket's first store in Zhejiang, located at B1 of Longfor Tianjie in Yinzhou, Ningbo, stood out among the crowd. Half an hour before opening, a long queue of dozens of meters had already formed at the entrance, with many Ningbo residents getting up early to experience the offline presence of this online supermarket for the first time. The opening day saw high enthusiasm both on-site and on social media, with netizens joking that it felt like the supermarket was being emptied by Ningbo residents. This marks the second offline store in just four months, following the opening of the Beijing Wanliu store on December 19, 2025, signaling an accelerated expansion pace.
葛畅The Next Super Blue Ocean Market: Halal Market Going Global
When Chinese brand exporters talk about the Middle East, Southeast Asia, or the Muslim market, few truly study Halal as an independent topic. Yet this super blue ocean market, spanning 57 countries, serving 2 billion people, and valued at $2.4 trillion, is keeping many Chinese brands out—not because they lost to competitors, but because they never even got a ticket in. This article explores the market size, opportunities, and challenges for Chinese brands.
戚特Why Is AI in Most FMCG Companies Still Stuck in PowerPoint?
Recent conversations with industry peers reveal a common pattern: companies have discussed AI projects around business teams, aiming to combine frontline actions, process data, and management feedback to help managers spot problems and employees improve. While logically sound and technically feasible, these projects often stall—not due to model capability or vendor solutions, but due to data and responsibility boundaries.
任文青The Way Out for Hypermarkets Lies in the 'Wet Market'
A recent report by Qince Consumer Research shows that from 2019 to 2024, the share of consumer traffic for fresh food purchases in free markets rebounded from 40.9% to 42.2%, while large retailers dropped from 35.1% to 21.8%. The report also indicates that nearly 60% of fresh food retail now occurs in community settings, shifting competition toward immediacy, experience, and value within community living circles.
赵波