NEW DISTRIBUTION RESEARCH TOPIC
How can brands grow beyond price competition?
Evidence and cases on product strategy, category innovation, marketing, and channel coordination in China’s consumer market.
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4701 articles · Page 22 of 196
How Should Distributor Bosses Respond During the Stagflation Period of the FMCG Category?
According to Nielsen data, from January to August 2024, the overall FMCG all-channel growth rate was 2.6% year-on-year, a relatively slow growth rate. Except for water, beverages, and alcohol, other categories showed negative growth in offline channels. The chart below shows the operating data of 302 medium and large distributors nationwide in the first half of 2024. (This data is a small sample and is for reference only.) Combined with the overall FMCG growth rate and distributor operations, almost all FMCG categories are declining, indicating a stagflation period. This inevitably makes distributor bosses question whether this business can continue, whether to switch to other industries, whether to continue representing first-tier brands with thin profits, and whether good service to downstream customers can help grow the business.
CiciUnexpectedly, Consumer Attitudes Have Changed So Much in the Past Decade
Living standards have improved, but what are people's consumption preferences? A brief recall of wages and prices ten years ago confirms the improvement, but by how much? Let's look at the data. Source: China Statistical Yearbook. By the end of 2023, per capita income and expenditure have nearly doubled over the past decade. Remember the Engel coefficient from middle school? It measures the proportion of food expenditure in total consumption, indicating living standards. However, the coefficient has limitations for China, as people have turned survival consumption into enjoyment consumption.
真叫卢俊团队New Chinese-style beverages upgrade to break through, Panpan is becoming different?
From a 'small bread memory' to a 'full-category leader', Panpan is injecting more dimensions into this answer through product innovations and supply chain upgrades. With its health-oriented, Chinese-style wellness positioning, Panpan Beverages is capturing consumers' attention in the 'light drinking' trend, achieving a compound annual growth rate of over 50% in 2024.
消研所Breaking the Involution: Better to Be Different Than Better
As society changes rapidly and market involution intensifies, brand building becomes increasingly difficult. The era of 'advertising rings, gold pours in' and 'creative brilliance, brand breakout' is fading from mainstream marketing. In this context, how can we build brands effectively? All marketing methods must be based on business logic, evolving with market, enterprise, and brand perception development; nothing is static. In the 'incremental' market era, brands relied on policy dividends, demographic dividends, and bold advertising creativity. Now in the 'stock' market era, with declining population growth, reduced consumption willingness, and oversupply, fragmented creative ads alone cannot break through competitive barriers. Only by evolving toward 'holistic, systematic, dialectical' scientific marketing methods can brands escape involution and build long-lasting brands. In terms of marketing development, brand building is advancing 'from the advertising era to the scientific era,' and I call this scientific marketing approach the 'Scientific Brand Concept.'
蒋秋铭What Will Drive Future Growth in the Beer Industry?
Currently, the beer industry faces intense competition and consumption upgrade challenges amid steady development, with rising market concentration and saturation. Meanwhile, as people pursue quality of life, more consumers are turning to high-end beer, and personalization and customization are becoming key trends. In this context, how can beer companies expand diversified sales channels and enhance their overall competitiveness? Recently, Northeast Securities released a report on the beer industry, comprehensively presenting the current status, competitive landscape, and development trends of China's beer industry, providing an important reference for the sector.
记者 刘雪霞Benchmark FMCG Distributor: Treat Stores as Warehouses, Make POS the Core of All Sales!
In the offline trading sector, distributors of daily chemical products face the greatest challenges. Despite this, some outstanding distributors manage to break through. This article features Guo Xiaolin, GM of Nantong Jindihuang Trading Co., who has achieved annual sales of 300 million yuan through a multi-brand, multi-category, and strong-channel model, with a focus on POS-driven performance and innovative marketing.
何雯Yili and Three Squirrels See Doubled Sales, 90% Free Traffic: FMCG Distributors Are Profiting Big on Dewu
A distributor recently shared that he quit traditional e-commerce platforms due to low sales and high return rates. However, on emerging platforms like Dewu, the food and beverage category is seeing significant growth, with active merchant numbers up 450% year-on-year and GMV for merchants exceeding one million up 400%. Dewu's semi-managed model, low operational barriers, and high free traffic are helping distributors achieve rapid growth.
AsherAs Baijiu Market Declines, Jinsha Distillery Unveils New 'Upstream Strategy'
Amid slowing growth and intensifying competition in the baijiu industry, Jinsha Distillery held a grand launch event on December 10, 2024, in Jinsha County, Guizhou, to unveil its new 'Upstream Strategy' under the brand slogan 'Strive Upstream, Drink Zhuoyao.' The strategy aims to leverage the company's location in the upper reaches of the Chishui River to build a competitive edge in quality, brand, marketing, and technology, positioning Zhuoyao as a high-end sauce-flavor baijiu and charting a new path for high-quality development in the industry.
New DistributionPreparing for the Year-End: Promotions Can Be Done This Way
The year-end is a prime opportunity for FMCG companies to turn around their annual sales performance. Well-executed promotions can not only boost sales and achieve a strong start, but also lay the groundwork for the coming year's marketing strategy. How should promotional plans be designed to help improve year-end performance? Let's discuss this with specific cases.
崔自三Cold Snap Arrives: Why Is the "Warm Drink Trend" Struggling to Warm Consumers' Hearts?
As the first cold wave of winter arrives, people instinctively bundle up and, in their hurried steps, yearn to hold a hot drink to warm their hands and dispel the chill. Major brands have keenly seized this demand, upgrading their warm beverage offerings in an attempt to spark a "warm drink revolution." However, can this surging "warm current" truly warm the market? During recent market visits, the author observed that many customers merely glance at the warm drink cabinets before turning away. This coexistence of "boom" and "bust" reflects the complex reality of the warm drink market, where brand enthusiasm is high but sales remain disappointing.
杨玉琳The 'Chinese-style health food' track that Genki Forest and others are eyeing: 'It's highly likely a 10-billion-yuan blockbuster product will emerge'?
Run Kang Pharmaceutical's deputy general manager Guan Yuling told FBIF that it is highly likely a 10-billion-yuan blockbuster product will emerge in the Chinese-style health food track. In recent years, Run Kang has focused on OEM business for Chinese-style health foods, collaborating with brands such as Zishi, Haidilao, Metro, Wanglaoji, Leiyunshang, Tongrentang, and Honeymoon Dessert. From 2021 to 2023, downstream orders continued to grow, prompting Run Kang to expand capacity every six months. Guan Yuling's judgment is based on witnessing sales growth of partner brands and Run Kang's revenue doubling for three consecutive years.
FBIFSnack Discount Retailers in 2024: Small Brands Exit, Giants Aim for 'Terminal Dominance'
The snack discount retail industry is entering a new competitive phase, marked by the formation of a leading tier. In June, the MMHP Group, formed by Snack Busy and Zhao Yiming Snacks, surpassed 10,000 stores and now exceeds 14,000, while the second-place Wanchen Group is close to that threshold. Meanwhile, mid- and lower-tier brands face squeezed survival space, with some franchise stores incurring losses and closures, fueling industry skepticism.
楚勿留香Baijiu Consumption Downgrade: Can Bottled Wine Hold the Bottom?
The trend of baijiu consumption downgrading is unstoppable, and in this context, bottled wine (guangpingjiu) is riding the wave. This raises the question: can bottled wine, targeting mass consumers, hold the bottom for the liquor industry? In fact, the changes in the baijiu consumption market are not simply a reduction in price demand, but the result of an aging consumer base, users' pursuit of high cost-performance products, and the diversification of young people's needs. It should be noted that the 'pyramid structure' created by decades of baijiu marketization is not so easy to collapse. Whether bottled wine can support an important pole in the dumbbell-shaped structure remains uncertain.
杨伟In the Era of Interest E-Commerce, Are Brands Still Important?
Liu Chunxiong discusses whether brands remain important in the era of interest e-commerce, prompted by a question from expert Gong Fanggang. He argues that while newbie dividends can create rapid success, sustainable business requires converting these into stable assets like brands and offline channels, as interest is fleeting and platforms do not provide permanent support.
刘春雄National Benchmark Daily Chemical Distributor Deep Study Tour - Henan Shizhirui Trading, Complete Success!
On November 28, the first stop of the National Benchmark Daily Chemical Distributor Deep Study Tour, Henan Shizhirui Trading, concluded successfully. Within just half a month from announcement to start, registrations far exceeded expectations, with over 110 attendees on the day. Zhang Wenhai, General Manager of Shizhirui Trading, and Yuan Lai, Chief Content Officer of New Distribution and initiator of the Tower Alliance, shared valuable insights. At the post-event dinner, many distributor owners expressed that the tour was highly rewarding. Many followers of New Distribution are curious about why this study tour was organized.
New Distribution"Hold on for two more years; if it doesn't make money, I'll close the shop."
A few days ago, I walked into a small supermarket at the entrance of my residential community to buy a bottle of water. I noticed a thin layer of dust on the shelves and saw that the shelf life of the products was only half a year left. It was clear that sales were sluggish, and the salesperson hadn't visited to tidy the shelves for a long time. Seeing the sparse customers in the store, I chatted with the owner. The couple, trapped in their small shop with low foot traffic and thin profits, shared their struggles.
何雯Traditional Leisure Snack Giants Flounder in the Mire
The rise of bulk snack retail is burning the backyard of traditional leisure snacks. According to iiMedia Research, China's leisure food market grew from 410 billion yuan in 2010 to 1.1654 trillion yuan in 2022, with projections of 1.2378 trillion yuan by 2027, but growth is slowing to under 3% post-2021, while snack collection stores maintain over 10% growth. In this context, the traditional leisure snack giants—Three Squirrels, Bestore, and Lai Yifen—are facing significant challenges, with revenue and profit pressures, store closures, and price wars.
蒙嘉怡Zong Shifu AD Calcium Milk: Putting Zong Fuli and Wahaha's 70 Billion on the Hot Seat
Zong Fuli, China's richest woman, and Wahaha have become hot topics in the food industry. First, the 42-year-old Wahaha leader became China's richest woman with a net worth of 80.8 billion yuan. Then, some Wahaha distributors will sign 2025 contracts with Hongsheng Beverage Group instead of Wahaha, involving 14 markets, accelerating Zong Fuli's divestment from Wahaha. Yesterday, at Wahaha's annual sales meeting, Zong Fuli announced that 'Wahaha has successfully matched its performance scale from ten years ago in 2024,' implying a return to 70 billion yuan in sales.
小满Carlsberg China: Only Chongqing Brewery Left?
The recent transfer of control of a Gansu-listed company has drawn attention in the beer industry. As the former 'Northwest King' of beer, Lanzhou Yellow River has long declined, losing competitiveness in China's mainstream beer market. Therefore, after new shareholders take over, injecting assets to promote restructuring of the listed company has been a plan set over a decade ago. Carlsberg, which jointly operates Yellow River and Qinghai Lake beers with Lanzhou Yellow River, faces a choice: exit completely or take over these assets? Carlsberg China has faced such decisions several times before.
杨伟Zhongxin Food's Ye Zhongfu: The Secret to Heineken's 10-Fold Growth in Taizhou in 5 Years
In an era of unprecedented change, Ye Zhongfu, founder of Taizhou Zhongxin Food, demonstrates that focusing on existing advantages rather than盲目出击 can lead to remarkable growth. By adhering to a differentiated strategy and building strong partnerships, his company achieved over 10-fold growth for Heineken in Taizhou within five years.
陈思廷Chinese-style health drinks that have "simmered" their way to success, backed by young people's "life-extending" anxiety
This year, young people with "awakened blood" have not only embraced a "light wellness" lifestyle but also made Chinese-style health drinks popular. Under the health and wellness trend, Chinese-style health drinks represented by sour plum soup and small hanging pear soup have rapidly risen, becoming consumers' new "water substitute."
FoodailyDialogue with Sharlene Wu, CEO of Grey & AKQA China: To Live Great, Brands Must First Believe in Greatness | Brand Narrative Questions
Can creativity solve business problems? The management classic "Built to Last," first published in 1994, clearly states that most brands that survive across eras share a commitment to corporate culture and values while continuously driving innovation. Sharlene Wu, CEO of Grey & AKQA China, offers a similar answer: "Believe in the power of the brand, persist, and you will win." This confidence is also what has driven Sharlene's deep engagement in the advertising industry for over 20 years.
New DistributionThe Life-and-Death Game of Cigarette and Alcohol Stores
According to the latest data from Qichacha, in 2023, over 180,000 new cigarette and alcohol stores were registered nationwide, bringing the total to 9.05 million. Jiangsu, Guangdong, Hunan, Sichuan, Fujian, Shandong, Henan, Hebei, Anhui, and Hubei rank among the top ten provinces, each with over 400,000 registered stores. Despite the vast market (baijiu over 700 billion yuan, cigarettes over 2 trillion yuan), many stores face survival crises due to e-commerce price wars, consumption diversion, and group-buying failures, leading to a shift toward refined operations.
备受酒商关注的73-Year-Old Chinese 'Daily Chemical King' Sells It
Over 30 years ago, a young man observed that in large shopping malls in Taiwan, China, cosmetics counters were at the entrance, while in mainland China, they were food counters. He saw a business opportunity and founded C-Bons Group, becoming Hubei's richest person. Now, at 73, he has sold his daily chemical care business, including the sanitary napkin brand Jieting, to Haoyue Care for 360 million yuan.
张文静