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 56 of 196
World Book Day: Yangyuan Six Walnuts Teams Up with Fan Deng for a Knowledge Feast
On April 23, World Book Day, Yangyuan Six Walnuts partnered with Fan Deng, founder of Fan Deng Reading APP, as the 'Chief Knowledge Partner' to present a knowledge feast themed 'Knowledge Evolution: Answers in Books'. This collaboration underscores the brand's commitment to knowledge marketing and its focus on brain health nutrition.
澄韵New Consumption One Year After Listing: Who Is the Biggest Loser? Who Is the Money-Making Machine?
New consumption is a gorgeous robe, but in the annual reports one year after listing, it reveals a thin lining. A year ago, new consumption companies saw a wave of listings; now, with the disclosure of annual reports, it's time to see who is truly capable. Recently, five 'first stocks' of new consumption have released their 2021 results: Yixian E-commerce (Perfect Diary), Pop Mart, Betaini (Winona), Naixue's Tea, and Helens.
开菠萝财经团队Why Is It Hard for Big Brands to Innovate Successfully?
Innovation is often attributed to luck, but big brands launch numerous new products each year, yet many fail within a year. Despite having ample R&D capabilities, consumer insights, and distribution channels, big brands like Coca-Cola, Nongfu Spring, Uni-President, and Master Kong struggle to sustain successful innovations. The core issue lies in organizational rigidity, path dependency, and the mismatch between new products and existing marketing systems. To innovate successfully, companies need to create an organizational system that fosters innovation, such as establishing a 'Blue Army' unit with autonomy and modular organizational structures.
赵波Going Offline: The Urgent Task for Brand Owners is Dealer Sorting
In late 2013, Nongfu Spring's annual sales had just exceeded 10 billion yuan, but growth hit a bottleneck, prompting the company to reform its dealer network. As an assistant to the operations director, I developed five evaluation indicators for dealers—supply chain capability, financial strength, channel coverage, operational efficiency, and organizational strength—and successfully adjusted several dealers. This reform proved crucial for future growth. The article emphasizes that brand-dealer cooperation success depends on matching, and provides frameworks for evaluating dealers, including six key capability indicators and three critical points for adjustment.
高级研究员 海游Strength Recognized Again: Blue Moon Laundry Detergent Tops for 13 Consecutive Years, Hand Soap for 10 Consecutive Years
On April 22, the "2022 (30th) China Market Commodity Sales Statistics Results Press Conference" was held in Beijing. Blue Moon continued to lead, with its laundry detergent ranking first in market share for 13 consecutive years (2009-2021) and hand soap for 10 consecutive years (2012-2021).
New DistributionWho Is the Leader of China's Beverage Market?
As the 2022 beverage peak season approaches, the market sees new faces and products quietly disappearing. After reviewing the top 10 beverage brands in China, this article outlines their main products, market plans, and development directions, offering a glimpse into the latest trends. In China's beverage market, annual revenue exceeding 10 billion yuan is a threshold; above that, brands typically secure a top-10 position, while those exceeding 20 billion may enter the top 5.
王辰、齐成Unlocking the BbCc Link: New Product Hits the Market in 3 Months—Why Shahe Tequ's Digitalization Deserves FMCG Industry Attention?
This year, New Distribution has extensively covered bC integration and channel digitalization cases, mostly from leading brands. However, their methods may not suit smaller brands due to differences in scale and resources. In a recent in-depth exchange with Cao Jinqiang, Marketing Director of baijiu brand Shahe Tequ, we explored their innovative "3 x 3" model. Without any advertising spend, they leveraged 10 core terminal stores, 100 big C customers, and 1,000 precise users to achieve rapid market activation: 50 boxes per store monthly, 800 boxes per county, and market ignition within three months. This practice offers valuable insights for the entire FMCG industry.
任文青AndyPartnering with Olympic Champion Guo Jingjing, Master Kong Packaged Drinking Water Earnestly Crafts 'National Good Water'
Despite the global economic downturn, China's packaged drinking water industry continues to grow against the trend. Data shows that in 2020, sales volume increased by 16.78% year-on-year, with sales revenue up 7.04%. The Drinking Water Professional Committee of the China Food and Drug Promotion Association predicts that the market is entering a new phase of development and upgrade, with household consumption becoming a key growth driver. Focusing on healthy home hydration and expanding indoor water usage scenarios has become the keyword for 2022. Recently, Master Kong Packaged Drinking Water announced Olympic champion Guo Jingjing as its brand ambassador, further deepening its brand proposition of 'Choose Peace of Mind, Choose Health' and strengthening its position as 'national water' in household scenarios.
New DistributionFrequent Occurrence of Large-Age Inventory: How to Resolve This "Brand Red Flag"?
With the recurring pandemic, the issue of large-age inventory has become one of the more prominent problems for manufacturers and distributors. How to effectively avoid the generation of large-age inventory and minimize losses across the supply chain? Based on past experience, the author offers suggestions and digital application cases to inspire manufacturers and distributors. At its core, large-age inventory arises when the quantity of goods purchased exceeds the speed of sales, leading to slow-moving stock—a dynamic process. Causes include inaccurate distribution, overstocking, channel disruptions due to unexpected events, and poor customer inventory management. Solutions require both preventive measures and post-event handling.
邢仁宝Consumer Disconnect: A Brand's Nightmare
Many FMCG brands beloved by the post-70s and post-80s generations are losing favor with the post-90s and post-00s. This is often attributed to product aging or changing consumer needs, but the real issue is a disconnect caused by tactical, executional, and strategic misalignments. To avoid this, brands must engage consumers across all age groups through multi-dimensional touchpoints and adapt to evolving consumer behaviors.
高级研究员 海游Tea Drink Market Sees Ice and Fire, Meco Honey Valley Juice Tea Stands Out!
Is tea a good business? The answer is yes. In 2021, new-style tea drinks surged, with financing rounds and amounts hitting record highs, and '10,000-store brands' and 'new tea stocks' emerged. At the same time, fierce competition led to closures of many internet-famous brands. Amid this 'ice and fire' scenario, the industry is focused on segmentation and integration. Meco Honey Valley Juice Tea has carved out a new category and achieved phenomenal success.
田静Fanta's 'Double Standards' and Coca-Cola's Weakness
Fanta orange has been accused of using different ingredients in the UK and China, sparking a 'double standards' controversy. As Coca-Cola's carbonated drinks already face declining sales, this adds to the company's challenges.
财天作者SMEs: Don't Build a Brand and Die, Build a Brand and Die?
This article uses data from the National Advertising Research Institute's top 100 case studies to prove that brand building is an art that reduces trust costs and increases transaction premiums, while traffic is just a tactic. It argues that SMEs should adopt a dual-wheel strategy of brand and traffic, with a recommended initial budget ratio of 3:7 for brand versus traffic, and provides examples like Ulike, ibaby, and Daily Black Chocolate to illustrate the benefits.
陆星集Beverage Entrepreneurship: Starting with 100 Sports Venues, 100 Refrigerators, and 100 Scene Ads
Beverages, as the category with the largest market capacity and the most frequent and rigid demand in FMCG, have always been the first choice for entrepreneurs in the industry. However, despite the large capacity and steady growth, it is not easy for entrepreneurs to truly make a name for themselves. This article discusses two types of beverage entrepreneurship: those that are flashy but not profitable, and those that are profitable but lack innovation. It then delves into the case of Yuaneng Sports Drink, which started by securing 100 sports venues, 100 refrigerators, and 100 scene ads, and shares insights on finding opportunities in a red ocean market and executing a ground-level strategy.
袁来Frequent Hits: Deconstructing a1 Snack Research Institute's Marketing Methodology
In March 2022, a1 Snack Research Institute held its '2022 New Product Strategy Launch Conference', releasing this year's bakery new products and introducing the meat product line 'a1 Love Meat'. At the same time, a1 partnered with spokesperson Yang Yang to attract consumers through interactive marketing, and formed a strategic cooperation with Xinchao Media to leverage community elevator media nationwide for strong brand exposure. As an FMCG brand established less than six years ago (founded in 2016), achieving such high visibility is rare. Of course, it's not just visibility; in the market, they have also produced frequent hits...
秦淮From Smartphone Influencer to 125 Million Yuan Annual Sales of Ocean Snacks: Founder of 'Mr. Beaver' Shares Deep Insights and Reflections
Lu Ning, founder of the ocean snack brand 'Mr. Beaver', reflects on his entrepreneurial journey, from selling smartphones in college to building a company with 125 million yuan in annual sales. He shares lessons from two major crises, his strategic focus on cod snacks, and his approach to expanding into offline retail channels.
任文青AndyWho Killed Chewing Gum?
Chewing gum is a category that has almost always been a product that manufactures demand. From childhood fears of swallowing it to rumors about its ingredients, gum has been a constant presence. However, with the rise of mobile payments and changing consumer habits, the Chinese gum market has declined from its peak of 12 billion yuan in 2014 to 10.1 billion by 2018, leading to a loss of its former glory.
IC实验室Undercurrents in New Consumption: Traffic-Driven Companies Abandoned, Yet Some Players Thrive
Since consumption is an industry with a long slope and thick snow, those who believe in it should continue to believe. This is a compilation of first-hand information from the recent consumption industry. In the past month, '暗涌Waves' has learned from multiple sources about financing progress of key consumer companies or institutions, including Florasis, Saturdance, HotMaxx, and Meituan Longzhu. Over the past two years, the new consumption industry has experienced rapid rise and cooling, largely due to massive capital injection and unrealistic expectations.
任倩 刘旌A Comprehensive Overview of Major Players and Business Models in China's Pre-prepared Dish Market
In 2021, the pre-prepared dish market reached 340 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 18%, and was listed by Tmall as one of the top ten trend products for Double 11. Currently, Chinese households spend an average of 1 hour and 35 minutes per day on cooking, and compared to 2000, 45.9% of families have reduced their kitchen cooking time by about 45 minutes. Compared to cooking or waiting for delivery, pre-prepared dishes are undoubtedly a time-saving and labor-saving choice. With their pre-processed product characteristics, the dishes cooked are not only of high quality but also better meet health and safety requirements in terms of raw materials and nutritional pairing.
胡钶A 30-Billion-Yuan Blue Ocean: What Kind of Business Are Expiring-Food Stores?
A bottle of French Perrier water, normally priced at 12.8 yuan, sells for 5 yuan here; a can of Lay's chips, usually over ten yuan, can be bought at half price. Expiring-food stores, represented by HotMaxx, are sweeping through first-tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou. According to iiMedia Research, China's total snack sales reached 3 trillion yuan in 2020, implying a potential market supply of at least 30 billion yuan. With such promising prospects, capital has poured in. In 2020...
李树烽Forget Demographic Targeting: The Way Out for Small and Medium Brands
Demographic targeting has a flaw: traditional thinking is dooming products' futures, and the golden rule we always cite is sending many products and brands down a dead-end road. A flaw overlooked by everyone has put demographic targeting on a pedestal. Should we now demote it, or view it with skepticism? The answer lies in our marketing practice. Let's search for the truth with doubt. A CEO might say: 'My product is designed for young people, with super competitive selling points, a new-generation substitute, a large market capacity, and it fits the target group's lifestyle, with pricing aligned with channel promotion interests.'
张大力A Bottle of Baijiu at 1388 Yuan: Is Wahaha Really Selling Liquor or Just Testing the Waters?
Wahaha enters the baijiu industry, but what are its chances of success? In recent years, the 'sauce-flavor baijiu craze' has swept the entire industry, attracting capital from various sectors. Following Lenovo's acquisitions of liquor companies like Hunan Wuling and Shandong Kongfujia, beverage giant Wahaha has also entered the fray with its own product, 'Zong Shuai Jia Jiu'. A 500ml bottle of sauce-flavor baijiu retails at 1388 yuan, even higher than Moutai 1935, and features the Wahaha logo on the bottle.
唐伯虎Facing Product-Type Decline, How Can Brands Create Super Single Products?
In the FMCG industry, apart from channel and brand strength, is the product itself the core competitiveness of an enterprise? Yes and no. Yes, because some non-first-tier brands have quickly captured leading category positions with their products, while some first-tier brands have seen all efforts wasted due to product issues. No, because the underlying logic is that today's FMCG market will not sustain a brand solely on one super single product; the core competitiveness is not the product itself but the brand's ability to create products. For example, Nongfu Spring's new products are highly likely to lead in their categories, and it is this product creation capability that is the core competitiveness.
高级研究员 海游New Consumer Brands Are Creating "New Blood" from 9 Directions
Previously, many new consumer brands could quickly gather their first batch of "supporters" by positioning in niche tracks and using influencer marketing and high-aesthetic products. However, after the limited "category dividend" is consumed, converting consumers into brand fans is no longer easy. As the dividend fades, Morketing observes that new consumer brands are creating "new blood" by deeply cultivating "internal strength" from different directions to build brand barriers.
Morketing