In the Spring Festival of 2022, convenient and fast prefabricated dishes such as pepper chicken, Buddha jumping wall, and sheep scorpion, which are quickly popular and appear on consumers' tables.
Prepared dishes refer to dishes made of agriculture, livestock, poultry and aquatic products as raw materials, with various auxiliary materials, washed, cut, matched and pre-processed, and can be eaten directly by consumers after purchase.
1. Development environment
Demand side: The transformation of B-end operation and C-end demand jointly promotes the scale of prepared dishes
B-end: The restaurant's higher operating costs and the improvement of chaining have promoted the development of prepared dishes. On the one hand, the high cost of labor and rent and the trend of gradual increase are common problems faced by catering enterprises. The easy-to-operate, quality-controlled prepared dishes can help restaurants reduce kitchen area, reduce excessive dependence on chefs, etc., and help improve the efficiency and profitability of catering enterprises. On the other hand, with the continuous improvement of the chain rate and concentration of China's catering industry, the requirement for the consistency of dishes has further promoted the development of prepared dishes.
C-end: Lifestyle changes and the increase in the number of singles have jointly driven the demand for prepared dishes. In recent years, with the acceleration of the pace of life, the enhancement of health awareness and the improvement of disposable income, people's requirements for food health and quality have increased. The quality of takeaway materials is difficult to control, and the home cooking process is cumbersome, which is difficult to meet people's requirements for food under the fast-paced life. The characteristics of no cutting, no washing and no matching of prepared dishes save consumers the time of preparation in the early stage of cooking, and also provide consumers with high-quality dishes and tastes, effectively meeting the needs of current consumers for convenient and healthy diet. In addition, prefabricated dishes can meet the needs of single people for "one-person food" such as fast, convenient and small portions, and the increase in the number of "one-person households" also provides demand support for the further expansion of the prefabricated vegetable market. According to the China Bureau of Statistics, the number of "one-person households" exceeded 125 million in 2020, accounting for more than 25%. According to Shell's New Era of Solitude Report, China's solitary rate may exceed 30% by 2030.
Figure: Proportion of "one-person households" households
Source: China Bureau of Statistics, 36Kr Research Institute
Supply side: The increase in the number of participants in the midstream of prepared dishes has driven the growth of the pre-made vegetable industry
Due to the low threshold of prepared dishes, in recent years, the number of enterprises related to pre-made dishes in mainland China has increased year by year. According to Tianyancha data, at present, the mainland has more than 72,000 prefabricated vegetable-related enterprises. The rapid growth of prefabricated vegetable enterprises provides consumers with more categories and taste choices, and promotes the rapid development of the industry.
Basic support: The gradual improvement of cold chain logistics infrastructure supports the distribution of prepared dishes
In recent years, the scale of China's cold chain logistics has increased year by year, and the scope of infrastructure laying has been expanding. The increasingly perfect development of cold chain logistics not only shortens the transportation time of upstream raw materials, but also accelerates the speed of delivery of prepared dishes to users, providing a basic guarantee for the improvement of freshness and coverage of prepared dishes.
2. Development status
Industrial chain structure: it is composed of three parts: upstream raw materials, midstream processing and production, and downstream 2B/2C sales channels
(1) Upstream: supply of raw materials such as agricultural products, animal husbandry, aquaculture, vegetable planting, etc.
(2) Midstream: Food processing enterprises mainly clean, cut and refine raw materials into semi-finished products, and some categories also need to be heated and simply cooked.
(3) Downstream: Downstream consists of 2B and 2C channels. Among them, the 2B channel is mainly sold to catering enterprises; the 2C channel is sold to consumers through e-commerce platforms and offline supermarkets.
Investment and financing situation: The development of the prefabricated vegetable market has rapidly attracted more capital to enter
According to the data of 36Kr and Tianyancha, from 2013 to 2021, a total of 71 investment and financing incidents occurred in the prefabricated vegetable track, and the total amount of disclosed financing exceeded 1 billion yuan, involving 42 projects. From the perspective of financing time, there were peaks in financing in 2015 and 2016, with 14 and 17 cases respectively, and the popularity of the prefabricated vegetable track rose again in 2020, and a total of 23 financing occurred in the prefabricated vegetable track in 2020 and 2021.
Figure: List of investment and financing events in the 2021 prefabricated dish section
Source: Sky Eye Check, 36Kr Research Institute
3. Develop pain points
At present, the industry standards of prepared dishes in the mainland are not perfect, and there are still hidden dangers in food safety. The span of prepared dishes from raw material procurement to processing to sales is long, involving multiple links such as dish processing and cold chain preservation. Limited by cryopreservation technology, ingredients are prone to problems such as dishlessness and spoilage during long-term transportation and processing, which is easy to cause food safety hazards. In addition, according to Anxin Securities data, more than 70% of the prefabricated vegetable processing enterprises are small in scale, and many of them are individual industrial and commercial households to provide services for consumers in the workshop-style production and processing mode, and it is difficult for the industry to meet the standardized production requirements, and there are problems in product quality control.
4. Room for growth
In addition to professional prefabricated vegetable production enterprises, large catering enterprises, food and supply chain enterprises, supermarkets, convenience stores and other enterprises have also entered the market, but compared with developed countries, the mainland prepared vegetable industry has a large space for development. According to Statista data, the total consumption of prepared dishes in China in 2021 reached 1.7472 million tons, and the per capita consumption of prepared dishes was 8.9 kg, far lower than the per capita consumption of 23.59 kg of prepared dishes in Japan. According to NCBD data, it is expected that the size of China's prepared vegetable market will exceed 830 billion yuan by 2025.
Figure: Consumption of prepared dishes in China and Japan in 2021
Source: Statista, 36 Kr Research Institute
Figure: China's prepared vegetable market size and forecast from 2018 to 2025
Source: NCBD, 36Kr Institute