Xinhua Deep Reading|Time-honored brand renewal: "The same model as people more than 100 years ago", what kind of experience is it?
China's time-honored brand, with an average "age" of nearly 140 years old, has recently made a strong comeback.
"You're still there!" The "white moonlight" in the hearts of those elderly and the "childhood memories" of middle-aged people seem to have passed through a time tunnel and been re-placed in a conspicuous position on the shelves of supermarkets, and even become "Internet celebrities" sought after by young people on e-commerce platforms.
There is only one category of ice cream, with old trees such as Guangming, Madier, Meiyile, and Arctic Ocean opening new "flowers", and new cross-border cross-borders such as Wu Yutai, Moutai, and White Rabbit, and the common purpose is to "circle fans" young consumers.
In most people's impression, time-honored brands are old brands and old products, which have been silently scattered in the market and public view for many years.
According to statistics, there are currently 1,455 Chinese time-honored brands in the country and more than 3,000 local time-honored brands. At a time when China's daily consumer goods production capacity is astonishing and the competition between international and domestic brands is unprecedentedly fierce, where does the explosive power of time-honored brands come from? How to rejuvenate the "new"? Can it be sustained?
(1) The return of the "king".
During this Dragon Boat Festival holiday, time-honored brands are frequently "new":
Turn on your mobile phone, and in the comment area of the micro-movie "World Model" released by Wufangzhai, you can see the comments of "magic" and "Zonglaiwu" everywhere. "Time is sticky, like a kind of glutinous rice, it is flowing, making glutinous rice soft again"...... Through avant-garde images and recitations, the "King of Zongzi" tries to confide and reconstruct the relationship between people and food and people in the process of making zongzi. For several consecutive years, Wufangzhai has launched various "brain hole" blockbusters, which have been labeled as "Wufang Pictures" by netizens.
Zhiweiguan has designed a series of health dumplings in conjunction with the century-old Chinese medicine "Fang Huichun Tang"; Cao Xiangtai put handmade mung bean cake on the shelves one month earlier than last year, which made netizens exclaim that the food circle began to "pet fans".
Beijing, Qianmen Street. The summer rain that came soon could not extinguish the enthusiasm of the young people lining up at the gate of Wu Yutai Tea House.
They waited in line for 9 yuan a tea-flavored ice cream. During the Dragon Boat Festival, the store sells an average of 4,000 ice creams a day, with a one-hour wait at its peak.
"Can I still drive after drinking a soy sauce latte?" Moutai once made headlines with a cup of "sauce latte", and its launch has been the star product of Luckin Coffee ever since.
Cross-border, co-branding, "touching the net", and creating image IP...... Driven by Internet e-commerce platforms and live streaming, many time-honored brands have made frequent moves, putting the "old wine" of feelings into the "new bottle" of the times, so that the products have changed from "few people care" to "drink glass after glass".
On May 13, 2024, at the China Brand Expo held in Shanghai, a staff member live-streamed the goods at the booth of the time-honored Chinese brand "Xinbaotang". Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Wang Xiang
"Time-honored brand, it's quite 'trendy'!" A netizen said with emotion.
According to the Douyin e-commerce report, the number of time-honored merchants who receive revenue on the platform in 2023 will increase by 89% year-on-year, and the number of users who purchase time-honored products will increase by 38% year-on-year. Meituan reported that orders for time-honored brands on the platform increased by 25.6% year-on-year in the past year (as of May 26). According to iiMedia Research, more than ninety percent of consumers in 2023 said they had visited a time-honored Chinese restaurant to consume.
"I feel that many time-honored brands that I had only heard of before have come to my eyes for a while."
In the past year, Huang Qingmiao, a "post-90s" consumer, unexpectedly became familiar with many time-honored brands on Douyin, "thinking of using the same thing as people more than 100 years ago, I inexplicably have a thick resonance."
"Yu Meijing is finally connected to the Internet", "Bee Flower picks up boxes and delivers them", "Vitality 28 Uncle Live Broadcast Saves the Factory"...... Behind the sudden "hot search" of a group of time-honored brands by netizens, is the current consumption "preference" of young people who pursue both cost-effective and emotional connection. The ripple effect is: time-honored brands have been "resurrected" on e-commerce platforms, with "personalities" and hot stalks. Many netizens sighed: "Yo, the time-honored brand is still alive!" ”
Time-honored brand refers to a brand with a long history, products, skills or services that have been passed down from generation to generation, has a distinct traditional cultural background of the Chinese nation and profound cultural heritage, and has been widely recognized by the society and has formed a good reputation. It is understood that in the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China, there were more than 16,000 time-honored brands in the country, and now there are less than 5,000.
The precipitation of time has made the time-honored brand synonymous with a long history, distinctive characteristics, unique craftsmanship and genuineness. However, more than half a century has passed, and the pace of development of time-honored brands has not been consistent.
Some time-honored brands have changed hands several times and have been poorly managed, and their quality has declined; Some "rely on the old and sell the old", and their reputation is lost; Some are trapped in regional development problems, and they are becoming more and more "small"; Some encountered "Li Ghost", and it was difficult to protect brand rights...... The sharp decline in the number of time-honored brands is the result of some time-honored brands not keeping up with the rhythm of the times.
In February 2024, the Ministry of Commerce and other five departments announced the third batch of China time-honored brands, and 382 brands were newly identified as China time-honored brands, bringing the number of Chinese time-honored brands in the country to 1,455. In addition, there are more than 3,000 local time-honored brands.
The average "age" of time-honored Chinese brands is nearly 140 years old. Geographically, Shanghai ranks first with 197 time-honored brands, while Beijing, Jiangsu and Zhejiang are also provinces with more time-honored brands in China, with 137, 113 and 112 respectively.
From firewood, rice, oil and salt to qin, chess, calligraphy and painting, China's time-honored brands cover a total of 32 industries in 7 categories, of which food manufacturing accounts for 18.9%, followed by catering (16.6%), wine and tea manufacturing (15.5%), and retail (12.9%). Arts and crafts and processing and manufacturing are also industries with many time-honored brands.
For today's time-honored Chinese brands, Zhang Lijun, vice president of the China Chamber of Commerce and director of the Time-honored Brand Working Committee, summed up with three "more": pay more attention to the excavation and utilization of historical and cultural resources, focus more on serving the daily life of the people, and emphasize more on playing a leading role in demonstration, "It is gratifying that there are more and more enterprises that have done well in the past two years." ”
Some time-honored brands that have weathered the years have staged the glory of "the return of the king" in this round of competition.
In 2023, Wufangzhai will produce more than 400 million rice dumplings of various types annually. In order to find new growth points, Wufangzhai has set up a non-dumpling business department to explore baking, quick-frozen and other fields, and enter the food supply chain.
"You can only survive if you are constantly responding to market changes." Xu Wei, deputy general manager of Zhejiang Wufangzhai Industrial Co., Ltd., said.
(2) Survive in a changing situation
The market will prosper if it follows the trend, and it will die if it goes against the current. For time-honored brands, this round of struggle is a fate struggle related to life and death.
First of all, the disappearance of lifestyles and consumption scenarios is a fatal challenge.
"The earliest crisis was the advent of the high-speed rail era." Cui Chen, the new generation head of Texas Grilled Chicken, recalled.
Texas Grilled Chicken is a time-honored brand that has grown with the development of slow trains. In recent years, Texas Grilled Chicken has had to turn to open up new consumption scenarios, create local "citizen kitchens", deploy specialty stores across the country, and grasp new online consumption. This is not unique to the experience of time-honored brands.
The "stickiness" of traditional foods to modern consumers is also significantly weakening. "We are worried about whether young people will buy zongzi in the future." Xu Wei said that even if the zongzi is made to the extreme, the brand market share exceeds 30%, which is only billion, and the "cake" of the market is so big.
Obviously, the "rivers and lakes" of time-honored brands have undergone earth-shaking changes, the fierce competition of various brands is unprecedented, and the market share of time-honored brands is hitting the "ceiling".
On the one hand, a large number of new domestic brands have emerged.
For example, nowadays, people eat roast duck, pay attention to cost-effective Ya pear, pursue high quality to go to the whole duck season, Da Dong, and leave the market cake for cheap Fang and Quanjude to get smaller and smaller.
In Chinese pastries, rising stars such as Chef Bao, Zhan Kee, and Luxihe are frequently "new", and cutting-edge brands such as Momo Dim Sum Bureau have received a lot of attention from capital.
There are "Internet celebrity" brands such as Perfect Diary and Huaxizi, which took only 3 years from establishment to listing, and it is popular in Southeast Asia.
On the other hand, in the globalized consumer market, the impact of international brands on time-honored brands is also crushing.
There are also many "time-honored brands" in foreign brands: 69-year-old McDonald's, 114-year-old Chanel, 187-year-old Procter & Gamble, and 289-year-old Treasure Platinum...... In terms of manufacturing costs, product innovation, revenue scale and other aspects, there is still a big gap between many time-honored brands and international brands.
On June 17, 2024, the "2024 Time-honored Brand Carnival - Heartbeat Time-honored Brand" series of summer activities jointly organized by the Ministry of Commerce, Beijing Municipal Bureau of Commerce, Balizhuang Street, Chaoyang District and other units opened. The picture shows people shopping at the summer market. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Li Xin
Whether it is a traditional field or a new track, it has been crowded with new brands competing for traffic and investment institutions that are not bad for money, and the market "battle" has started in various fields such as food, beverages, alcohol, and daily chemicals.
The anxiety of time-honored brands being "picked on by young people" is even more prominent. In the Internet era, young consumers are increasingly able to capture information and distinguish business models, and they pay more attention to the quality and cost performance of goods, rather than just brand awareness. Due to the large room for choice, their loyalty to the brand is not high.
According to the research on the time-honored brand vitality index conducted by Maidi Brand Consulting, there are "four lows" in the development of time-honored brands in terms of brand awareness, purchase conversion, new product awareness, and communication and arrival. The elderly are still the main consumers of time-honored brands.
According to industry statistics, the new generation of consumer groups represented by the "post-95s" only know an average of 19 time-honored brands, those born between 1980 and 1994 know an average of 29, and the "post-60s" and "post-70s" know an average of 41.
"In general, consumers have more and more choices, and some time-honored brands born in the era of material scarcity have entered an era of full market competition, and there is no absolute advantage of industry monopoly or technical threshold." Zhang Lijun said.
It is worth noting that the state's management philosophy and methods of time-honored brands have also undergone significant changes.
"China's time-honored brand has long been no gold medal for avoiding death." Zhang Lijun said.
At the beginning of 2023, the Ministry of Commerce and other five departments jointly issued the "Administrative Measures for the Demonstration and Creation of Chinese Time-honored Brands", proposing to establish a dynamic management mechanism of "entry and exit" to promote the innovative development of China's time-honored brands in accordance with the market mechanism.
At the end of 2023, the Ministry of Commerce will remove 55 brands with long-term poor management from the list of time-honored brands in China for the first time, and require 73 brands with poor operation and declining performance to be rectified within 6 months, which has attracted attention and heated discussions from the outside world for a while.
Among them, the news that the "Zhengyang River" was "delisted" made many Harbin citizens feel regretful and stunned. In the TV series "The World", the protagonist Zhou Bingkun once worked in a soy sauce factory. And the prototype of this soy sauce factory is the Zhengyanghe soy sauce factory in Harbin.
"In the eighties and nineties of the last century, the business of Zhengyanghe Soy Sauce Factory was very good." A person in the condiment industry in Harbin recalled that after the restructuring of Zhengyanghe state-owned enterprises, it was sold several times, but unfortunately none of the bosses were really making soy sauce.
However, it is not so surprising that "Zhang Xiaoquan" was included in the list of "rectification". Zhang Xiaoquan, who was deeply involved in the public opinion turmoil because of the "garlic knife break", was unveiled in the middle of advancing and retreating, and the "face" of 400 years of glory was revealed, exposing the "lining" from corporate culture to corporate management.
The Ministry of Commerce has implemented the identification mechanism of "entering and leaving" and "selecting the best of the best", which has clarified the fundamental law of survival of the fittest in the market.
(3) Reform catastrophe
Outdated organizational structure, lack of human capital and lack of innovation are common dilemmas faced by many time-honored brands.
Many years ago, the famous economist Li Yining pointed out that for most time-honored enterprises, the only way out is to deepen reform, adapt to new changes in the market, and meet the new needs of the market. With a proper system, the management cost will be gradually reduced, and the quality of employees will continue to improve.
"It's harder to change old ideas than to climb to the sky!" Zhao Shuxin talked about his years in Wu Yutai, and deeply felt that the innovation of time-honored brands is much more difficult than ordinary enterprises.
Zhao Shuxin, who took office as chairman of Wu Yutai in 2013, recalled: At the beginning, when the discount promotion was planned, the old employees thought that it would affect the company's gross profit; Promote the upgrading and transformation of the store, the old employees feel that it is not necessary; The implementation of new college students to exercise at the grassroots level, the old employees feel that this is overkill......
The rigidity of the system, the aging of the concept, and the stagnation of progress have been vividly reflected in this time-honored state-owned enterprise.
In September 2020, because of a video of visiting a store and "shouting" from consumers, the century-old brand Goubuli Bun was criticized by the public. Subsequently, Goubuli Group Co., Ltd. issued a statement saying that the store was a franchise store before the group's restructuring and immediately terminated the cooperation with the franchisee of the store.
Although the relationship with the store has been discarded, problems such as declining gross profit margins, delisting, and sharp shrinkage of stores are still plaguing this time-honored brand, which was once known as the business card of Tianjin cuisine.
"Time-honored brands were basically transformed into state-owned enterprises through public-private partnerships, and then underwent state-owned enterprise reform. Some companies have changed thoroughly, while others have not; Some are actively and creatively reformed, and some are passively restructured at the request of the government, which makes the development of time-honored brands face many institutional and mechanism problems. The relevant person in charge of the Ministry of Commerce said.
Break the deadlock and activate the force.
"Every leapfrog development of Lao Fengxiang is through system reform." Yang Yi, chairman of the board of directors of Lao Fengxiang Co., Ltd., said that from the old Shanghai silver building in the Qing Daoguang period to the state-owned gold store in the planned economy era, from the operational difficulties in the early stage of reform and opening up to the fast lane of development after the new century, "reform" runs through the entire development process.
Relying on reform, Lao Fengxiang, founded in 1848, has developed into a listed company integrating R&D, design, production and sales, with nearly 60 member companies - Lao Fengxiang Co., Ltd., which is firmly in the position of the leading brand of gold jewelry in mainland China, and has been selected into the list of "Top 50 Global High-end and Luxury Value" released by international authoritative brand evaluation agencies for many times.
In 2018, Lao Fengxiang Co., Ltd. was selected as a pilot enterprise of the "Double Hundred Action" for the reform of state-owned enterprises. It was this reform that Lao Fengxiang introduced strategic investors such as Guoxin Holdings (Shanghai) Co., Ltd., and it took only 5 months to smoothly solve the problem of equity solidification that had plagued Lao Fengxiang for more than ten years.
On July 29, 2022, the audience took pictures of the "Phoenix Dance Nine Days, Golden Phoenix Crown" exhibited by Lao Fengxiang at the Consumer Expo. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Yang Guanyu
It turned out that at the end of the nineties of the last century, Lao Fengxiang successfully carried out equity transformation, and everyone held shares, which promoted the rapid development of the company for a period of time thereafter. However, due to the lack of a perfect equity exit mechanism, problems such as the difficulty of equity "exchange" for new and old employees caused by equity solidification have gradually emerged.
"From the withdrawal of the original equity to the introduction of strategic investors, we will do things in full accordance with the laws of the market." Yang Yi said that after solving the equity problem of state-owned enterprises according to the market-oriented path, Lao Fengxiang also promoted the reform of the professional manager system, improved the market-oriented selection and employment and salary distribution mechanism, and stimulated the innovation power of operators.
The latest data shows that in 2023, Lao Fengxiang Co., Ltd. will achieve an industrial output value of 50.661 billion, a year-on-year increase of 20.66%; operating income was 71.436 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 13.37%; The total profit was 3.979 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 31.41%.
Untie the shackles and promote new life.
New dishes are introduced every 3 to 4 months, and the style of the store is upgraded every few years...... In recent years, 70% of the customers attracted by Taotaoju, who are over 140 years old, are under the age of 35.
Until the end of 2020, Tao Taoju introduced authorized operators of catering business and high-quality private capital through capital increase and share expansion, completed the company's mixed ownership reform, and the overall brand value exceeded 500 million yuan, realizing the rapid doubling of business performance, asset value, especially brand value.
"In recent years, Taotaoju has taken the lead in experimenting, and through the establishment of the development idea of 'big brand, light assets, and platform', the time-honored brand of Taotaoju, which was once an inefficient asset, has been successfully activated." The relevant person in charge of Tao Taoju introduced.
Today, Tao Tao Ju has broken through the shackles of sticking to the original site and one store at a time, starting from Guangzhou, with restaurants all over Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Chengdu, Xiamen and other cities; From a single store operation to an integrated operation of "online + offline", the average growth rate of sales on Taotaoju e-commerce platform has exceeded 40% in 7 years.
Stir up the "stagnant water" and lead the "catfish".
"In the first two months of this year, our front store sold the whole year's sales, relying on the incentive mechanism. Sell more and get more money, and employees will naturally be motivated. Zhao Shuxin said that the appraisal system will affect income, which in turn will affect the flow of personnel. Some people can't adapt to this mechanism and may leave their jobs. "There are in and out, like a 'river', the enterprise has vitality."
Implement flat management, streamlining the original 16 departments to 7; Implement the grassroots experience of new college students, so that young middle-level managers can carry indicators and pressure...... Over the past ten years at the helm of Wu Yutai, many of Zhao Shuxin's reform measures have been carried out around stimulating the vitality of talents.
Market-oriented employment can stimulate the "catfish effect", so that creative vitality can burst out and wisdom can fully flow.
Since 2021, Guangzhou Light Industry Group, which has 5 time-honored brands in China, 12 time-honored brands in Guangdong and 24 time-honored brands in Guangzhou, has officially implemented the tenure system and contractual management of managers in a number of time-honored brands, and attracted a group of "post-80s" and "post-70s" professional managers to take office through the global "hero post".
"Strive to be capable, and open up channels for people who are in the prime of life, have ideas, and have the ability." Zeng Chenxiang, chairman of Guangzhou Light Industry Group, said.
After a series of personnel reforms, a group of talents who have gone through the professional field and the "real gold tempering" of the market have started a business in the group, and the "catfish effect" has stirred up the development of the enterprise "a pool of spring water". From January to April this year, the company's operating income increased by 7.8% year-on-year, and the total profit increased by 11.2% year-on-year.
For these time-honored brands, it is not easy to get out of the comfort zone, and there are still many time-honored brands that dare not change or will not change. But for those time-honored brands who have the courage to innovate the old and the new, the market is the best return.
(4) Brand evolution
Why do we still "need" time-honored brands? This is the primary issue that all parties need to think about under the market law of survival of the fittest.
"The time-honored brand gives me a sense of closeness and trust." A netizen left a message expressing people's simple feelings for time-honored brands.
In 1669, the fourth generation of Lejia, Le Xianyang, founded Tong Ren Tang Pharmacy in Beijing, marking the establishment of the Tong Ren Tang brand. "Tongren" comes from the Book of Changes, which means: "No matter how close or close you are, you will treat everyone equally." ”
The old shop of Tong Ren Tang on Qianmen Street in Beijing has a story that a patient flew from Guangdong to Beijing in search of a rare Chinese medicinal material, iron falling flowers, that is, iron filings that fall from the hammer when striking iron. For the sake of this penny and gram of "star ash", he has searched all over South China, and finally found this medicinal herb in Tongrentang.
What is a signboard? The genetic code of the enterprise is also.
From the story of finding the iron falling flowers, it is not difficult to perceive the brand value that Tong Ren Tang has adhered to for 355 years. The word "keep" is the foundation of the time-honored brand.
From the cloisonné enamel technique of copper tires, which is known as the national treasure "Jingcui", to the "Ten Bamboo Zhai" in Nanjing, which has profoundly influenced the development of East Asian calligraphy, painting, printmaking and printing. From Wang Xingji's inheritance of national intangible cultural heritage skills and participation in the compilation of vocational training materials such as "Craft Fan Worker", to Rong Bao Zhai's exquisite depiction of Chinese paintings, the "woodblock watermark" technology...... These traditional skills, which have been passed down from generation to generation, are still dazzling today.
Keeping ingenuity, quality, and integrity is the way of enterprise development that will never be "outdated".
Yili Food's "Righteousness First and Profit", Tianfu's "People's Hearts Are Self-Evident, Good as Family", and the time-honored brand is based on virtue and integrity. The strict stitching of the inline liter mille-feuille bottom cloth shoes, and the strict process of restoring ancient books in Chinese bookstores, all demonstrate the craftsman spirit of time-honored brands with quality first and excellence.
It is understood that there are 356 old sites of time-honored brands and more than 7,000 relics related to time-honored brands across the country, which have been registered and announced as immovable cultural relics; Among the 1,455 time-honored enterprises in China, nearly 800 are involved in intangible cultural heritage items, and more than 80 of them are themselves protection units of national intangible cultural heritage representative items.
The history of the business development of a time-honored brand is also a sample of China's social changes and cultural pulse.
From the initial family-owned private enterprise, to the public-private partnership in the early days of the founding of New China, to the pure state-owned enterprises in the era of planned economy, and later to the diversified enterprises with investment subjects in the period of market economy, in the ups and downs of many time-honored brands, a development logic is clearly visible——
Time-honored brands are the product of market competition, and the genes of the market flow in their blood, and only by returning to the market can they continue to evolve.
"There are so many cross-border ice creams, why Wu Yutai's has been selling well for 15 years, because we only add homemade tea powder and pure milk, and nothing else." Zhao Shuxin said that no matter how innovative he is, he can't do without the "housekeeping skill" of making tea.
At the same time, "old traditions can't just be 'lived' in museums. Zhang Lijun said that innovation and change are the key to the "live" of time-honored brands.
"Should the taste change, to what extent, and should the menu be innovative?" Luo Yulin, the head chef of the Yuyuan branch of the old hotel in Shanghai and the fifth-generation inheritor of intangible cultural heritage, said bluntly that he was once very "entangled".
"Young people who buy ice cream today may be repeat customers of raw leaf tea tomorrow." Zhao Shuxin said that attracting young people is to cultivate potential customers, and ignoring young people will be eliminated by the market.
During the Dragon Boat Festival holiday, the Yuyuan branch of the old restaurant in Shanghai is hard to find, and the diners in line are all coming to the main "12 dishes of intangible cultural heritage". For this "signature" menu, Luo Yulin led the kitchen team, just like scientists doing experiments, constantly summarizing and refining the secrets of production, and improving and upgrading them according to the tastes of modern diners.
Wu Yutai's nine-way production skills of jasmine tea, which have been passed down from generation to generation, have been included in the national intangible cultural heritage list and the representative list of human intangible cultural heritage. As the head of Wu Yutai, Zhao Shuxin now devotes a lot of energy to cooperating with scientific research institutes to speed up the research and development of products and production lines.
"Time-honored brands relied on experience in the past, and they must rely on technology in the future." Zhao Shuxin said, "Wu Yutai from a store in Beixinqiao in the past to sell hundreds of catties of tea a year, to now more than 600 stores, selling more than 2,000 tons a year, not only to ensure quality, but also to improve output, without the power of science and technology, how is it possible?" ”
"Baidu Guochao Pride Big Data" shows that in just ten years, "Guochao" has experienced three eras: the 1.0 era of old brand renewal, the 2.0 era of the rise of countless new brands, and the 3.0 era of "two-way output" of national culture and technological pride.
Zhang Lijun said that for time-honored brands, it is necessary to grasp the opportunities brought by the rise of the national tide, and to promote the high-end and quality of national tide products.
This year's government work report proposes to actively cultivate new consumption growth points such as domestic "trendy products". The "Outline of the Strategic Plan for Expanding Domestic Demand (2022-2035)" proposes to "build Chinese brands, cultivate and develop Chinese time-honored brands and characteristic traditional cultural brands". Time-honored brands have gradually released new momentum for reform and development with favorable policies.
The tide of globalization is mighty. From an international point of view, "century-old stores" are a guarantee of quality and a symbol of strength, and half of the German companies selected as the world's top 500 companies have a development history of more than 100 years. As a large country with 5,000 years of civilization and the world's second largest economy, it is necessary to cultivate more "century-old stores" with high gold content.
On May 5, 2024, the 32nd China International Bicycle Exhibition opened at the Shanghai New International Expo Center, and visitors exchanged and discussed next to an electric bicycle at the Phoenix Bicycle booth. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Fang Zhe
At the 2024 China (Shanghai) International Bicycle Exhibition held not long ago, the century-old brand Phoenix participated in the exhibition for the first time with its three sub-brands, Phoenix Electric, FNIX and Maruishi, attracting many fans. Among them, the price of the Phoenix Electric product line, an exclusive sub-brand of lithium batteries, is ten or even dozens of times that of traditional bicycles, which is still in demand, especially favored by consumers in Europe and the United States. According to data from Alibaba International Station, in the first four months of this year, the sales of Phoenix electric bicycles in Germany and Canada increased by more than 15%.
This was unthinkable in the past. At that time, the transmission, known as the "heart" of the bicycle, relied on imports, and China had the title of "bicycle power", and many domestic brands could only be OEM-based, spinning in the low-end market, and "going to sea" did not even have a name.
Nowadays, the time-honored bicycle brand represented by Phoenix continues to "evolve": it not only breaks the "stuck neck" of parts, but also opens up a new power and new track through a complete upstream and downstream industrial chain and an excellent cost control system.
"In recent years, more and more time-honored brands have gone abroad to tell China's brand story to the world, show cultural self-confidence, and become the representative of Made in China to Intelligent Manufacturing in China through the power of science and technology." Chen Lifen, a researcher at the Institute of Market Economy of the Development Research Center of the State Council, said.
Needless to say, the brand reputation and appeal of time-honored brands come with "traffic", and the key to transforming "traffic" into "retention" is to improve product power from playing the "sentimental card" to making consumers pay repeatedly. In other words, if the purchased product meets or exceeds expectations, then consumers will feel that it is "worth it" and trust in the time-honored brand will increase. Otherwise, trust will be reduced.
The market is changing rapidly, but there is also one constant criterion - consumer satisfaction. "Whether a time-honored brand is good or not must be decided by the people." Li Gang, director of the Department of Circulation Development of the Ministry of Commerce, said.
Source: Xinhua News Agency
Reporter: Xie Xiyao, Qu Ting, Pan Jie, Wei Hongyi, Zhou Rui, Yu Yun, Ding Le