Text丨Song Meijia
enemies, and other people.
Behind the intensification of competition in the mass snack track, friction and targeting are indispensable.
However, from the past development of successful enterprises, we can understand a truth, the more current the more we can see the pattern and mind of an enterprise, which often determines how far the enterprise can go.
Recently, a battle on the snack track is quite interesting.
1. "We beat people"
In the past two years, as a bright new star in the consumer field, the mass snack track has been making great progress and has become a bright spot under the new normal of the economy. Competition is not only the fierce confrontation of the number of stores, but also those impulsive folk tales.
On June 10, people in the industry swiped the Douyin blogger Love Snacks Dasheng (the founder of Love Snacks) to post a video: "We beat people, I was impulsive, I apologized to the person in charge of their project, and I also wrote a letter of guarantee to the police, and I also received education."
On June 13, Ai Snack Dasheng released another handwritten statement on his account, which reads as follows: I, Tang Guangliang, on the morning of June 8, 2024, in the Hunan Branch of Wanchen Company, an office building in Changsha Yunda Central Plaza, carried out excesses against Liu Zequn, an employee of Wanchen's brand, because of impulsiveness. I am deeply aware of my mistakes and possible legal consequences, and I sincerely apologize.
At the same time, I voluntarily promise that I will never do any illegal things to Wanchen Group and Haoxianglai Company in the future, and I will never publish any false or offensive remarks or videos on the online platform.
In this regard, we contacted Wanchen Group to understand the situation. "It's true, but it's been resolved." Under our questioning, the relevant person in charge said:
"The snack industry has developed very rapidly this year, we understand the pressure of Mr. Tang as an entrepreneur, however, the incident involves the personal rights and personal dignity of employees, the group attaches great importance to it, and reports to the public security organs and other relevant departments as soon as possible, and the relevant units enforce the law impartially, the parties have received education, publicly apologized, and obtained the understanding of employees, the employee problem is solved, and the matter is solved."
The owner of the account that posted the video on Douyin is none other than Tang Guangliang, the founder of the new mass-selling snack brand. It is understood that because of the "flop", that is, the snatching of stores, the two sides of the incident clashed and even moved.
2. Intensified competition in the snack industry?
With the issuance of the apology statement, the untrue remarks related to this matter against Wanchen Group and its Haoxianglai brand have also disappeared.
The peaceful resolution of this incident has sent a positive signal to the entire industry, and individuals have responsibilities and enterprises have minds. At the same time, it also warns the brands in the torrent of competition in the deep mass snack track that maintaining rationality and advocating friendly competition is the key to achieving win-win development.
Tianyancha information shows that Love Snacks was established in 2020 and co-founded by Tang Guangliang and Dai Shanhui (who quit in 22). It was also reported that after the community group buying food sharing project was blocked, the next project was started - Love Snacks.
It is understood that Ai Snacks has been stationed in Hunan, Hubei, Sichuan, Chongqing, Jiangxi, Shaanxi, Guizhou seven provinces and cities, with a total of more than 1,400 stores.
In August last year, Ai Snacks controlled the local mass snack chain brands Dinosaur and Teddy in Chengdu, and acquired Guizhou Hu Weihong Snacks in September of the same year, which achieved rapid growth in stores.
However, it is worth noting that even according to the current total of 1,400 stores, the volume of love snacks is also ranked behind the mass sales of snacks.
The number of stores has grown rapidly in the past year, and the official website shows that the number of stores has exceeded 6,500, and public data shows that the number of stores is still opening rapidly, with an average of about 900 stores per month.
It can be seen that the two are not the same volume level.
Since the beginning of this year, Ai Snacks wants to rapidly expand the number of stores, according to the widely disseminated Ai Snacks franchise strategy on social platforms, Ai Snacks will walk on the road of Wandian brand as the benchmarking object.
According to the online franchise strategy, the new franchise policy of Love Snacks in the second half of 2024 states that the new franchise stores will receive a subsidy of 200,000 yuan for opening stores within 300 meters of the diameter of the "A Want to Come" brand, 300,000 yuan within 100 meters, and 400,000 yuan within 50 meters.
In the process of rapid development of the industry, the competition has become more intense.
The first is that there have been many mergers and acquisitions in the industry, which means that the situation of big fish eating small fish may continue to occur in the future, and companies with small number of stores, poor sales performance, and low consumer mental rankings will be more disadvantageous in the competition.
Secondly, although the total amount of the industry is improving, the objective situation of the market is that there is still an upper limit to the total amount, which means that in every city and every commercial district, the snack stores in the minds of consumers will have first-mover advantages, brand advantages and experience advantages, and occupying these advantages will become the key to the development of enterprises.
This may also be the root cause of the "gaffe" of love snacks in the face of high competition.
3. In the period of rapid growth of the industry, it is necessary to find a good ecological niche
At present, the mass snack track has entered a period of rapid growth with fierce competition, but the competition still has to maintain the bottom line.
Although Jianghu gas is a bad phenomenon of competition in some fields in the past, it is interpreted as wolf nature and Jianghu gas, which may be misleading for some brands.
What determines the market outcome is still the strength of the enterprise itself, as well as the choice of competitive niche at the critical moment, the so-called vision-strategy-execution.
For example, the new tea drink has been the hottest track in China in the past five years, but we can see that due to the different positions of different brands, there are still multiple brands coexisting in such fierce industry competition.
For example, Heytea and Naixue's tea, which take the high-end route, have not made mid-range brands such as Tea Baidao and Shanghai Auntie disappear, and Mixue Bingcheng, which has taken the sinking market and low-price strategy, has more than 30,000 stores in China, and there are still sinking brands such as Tianlala.
In addition, Bawang Tea Ji and Tea Yan Yuese, with the freshness of the bottom tea, have also stepped out of the differentiation with Chayan Yuese, and have received a good market response, in turn, Chayan Yuese has not been invaded by alien species by virtue of its deep cultivation in the Hunan market.
Therefore, in the period of rapid growth in fierce competition, the sooner you find the ecological niche, the better you can survive to the end, on the other hand, if you hit it hard, it will not benefit anyone.
On the other hand, taking 10,000 steps back, the market does encourage free competition, but the premise of free competition is compliance with laws and regulations, and the situation of beating people with their fists is not allowed at any time.
In any industry, competition is an important driving force to promote the development of the industry, and it is an important way to promote innovation, optimize resource allocation, and improve the overall industry level.
Enterprises in each echelon can find their own survival and development strategies in the competition, and the leading enterprises use their economies of scale, brand effect and operations, research and development capabilities, often leading the development trend of the industry and setting high standards; Enterprises at the waist level and below are deeply cultivated in specific fields through strategies such as flexibility, market segmentation, and rapid response to customer needs, so as to achieve characteristic survival and development.
In short, harmonious coexistence, rational competition, and jointly shaping a diversified and dynamically balanced industry pattern are the right way to promote the healthy and sustainable development of the entire industry.