The "price war" triggered by a durian layer reveals the ultimate "involution" of the new retail track. Behind the "price war" is the competition between supply chain and commodity chain.
Since the beginning of this year, with the promotion of policies, instant retailing has entered the fast lane. It used to be "the next day" and "half-day", but now the distribution efficiency of major e-commerce platforms has evolved to "hourly". In order to catch up with this express train, the traditional Shangchao department store has also continued to overweight, and both online and offline efforts have been made to broaden its business model and sales channels.
Keywords: price war
At the end of July this year, Box Horse offered a "moving mountain price", which was on the verge of a "price war" with Sam member stores. Box Horse reduced the price of some of the same goods in Sam, and Sam also bit the price and adjusted the price. Some representative commodities have experienced a decline of 30% to 40%.
In August, when Box Horse introduced 99 yuan durian Melaleuca, the price of Sam durian Melaleuca was reduced from 128 yuan to 98.9 yuan. Then the box horse dropped to 89 yuan, and Sam was transferred to 1 yuan, which was lower than the box horse. In the end, Box Horse reduced its price to 79 yuan and Sam to 85 yuan.
The "war" started from a durian thousand-layer cake continued to spread. Almost at the same time, the US Mission quietly launched a tug-of-war price for buying vegetables. A box of hemp potatoes cost 14.3 yuan, which is cheaper than a box of horses in 0.6 yuan. RT Mart launched a "no noise price" and launched 10.9 yuan/box of hemp potatoes and 9.9 yuan /10 flowers and other commodities.
Some people think that it is foreseeable that in the pursuit of cost-effective consumption trend, having stable and low-cost supply sources will undoubtedly increase the competitive advantage of platforms and brands, and the "price war" competition will eventually be the competition between supply chains and commodity chains.
Keywords: Hours of arrival
At the beginning of this year, Document No.1 of the Central Committee clearly stated for the first time that "new modes such as joint distribution and instant retail should be vigorously developed". In July, the notice of the general offices (offices) of 13 departments, including the Ministry of Commerce, on printing and distributing the "Three-year Action Plan for Comprehensively Promoting the Construction of a Quarter-hour Convenient Living Circle in Cities (2023-2025)" showed that it supported the development of online and offline instant retail mode, empowered physical stores and expanded the service radius. According to the data released by the Ministry of Commerce at the end of September, in 2022, the number of instant retail orders exceeded 40 billion, and the market size reached 504.286 billion yuan. It is expected that the scale will triple again in 2025.
At the national level, the development of instant retail is encouraged to accelerate the industry into the fast lane. In this context, major e-commerce platforms and even traditional supermarkets and department stores continue to exert their strength.
In March this year, Taobao released a notice about adding the "hourly service specification of Taobao", and Taobao plans to add the "hourly service specification", which will take effect on March 31. At the end of March, Boxma Xiansheng announced that it would expand its coverage and provide "one-hour service" for areas 3-5 kilometers away from the store. In September, JD.COM released the strategy for 2024 when he arrived home, which mentioned that he would focus on all categories, "hourly delivery" and platformization, and the user scale of JD.COM’s "hourly delivery" service would increase by over 50% within three years. In October, Tik Tok platform added an independent entrance of "Hour Reach", and users can search for "Hour Reach" on Tik Tok to go to the corresponding page. Tik Tok’s "Hour Reach" cooperative businesses include local stores such as Yonghui Supermarket, Dingdong Shopping, wu mart and Qixian Supermarket.
During the period of double 11, Intime Department Store, Chongqing Department Store, Youa Shares, Kaide MALL and other physical department stores have launched various types of shopping card group purchase and theme live broadcast activities in Meituan and Public Comment, and cooperated with live broadcast platforms and third-party distribution. Some people think that the local Shangchao brand has a solid local word-of-mouth and store network, and with the help of the local retail platform, it can further improve the conversion efficiency of goods from planting grass to buying. In the future, the cooperation between Shangchao and the retail platform is expected to become the new normal of digital operation of local Shangchao.
Keywords: discount snacks
Discount snacks have become the "top stream" of the retail industry this year. In September, Wanchen Group announced the merger of its brands "Laiyoupin", "Haoxianglai", "Yadi Yadi" and "Lu Xiaochan", and the unified brand after the merger was "Haoxianglai brand snacks". According to its official website, up to now, Haoxianglai has more than 5,000 stores nationwide, and it is rapidly expanding at the rate of adding 500 stores every month. It is planned to become the first brand with 10,000 stores in the industry by the end of 2024. In October, Hunan "Love Snacks" announced the holding of Shaanxi "Snack Bubble", which is the third acquisition of "Love Snacks" this year; In the same period, the "Snack Cabin" strategy integrated all the stores of the Guangdong brand "Snacks" and announced that the number of stores exceeded 600. In November, Zhao Yiming Snacks and Busy Snacks, two domestic brands of discount snacks, officially announced a strategic merger, with more than 6,500 stores after the merger.
Under the trend of cost-effective consumption, the county has become the main expansion area of snack sales. The person in charge of snacks in Zhao Yiming once revealed to the media that more than 2,800 county-level administrative regions in China have provided enough market space for brands to realize the chain scale of ten thousand stores.
Some people think that the discount trend of snack chain channels is becoming more and more obvious. However, at present, the business models of many snack brands in China are almost the same, and the snack discount industry is still in fierce competition. Snack discount brands need to explore more advanced business models to increase competition barriers.
Beijing News reporter Yu Guigui
Editor Wang Lin
Proofread Liu Jun
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