In China, Maotai is a symbol of power.
In the past few years, driven by the top-down policy, Maotai withdrew from the category of official hospitality wine. However, the temperament inherited from official duties, fame and decency, coupled with the unique red culture and scarcity of Maotai, makes a bottle of wine bear more symbolic significance of status and identity than itself.
Maotai equals success, Maotai equals honor and Maotai equals face, which is still the psychological basis of many consumers in China. At the same time, Maotai is facing the challenge of a general e-commerce platform like Pinduo, and their psychological impression to consumers is precisely the low price.
In September, Pinduoduo gave a high-profile subsidy of10 billion yuan to put 500ml 53-degree Tian Fei Maotai on the shelves, which is the core product of Maotai in a narrow sense. The unit price after subsidy ranges from 2369 yuan to 2559 yuan. In fact, it coincides with the double consumption, and the demand for Moutai is increasing greatly. After August, the price of Tian Fei Maotai rose frequently.
Pinduoduo sells Maotai at a price lower than the market price of nearly 1000 yuan, which has attracted market attention.
Maotai Group responded to the media that there was no supply at the company level. As for whether the supply of goods on Pinduoduo comes from Maotai dealers, it is still unknown.
In the past five years, Pinduoduo has changed the pattern of e-commerce in China with a commercial destructive power, the core of which lies in the efficient purchase and realization of traffic. China's complex and huge commodity wholesale system provides Pinduoduo with enough room for price maneuver.
For a long time, offline dealers have occupied a strong position in Maotai's sales system, but the structure is too scattered. The tributary of the channel formed by more than 2,000 dealers made it difficult for Maotai Group to control and there were many problems, which gave Pinduoduo an opportunity.
Maotai's attitude towards Pinduoduo is still ambiguous, except for a response, and there is no other practical action, which is different from Maotai's image of iron-fisted dealers in recent years.
Maotai and tens of billions of subsidies, this is a psychological offensive and defensive war.
The purpose of tens of billions of subsidies for each platform is innovation, which means that they prefer products that are attractive to consumers and have their own drainage ability. If they are "star physique" with their own topics and enthusiasm, so much the better.
Only products with strong brand recognition and stable price system can make the platform feel obvious profit-making space for consumers under the condition of subsidies. From these two perspectives, Maotai is worthy of the platform's favor. Therefore, Pinduoduo is not the only one who has sold Maotai in tens of billions of subsidies.
In the Spring Festival of 2020, it became a partner of CCTV Spring Festival Gala with a cost-effective subsidy of10 billion yuan. Not only did 1 0,000 bottles of 53-degree Tian Fei Maotai sold at the direct retail price of 1 0,499 yuan in the Spring Festival Evening be provided for snapping up, but also the supply was increased during the ten-day holiday, so that more consumers could buy cheap Maotai during the New Year.
It is reported that a considerable part of the goods participating in the Spring Festival10 billion subsidy come from Ali's direct business such as Tmall Supermarket and Tmall International's official direct sales. Tmall itself is a direct marketing channel authorized by Maotai. It is reasonable to launch subsidies within a limited time during the Spring Festival, focusing on "having fun with the people".
Aauto faster also launched 20,000 bottles of 53-degree flying Maotai at the 6 16 quality shopping festival in 2020, with a limited edition of 1699 yuan. In September, follow-up activities such as Aauto Faster JD.COM Double Billion Subsidy, Maotai Super Product Day also briefly appeared 53 degrees flying, and the price has been above 2,000 yuan.
But among them, the role of 53-degree flying is a gimmick and a way to attract users' attention. The main live content and sales content are generalized Maotai except 53-degree flying.
Take Li Xuanzhuo, the anchor of Aauto faster, who has 4.54 million fans, as an example. Some of his live broadcasts will provide the opening benefits of "0 yuan Free Delivery" or "1 yuan spike", 1 bottle or several bottles flying at 53 degrees, and then start to focus on introducing other Moutai wines, such as emphasizing that the Zodiac wine is a Moutai wine with collectible value, which has room for appreciation. "You can collect it yourself or give it away." Some lower-priced Maotai series wines are "cheap to drink at home".
The rationality of Aauto Quicker's subsidy to Maotai10 billion yuan comes from its strategic cooperation agreement with JD.COM retail and the "JD.COM". COM is the first authorized online retailer of Maotai Group, which has always been Liu's pride.
In terms of platform positioning, Aauto Quicker's live broadcast takes Maotai, or the front-end anchor peddles propaganda, and the back-end takes JD.COM's goods for promotion. The words only expand the definition of Maotai in a narrow sense, and the actions only stay at the marketing level, without touching the brand connotation of Maotai.
In contrast, unlike poly-cost-effective, Aauto Quicker's tens of billions of subsidies are mainly concentrated in limited time, or other Moutai wines are sold under the banner of 53-degree flying. Pinduoduo highlights the long-term unlimited subsidies of 53-degree flying.
In May, Pinduoduo held the first food festival and distributed 13000 Zhang Tianfei Maotai coupons in batches within three days, including 3000 coupons from 500 yuan and 10000 coupons from RMB. The actual purchase price after the coupon is 65,438+0499 yuan and 65,438+0899 yuan respectively.
At that time, it was reported that Pinduoduo maintained the low price of 53-degree Tian Fei Maotai for a long time through the joint subsidy between the platform and merchants, and the subsidy price of 1999 yuan in May was "the lowest price in the whole network for large-scale online supply of Tian Fei Maotai".
In this round of1000 billion subsidy in September, each user was limited to two bottles of Tian Fei Maotai, which cost 2,369 yuan, but it was fully supplied during the group war. There is no snapping logic, you can buy it at any time. As of June 9 10, the page shows that the product has been spelled more than 6,800 pieces.
The problem is that Pinduoduo, as an e-commerce, does not have the direct selling qualification of Maotai, nor does it cooperate with other qualified official direct selling channels.
Pinduo, who just turned five, didn't miss Maotai's public e-commerce investment. On July 20 19, Kweichow Moutai Sales Co., Ltd. made its first public investment for the e-commerce platform, and planned to select three comprehensive e-commerce companies to supply 170 tons, 130 tons and 100 tons respectively during the year. In the column of service provider qualification, Maotai put forward the requirements of 1 1, including the main business income of more than 50 billion yuan in 20 18, the liquor sales of more than 500 million yuan in 20 18, the number of registered users of self-operated platforms of more than 50 million, and the coverage rate of offline stores (distribution points) in provincial capital cities of 80%.
By 20 19, Pinduoduo's operating income was just over 30 billion, and there is no offline network covering the whole country. Under the strict bidding conditions of Maotai in black and white, it is impossible to get the bidding ticket. In the end, Tmall and Suning took the lead in winning the bid and became the direct e-commerce officially certified by Maotai. Prior to this, for a long time, in addition to the official online mall of Maotai, the official flagship store of Tmall Maotai and the national liquor Maotai of Alibaba's flagship store, only Brewmaster.com and JD.COM Mall were authorized online e-commerce.
Since there is no way to take the direct channel, Maotai with many products can only come from another set of sales system of Maotai: a large number of offline dealers all over the country. Even after several years of dealer system reform, it is still the weakest link of Maotai Group's control, which also gives Pinduoduo an opportunity.
The establishment and reform of Maotai dealer system has its historical reasons. From the late 1990s to the listing of 200 1, Maotai has just stepped out of the production mode of special supply and approval by the government in the planned economy era, with more than 300 dealers and agents nationwide.
Subsequently, the liquor industry ushered in golden decade. Although some business problems occurred during this period due to the rapid expansion of the distribution network, low-priced sales and low-priced cross-selling occurred from time to time, and the order of the Maotai sales market was disturbed, the overall momentum was still developing rapidly. With the help of the east wind of government consumption, the net profit surpassed Wuliangye in an all-round way and became the first brand of high-end liquor.
At the end of 20 12, the central government issued eight regulations to crack down on public funds for eating and drinking, and the consumption of high-end liquor was forced to temporarily stay away from the logic of power. Then, the "Black Swan" liquor plasticizer incident was superimposed, and the whole industry fell into an adjustment period. The price of Maotai has also fallen all the way. The market price is as low as 8 10 yuan/bottle, even the retail price is lower than the ex-factory price.
Under this heavy blow, expanding the dealer system and opening up the sinking channel to meet the consumer demand of residents has become the new fulcrum of Maotai.
In July of 20 13, Maotai first issued the agency right: paying 30 tons of money at 999 yuan can be exchanged for 3 tons of distribution rights in 9 yuan on August13 the following year; After four months, the price will increase. After completing the original annual sales task, the dealer can increase the sales quota according to the proportion of buying five bottles and getting one free; By April of 20 14, as long as 20 tons of Tian Fei Maotai are sold within two years, they will be qualified as dealers.
The flood irrigation channel expansion, R&D brand strategy and the promotion of low-end product lines have helped Maotai gradually overcome the painful period of transformation, and the overall revenue and profit growth rate have rebounded. With the improvement of the market, the larger profit gap makes dealers return to the mode of "lying down to make money". Under the huge profits, the team system gradually shows the disadvantages of being too bloated and difficult to control. Some dealers hoard, speculate on price increases, and even replace fake wine with real wine, which is chaotic and the reform is imminent again.
At this time, the qualification of Maotai dealers has meant a privilege. The transaction of power and money behind the dealer system, which has been settled for more than ten years, is complicated, and it is very difficult to move its cake.
Yuan Renguo himself was punished by law for "taking advantage of his position to help others obtain the distribution right of Moutai, family distribution and increase the supply of Moutai". And illegally accepting other people's property directly or through a specific related person, the amount is huge. "
2065438+In August 2005, Li Baofang became the general manager of Kweichow Moutai Group, then served as Party Secretary and General Manager of Maotai Group, and took over as Chairman of Maotai Group three years later. Unlike Ji Keliang, who established "technical Maotai", and Yuan Renguo, who created "national liquor Maotai", Li Baofang was the first "top leader" in Maotai's history who was not cultivated internally for a long time.
No foundation means less redundant resistance. From the second half of 20 17, Maotai began to clean the dealer team. For dealers who supply goods to the e-commerce platform privately, the accounts of purchase, sale and storage are not perfect, they do not support the investigation and assessment work of company personnel, and take iron fist measures to investigate the liability for breach of contract or even prohibit the distribution qualification, which is called "Moutai cutting" by the outside world.
According to the 20 18 annual report, maotai reduced 437 maotai liquor dealers that year, accounting for 15% of the total number of dealers last year. Since 20 19, in order to further optimize the layout of marketing network and enhance the overall strength of distributors, Maotai has also eliminated some Maotai-flavor series wine distributors, reducing the number of Maotai-flavor series wine distributors 137 and 503 throughout the year. By the first half of 2020, the number of Moutai liquor dealers will be reduced by 34 again, and the number of Maotai-flavor liquor dealers will be reduced by 293.
Li Baofang also pointed out many times that Maotai's marketing system with specialty stores and special dealers as the main body is gradually becoming single and unsuitable, the market layout is unreasonable, and the self-operated channels and social channels have not formed effective complementarity; The flattening of the market is not high, and the ability to adjust and balance the market is insufficient.
Under the guidance of this idea, Maotai began to develop its direct sales channels. When it signed a distribution contract with the distributor in 20 19, the total distribution supply remained unchanged in 20 17 years, and all the incremental and discount points in the annual sales plan were used to promote marketing flattening. 2065438+April 2009, Maotai issued the first batch of investment announcements for supermarkets and stores in China and Guizhou, and CR Vanguard, RT Mart and Wumart were among the first batch.
A month later, Kweichow Moutai Group Marketing Co., Ltd. was formally established. As a wholly-owned subsidiary of Maotai Group, the new sales company took over some Moutai quotas originally belonging to listed companies, and set up a self-operated network management department, focusing on end customers such as group buying and supermarkets, which complemented the original marketing system. Shortly after the establishment of the new sales company, the tender announcement of the above-mentioned e-commerce platform that Tmall and Suning were finally shortlisted was also released soon.
In June 5438 +2020 10, Maotai signed contracts with KA (key customers) stores in Shandong, Jiangsu and Chongqing. In June, 22 new direct sales channels were signed, including 6 regional KA stores/KLOC-0, 4 vertical e-commerce companies and 2 tobacco retail chains. On this basis, by the first half of 2020, the proportion of Maotai's direct sales will be 5.9% at the end of 20 1 1.7%, and the quarterly Q2 value will reach 15.5438+0%.
The variables of Maotai's sales channel reform come from the personnel changes in March 2020. At the age of 62, Li Baofang, who has been out of service, officially stepped down after achieving the three goals of Maotai's share price exceeding 1000 yuan, market value exceeding 1 trillion yuan and revenue exceeding 1000 billion yuan. Gao Weidong (48 years old), who belongs to the "Airborne School", took over the baton in an all-round way and became the youngest chairman of the key liquor enterprises in China.
The change of the head often means the evolution of the development stage and the change of the development strategy. For Gao Weidong, it takes time to master all aspects of Maotai, a large state-owned group. The special background of this year's epidemic also makes a smooth transition inevitable.
At the exchange meeting of brokers in August, Maotai only said roughly that "there have been some (strategic) changes in Maotai since (Gao Weidong) took office". At present, research has been carried out at the grassroots level, and three lifelines of Maotai's quality, safety and environmental protection have been put forward. Regarding the planning of direct sales, the response is that the proportion of direct sales will increase more on the basis of last year, but the 14 th Five-Year Plan is still being formulated, and there will be clearer goals later.
Such a handover period may also give more products a time window, allowing them to monopolize Maotai in tens of billions of subsidies. At present, Maotai only gives a "no supply" reply and has not taken other practical actions.
There are two different attempts and bottom lines behind this somewhat ambiguous attitude, and they are also attacking and defending in this psychological war.
On the one hand, Maotai may be happy to see the e-commerce subsidy of generalized Maotai except for 53-degree flying. In the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan" and the medium-and long-term development strategic plan of Maotai, it is proposed to vigorously implement the "133 brand strategy", that is, to build a world-class core brand of Tian Fei Maotai, with three strategic brands with Huamao, Elvis Presley and Laimao as the core, including three key brands of China Maotai, Renjiu and moutai prince.
At the annual general meeting of shareholders attended by Gao Weidong for the first time since he took office this year, the fair-price purchase qualification of 1 box of Tian Fei Maotai +2 bottles of Zodiac wine, which has always been an important welfare for the participants, became a gift box sales method, and the gift box included 1 bottle of Tian Fei Maotai+1 bottle of Zodiac wine +6 bottles of series wine. Although this move attracted the general dissatisfaction of Maotai shareholders, it was enough to show the group's attempt to innovate the product matrix.
Series liquor is a moat built by Maotai to prevent other liquor brands from being in the low-end market. And in 53 degrees Tian Fei, because the geographical area of the core producing area is fixed, the production capacity is fixed, and the annual stock, output and consumption of base wine are clearly figured out and accurately calculated by various securities analysts, series wine, as a by-product of Tian Fei Maotai, may also become a reliance to promote the future performance development of listed companies.
However, at present, the revenue ratio of series wines to Maotai is only about 10%, which is still low. Pinduoduo can provide a way for a series of wines to reach consumers directly in the sinking market, which is also the cooperation space of 10 billion subsidy platforms such as Maotai and Pinduoduo. In this sense, Aauto is faster than others. Li Xuanzhuo sells the Zodiac Maotai in the name of value-added and collection, and encourages Laotie to buy Laimao on the grounds of "giving gifts with noodles", which is what Maotai and the direct selling system are happy to see.
On the other hand, it is also a sharp contradiction, and it has been flying at 53 degrees. Maotai, as a daily consumer product supported by consumption power and huge distributors, has long played the role of "hard currency" and "scarce goods", and is also an important pillar supporting Maotai's 2 trillion market value and foreseeable valuation space. Therefore, the 53-degree flying with a very high brand premium is only allowed to be "bullish and not bearish".
This brand logic supported by strong premium is in direct contradiction with the emerging e-commerce subsidy logic that emphasizes low price and high quality.
Among them, the subsidies of Juhua and Aauto Quicker can be accepted by Maotai because their sources are all direct channels. The direct selling channel itself can increase profits for Maotai, and at the same time, it can also be used as a throughput hub to undertake the original quotas of illegal dealers in Maotai, and release these quotas at specific time points to assume the role of price stabilizer.
On the basis of Maotai's strong control, the downstream channels will carry out limited profit promotion out of their own pockets, as long as it is within the controllable range, it will not have much impact on the positioning and image of the brand itself.
There are many products that lack supply-side advantages, so we can only open a breakthrough from the consumption side to sell Maotai. From the beginning, we should not only focus on subsidizing the core product of 53-degree flying, but also provide sufficient subsidies that can be bought at any time, which captures the psychology of consumers-the 53-degree Maotai full of aura is not high above, and you can also buy it at any time at a low price.
This psychological suggestion to consumers is the most taboo part of Maotai Group.
From this deduction, once Pinduoduo forcibly copied this price promotion game from the direct sales channel to the dealer channel of Maotai, the price system of core products was once again challenged by the weakest link, and it was difficult to consider the degree of the value premium of Tian Fei Maotai in consumers' minds.
Moreover, a lot of goods can not eradicate the problem of counterfeit goods, and in the unauthorized pure gray area, it may also bring great damage to the brand image of Maotai.
Although Maotai's attitude towards e-commerce channels is harsh, it is not completely rejected, and it is difficult for Maotai, which has great protection, to continue to make a free explosion in Pinduoduo's tens of billions of subsidies. Although Pinduoduo has been looking for space in the wholesale system for a long time, negotiations and business contacts between the two sides should be under way. How and how Pinduoduo gets the authorization is also a problem worthy of attention in the future.
Before all this is clear, it is related to the special consumer psychology and price trend of this special brand. Maybe what Pinduoduo should do is: "Don't advertise".