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This also shows that different consumer products have different life cycles. In the past, we always said that all consumer products are worth redoing. This may be possible in a 20-year cycle, but may not be applicable in a short cycle of 2-3 years. But no matter how the cycle changes, it is undeniable that only good products can lead consumer brands through the cycle.
How can I find a good product? There is a current discovery in the investment circle that as the general trend of consumption upgrading continues, the value of some traditional industries and even upstream supply chains is getting higher and higher. Segmented tracks and companies with core product capabilities, high entry barriers, and growth dividends have been targeted by a group of investment "falcons".
Yu Taiping, a Chinese tuna industry chain enterprise, is the high-quality standard in this corner.
Seizing the characteristics of tuna food being acclimatized and domestic consumption upgrading, Yu Taiping focused on raw material upgrades, quality upgrades, and health and nutrition upgrades. Finally, with three brand matrices, children's nutritional food brand Yukai, pre-packaged table nutritional food brand Yu Taiping, The tuna-themed restaurant brand Yuqianli is gradually opening up the domestic tuna market.
has delved into polishing the industry chain and product quality, and accurately operated value marketing for high-consumer groups. After gaining a certain reputation, Sun Xiaotong, founder of Yu Taiping, has a bigger goal - to create a leading brand of children's snacks in China and provide more Chinese children with Better tuna food.
I believe that many people’s impression of tuna is still in the sashimi stage. In a popular TV series "The First Half of My Life" a few years ago, in order to please his girlfriend, Jinling Hehan spent tens of thousands of yuan to buy a piece of top-quality tuna for Tang Jing and ate it at the Japanese restaurant they often went to. Of course, the tuna that most people are exposed to is not that expensive, but it is still a high-end ingredient.
As people’s awareness of food safety and health has increased in recent years, tuna has also ushered in a consumption boom in China.
Data shows that although domestic tuna sashimi consumption accounts for less than 10% of the world's total, domestic consumer demand has increased by about 30% annually in the past ten years. China has soared from zero consumption of ultra-low-temperature tuna ten years ago to over 20% of domestic sales in 2019. million tons, especially in coastal cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.
Sun Xiaotong estimates that based on the domestic annual catch of more than 400,000 tons and the added value after processing increased by 10-15 times, the domestic tuna food market is about 100 billion in size.
This change stems from the high-end nutritional value of tuna. Tuna is a highly migratory fish in the ocean. It is located in the deep sea and has less contact with seriously polluted offshore waters. It has the characteristics of no pollution, high protein, no purine, low fat and low calories, and multi-dimensional nutrition. It is known as the "best product of the deep sea" "The King of Fishes" is also one of the three most nutritious fish recommended by the World Nutrition Society.
Tuna is praised for being rich in two substances.
One is DHA, commonly known as "brain gold", which is an essential unsaturated fatty acid for the human body. The human cerebral cortex contains more than 30% DHA, and the retina accounts for more than 50%. However, DHA cannot be synthesized in the body and must be ingested from food. . The DHA content of tuna is 2.94g/100g, which is by far the highest among the edible land animals, plants and marine organisms in the world. Therefore, tuna is also known as the "deep sea brain gold".
The other is high protein. The protein content in tuna is 20%, and the protein biological value is as high as 92. It is a "lean protein" that is easy to digest and absorb, and is very important for the growth of children's internal organs and bones.
Compared with pork, the most mainstream raw material on the Chinese dining table, tuna has not been defeated. Pork contains high purine, and coupled with the uncertainty of raw material quality, it is difficult to meet the current high-end consumer groups' pursuit of high nutrition.
In addition, the annual output of pork is 40 million tons, and the table food market using pork as raw material seems to be saturated. However, China’s annual tuna catch is 400,000 tons, and the tuna table food market bred by this is still in the blue ocean zone.
It stands to reason that tuna consumption has exploded in China, but the fact is that domestic sales of tuna were once very difficult.
The family business of Sun Xiaotong, founder of Yutianping Group, has been engaged in tuna fishing for nearly 20 years. She recalled that after China catches tuna, most of the raw materials are exported abroad, or they are rough-processed and broken down into blocks before being exported. A very small amount flows into the domestic market, so the domestic tuna industry chain is very short.
The situation loosened around 2014. At that time, in order to ensure the supply of high-value deep-sea raw materials and improve the physical fitness of the people, the Chinese government vigorously supported distant-water fisheries and encouraged local tuna fishing companies to convert raw materials into Domestic sales.
At that time, many companies responded, but the outcome was embarrassing - a large amount of tuna could not be sold.
It turns out that tuna lives in the deep sea area below 400 meters and swims almost 24 hours a day. Therefore, its muscles are strong and delicious when eaten raw, but it tastes hard when cooked. As a result, tuna food is mostly in the form of sashimi, sushi, canned food, etc., which is seriously inconsistent with Chinese people’s eating habits.
Sun Xiaotong, however, sees opportunities. She feels that the Chinese market has great potential and is in the stage of a major consumption upgrade. Consumers are paying more and more attention to the nutritional value of food ingredients and pursuing a healthy and quality life. Therefore, as long as we develop products suitable for Chinese people, , you can find the unlock code for tuna food that is acceptable to Chinese people.
The process was more difficult than imagined. Since its establishment in 2018, after three years of research and development, Yu Taiping has gradually grown into a domestic tuna industry chain enterprise.
By linking to the China Ocean Shipping Association, Yu Taiping integrates raw material resources at the fishing end, and delve into product research and development and intensive processing. At the same time, it lays out market channels and goes further and further in upgrading the raw materials, quality, and health nutrition of tuna, improving the entire tuna industry. The added value of the chain.
More importantly, Yu Taiping has made tuna food suitable for Chinese tastes, filling the gap in the Chinese tuna food market. The three brands launched by Yu Taiping, the pre-packaged nutritional food brand Yu Taiping, the children's nutritional food brand Yu Kaitai, and the tuna-themed restaurant brand Yu Qianli, have also become Yu Taiping's tentacles to penetrate into China's high-consumption groups.
The first step in developing localized food is to deeply understand the eating habits of the target group and then find the matching contact points. In this regard, Yu Taiping did a lot of market research and finally found a breakthrough in breakfast sausages, dumplings, wontons and other table foods.
Users actually have urgent consumption upgrade needs for household prepackaged frozen food. In the past, domestic frozen foods mostly used pork as filling, which is high in purine and not healthy enough. It is also highly homogeneous and the quality cannot be guaranteed.
In addition, the epidemic has made many users develop the habit of eating at home, stimulating the outbreak of the entire pre-made dishes and other semi-finished products industry. iiMedia Consulting predicts that China’s prepared food industry will reach 345.9 billion yuan in 2021, and will maintain a 20% growth in the future. For tuna breakfast sausages, tuna dumplings, wontons, etc. that have differentiated competitive advantages, now is a good time to expand aggressively.
McKinsey predicts that by 2030, “middle- and high-income consumer groups may drive about 60% of urban consumption, compared with 35% under the current baseline scenario.By 2030, the number of middle- and high-income households in China may increase to about 400 million, close to the number in Europe and the United States combined.
In the next 10 years, middle- and upper-income consumers will be the biggest driving force for China’s consumption growth. Yu Taiping uses the high-end ingredient attributes and nutritional value of tuna to target middle- and high-income people, treating them as the main target customer group for tuna table food. There is no doubt about the consumption potential of this customer group.
The next step is research and development. Unlike offshore fish fillings, which taste delicious and smooth, tuna meat tastes hard after being cooked, and the taste does not allow the addition of meat tenderizers, softeners, etc., so Yu Taiping decided to start with process improvement. In the three years before
was established in 2018, Sun Xiaotong led the team to focus on research and development. After thousands of tests, they found the most suitable time and temperature control, and made precise improvements to the drum speed and mixing process. , while selecting the most suitable varieties and production techniques from more than 60 types of tuna, ultimately ensuring delicious meat quality and tender texture.
It can be seen that when looking for a breakthrough, Yu Taiping did not engage in self-guided research and development, but respected the most basic business common sense. It first went to the largest user group to understand their real needs, and at the same time, it was hard work and hard work. Short-term speculators attack the market with excellent product upgrades.
But it is not enough to get an entry card into the family dining table market. If you want to establish your own characteristics, you must find a broader blue ocean market.
At present, competition in consumer goods is fierce, and blue ocean spaces are often hidden in vertical fields targeting segmented groups. Yu Taiping once again chose to respect facts and market rules, thus starting an exploration in the field of children's snacks.
They objectively analyzed the characteristics of tuna. The most advantageous DHA and high protein components are critical to brain development, vision development, heart and bone growth. In contrast, children who are still in the developmental period need tuna more. The market is flooded with children's snacks that are no different from adult snacks, and many are high in sugar, salt, fat, and additives. However, parents born in the 1990s who have become more health-conscious can no longer tolerate them. This has opened up a small explosion in the children's snack market. .
Yu Taiping decided to seize this trend and start with tuna intestines. In the past three years, Sun Xiaotong visited many domestic fish intestine processing factories, visited many industry experts, and used thousands of kilograms of tuna for research and development. Finally, it was successful at the end of 2020. A tuna meat sausage containing low salt, high calcium, high protein, no trans fat, and targeted at children aged 3-12 years was born.
In 2021, the tuna children's snack brand "Yu Keai" was officially launched, determined to make tuna children's snacks with low sugar, less salt, low fat, less additives, high nutrition, zero trans fat, no coloring and no flavor.
It can be seen that a keen sense of the market can help find the blue ocean, and creating differentiated competitiveness is the basis for gaining a foothold in the blue ocean. In this process, it is necessary to clearly understand its own characteristics and market needs. Yu Taiping found its differentiated market positioning by combining its own advantages with the market's blind spots.
Yu Taiping did not stop there. In 2020, it opened a tuna-themed restaurant called "Yu Qianli" in Dalian. It broke the usual practice of eating raw tuna and developed more than 400 tuna dishes by itself, covering the eight major cuisines of Japanese, French and Chinese. Such practices have filled the gap in the domestic market where there is no consumption of Chinese-style tuna cooking. Many customers find it very novel, and some even offer to join.
This is Yu Taiping’s unique move. People’s difficulty in accepting new things is often due to lack of knowledge. Through the experiential window of the restaurant, it opens up people’s imagination and is more like a new brand culture. output. Compared with obviously oriented marketing products, this kind of experiential service can better occupy the user's mind and create a unique brand image.
Of course, this is also a common practice of many new consumer brands, from copywriting design to large service details, to connect with users emotionally in every aspect.
Nowadays, Yu Taiping’s three brands have been initially improved. “Yu Taiping” specializes in frozen cold meal series such as dumplings, wontons, breakfast sausages, fish balls, etc., and “Yu Kaitai” specializes in children’s snacks, children’s meal accompaniments, infant food supplements, In the four areas of children's health care, "Yu Qianli" does not rule out opening up franchises after standardization in the future.
It can be seen that each of the three directions has its own focus, seizing the demand points of different users for consumption upgrades, and combining Chinese people's eating habits and opportunities in blank vertical markets. In addition to focusing on market share development, it also simultaneously develops new categories and new brands. cultural dissemination.
In any case, when it comes to tuna consumption, Chinese consumers generally have insufficient knowledge and their consumption started late. In order to make more people aware of the benefits of tuna consumption, the creators of the new category must also shoulder the burden of educating the market and work hard on value marketing.
In terms of marketing channel selection, Yu Taiping has taken another innovative step. It did not blindly expand channels, but grasped the characteristics of the target group and concentrated on serving the channels that are most suitable for them. This way, the conversion efficiency is high and the cost is relatively low.
Since tuna is a high-end ingredient and is targeted at mid-to-high-end consumer groups, Yu Taiping jumped out of the conventional Japanese catering and fresh market channels and chose high-end property channels with more accurate audiences.
Yu Taiping has cooperated with Greentown. Greentown serves nearly 2,000 communities across the country, and its online membership covers nearly 300,000 families. At present, Yu Taiping has opened up Greentown’s nationwide online platform, and is piloting offline in Hangzhou to open up the last mile of community distribution. In the future, it will cooperate with the top ten properties in the country.
In addition, Yu Taiping also cooperates with high-end shopping malls and supermarkets such as Hangzhou Tower, Nanjing Golden Eagle, Dalian Friendship Mall and other city landmarks, and covers channels such as OLE, Kidswant, Sam's, and Hema. Sun Xiaotong revealed that there will still be no large-scale expansion of channels in 2022, but high-end channels that are close to the target group will be chosen.
In terms of marketing methods, Yu Taiping did not rush for quick success and forceful advertising. Instead, it grasped the psychological characteristics of most Chinese families who are not familiar with tuna, and then spread the concept after establishing trust.
Utilizing the membership resources of high-end channels, Yu Taiping held a variety of offline activities, such as food tasting, tuna cutting show, parent-child DIY, children's painting, deep-sea fish nutrition courses, etc., to promote the scarcity value of tuna through popular science Integrate into the user group in an easy way, allowing consumers to form a natural repurchase habit after learning about tuna.
Through industrial chain and branding operations, as well as value marketing communication, Yu Taiping has gradually gained a firm foothold in the market.
Faced with its three brands, Sun Xiaotong thinks very clearly, "Table food is our survival profit product, which brings cash income to support the development of the company, but the children's brand is our development goal, and we must become the leader of children's snacks in China." Brand, this is our biggest dream, we hope that more Chinese children can eat better tuna food.”
How determined is this? Sun Xiaotong revealed that they are now working with national professional organizations to jointly formulate food standards for nutritional tuna snacks for children, which are expected to be released in early 2022.
Yu Taiping’s 2022 plan is also closely related to children’s snacks. The current flagship product in this area is tuna meat sausage. In the future, more food suitable for children will be developed, especially for infants and young children under 3 years old. Nutritional and health foods, such as high-purity DHA crude oil extracted from tuna, are used for new product development.
In terms of market development, Yu Taiping is currently mainly deployed in three cities: Nanjing, Hangzhou and Dalian. In 2022, it is expected to reach the front line, with deployment in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, as well as Xiamen, Chengdu, Chongqing and other cities. In terms of e-commerce, Yu Taiping currently has stores on JD.com and Tmall, but Yu Taiping has no layout for home frozen products. They are also discussing cooperation with high-end cold chain logistics to solve distribution problems before laying out channels.
No matter what, Yu Taiping always expands around tuna and delivers more high-end nutritious food to Chinese families.
The supply and demand mismatch problem caused by this wave of consumption upgrades has also led to the upgrading of the tuna supply chain. As the only tuna industry chain enterprise in China, I believe that Yu Taiping will further lead the way in a new category after filling the gap in the segmented industry. continue to innovate.
