LINE FRIENDS is continuously closing its offline stores in the mainland. The store recently posted a notice announcing that the store had officially closed at 10 p.m. on May 5.

Intern reporter | Wei Xianghui

LINE FRIENDS is closing offline stores in the mainland one after another. The latest

to cease operations is its LINE FRIENDS flagship store located on Huaihai Road, Shanghai. The store recently posted a notice announcing that the store had officially closed at 10 p.m. on May 5. So far, there are no LINE FRIENSDS offline stores in Shanghai.

’s Huaihai Road LINE FRIENDS flagship store, which was officially opened to the public in November 2016, is the first boutique in Shanghai with the theme of Brown Bear’s sister CHOCO. It covers an area of ​​nearly 800 square meters on three floors and houses LINE FRIENDS CAFé. . The CHOCO sitting on the eaves outside the store is quite eye-catching and once attracted many consumers to take photos and shop.

After the store is closed, for consumers who purchased products at the Huaihai Road store during the business period and need after-sales service after the store closes, LINE FRIENDS stated that it will properly handle related issues. Consumers can contact the customer service number published on the product packaging. After-sales service.

Shanghai is not the first mainland Chinese city where LINE FRIENDS offline stores have withdrawn. Previously, it had successively closed its offline stores in Hangzhou, Chongqing, Beijing and other places. According to information released by the LINE FRIENDS brand WeChat public account, at its peak, the brand operated 12 stores in China. Jiemian News inquired about public information and found that as of May 14, only two LINE FRIENDS stores in the mainland, Chengdu Ocean Taikoo Li and Nanjing Catherine Plaza, were still open. LINE FRIENDS confirmed to Jiemian News that all offline traditional stores will be closed one by one. It is not difficult to infer that the only two stores currently available will also be closed in the future.

"This is a move in line with the brand's overall strategy." Regarding the continuous store closures, LINE FRIENDS explained, "Due to the needs of the overall strategic layout, the brand will no longer focus on offline stores as its business focus in the future, and will develop content as its core. Digital assets are more concentrated online and on platforms. For offline stores, LINE FRIENDS is also gradually adjusting in a phased and planned manner, first from authorized stores to direct stores, and then to offline stores. The space experience focuses on the theme space licensing and the pop-up store model in cooperation with commercial real estate.”

public information shows that LINE FRIENDS originated from the mobile chat tool “Line” launched by the Japanese subsidiary of Korean Internet company NHN, and subsequently derived related emoticons. It includes IP, game operations and other businesses. “Brown Bear”, “Connie Rabbit” and “Sally” are its representative IPs. In July 2014, LINE's operations in China were suspended, hampering the development of its messaging, social networking and gaming businesses. A few months later, LINE FRIENDS started offline store business.

At that time, there were only a limited number of IP players in the Chinese mainland market. The arrival of LINE FRIENDS quickly won the attention of young people. The cartoon image scenes for punching in and taking pictures and cute peripheral products always attracted the attention of its offline stores when they opened. Consumers go to the queue to check in. 2016 was the fastest year for the expansion of LINE FRIENDS offline stores in the mainland market. During the period, 6 stores were opened in Guangzhou, Nanjing, Shenzhen, Chengdu, Beijing and other cities.

However, as time goes by, with the rise of Internet emoticons and lack of culture and story support, the problems of homogenization of LINE FRIENDS store scenes and peripheral products, low cost performance, and insufficient innovation have become increasingly prominent. In addition, more and more new IPs are emerging on the market, which further squeezes the living space of LINE FRIENDS.

Zhou Jie, senior assistant director of the Guangzhou Commercial Real Estate Department of Cushman & Wakefield, once analyzed: "LINE FRIENDS has a single experience format, which only provides IP cartoon image scenes to take photos and check in, and lacks interactivity; while the peripheral products are simple in style, slow to update and lack innovation, resulting in The repurchase rate is weak and user stickiness is not strong. "

has gained something in the past, and LINE FRIENDS's licensing business in China has shown greater development potential. This is one of the main reasons why the brand has decided to withdraw from offline stores.

According to LINE FRIENDS, its licensing business in China has been officially operational since 2018 and has maintained an annual business growth of nearly 20%. It currently cooperates with more than 100 brands. For example, the offline theme store cooperates with the chain coffee brand Luckin , and authorizes the home wear brand " Fenton ".

In August 2020, Li Yiyong, general manager of LINE FRIENDS China, introduced at the China Authorizer Conference that the overall licensing business of LINE FRIENDS in the Chinese market increased by 80% in 2019. He also announced new directions for IP licensing cooperation, including testing IP+ games, IP+ e-commerce live broadcasts, IP short video animations and other fields. LINE FRIENDS’s IP operations are transforming into lighter content areas. After

closed its flagship store on Huaihai Road, LINE FRIENDS clearly stated that its future business strategy in the Chinese market will be to comprehensively carry out digital strategic layout, develop digital assets with content as the core, and serve its core business.

"Content is particularly important for the continuation of the vitality of IP. At present, LINE FRIENDS has cooperated with the leading short video platform and Tencent Weishi to lay out the Chinese local content market starting from short videos. In the future, LINE FRIENDS will also establish the Chinese market It has its own content center and introduces LINE FRIENDS’ overseas creatively competitive content assets to make efforts in the content field,” LINE FRIENDS said.

As for offline space experience, the brand will focus on theme space licensing and pop-up store models in cooperation with commercial real estate; landmark projects in cooperation with urban landmarks; and the lightweight PLAY STORE under preparation.

From now on, the online channels for consumers to purchase LINE FRIENDS related products include the official website, official Tmall store, official JD store, and LINE FRIENDS CREATOR WeChat customized mini program. Offline purchasing channels mainly include retail vending machines, pop-up stores and the PLAY STORE under preparation. At present, LINE FRIENDS unmanned vending machines have begun to be installed in some shopping malls. The brand expects to have 100 unmanned vending machines distributed in 20 first- and second-tier cities by the end of the year.