On November 24, 2023, at the "14th China Conference on the Development of Maternal and Child Health-Child Nutrition Standards and Norms Sub-forum", Yingshi and the Children's Professional Committee of the China Maternal and Child Health Association jointly released the "Clinical Research Report on the Stepwise Feeding Project of Complementary Food in China", which pointed out that the characteristic needs of the physiology, nutrition, perception and other dimensions of the baby's 1-5 stages are highly scientific and feasible. It is worth noting that this is also the first clinical research result released by the Chinese complementary food industry.
Dating back to 2020, as the pioneer of the concept of scientific graded feeding, Yingshi was the first to propose a five-stage precision feeding system for complementary food. At that time, some people said that Yingshi relied on grading to "become famous overnight", but in fact, as early as 2018, Yingshi made forward-looking research and judgment and accelerated the planning and layout. Until 2020, Yingshi broke through the traditional age classification, combined with the baby's sign development, growth needs and product solutions, and cooperated with the China Maternal and Child Health Association to officially announce the creation of a 5-level precision feeding system of complementary food science, which fundamentally solved the feeding anxiety and confusion of a new generation of young parents.
Since then, Yingshi has led the entire complementary food industry to set off a "step-by-step" boom. Yingshi's grading is not just a simple slogan of 12345, but a long-termism that deeply cultivates user research, works technological breakthroughs, and uses "addition, subtraction, multiplication and division" to solve the hierarchical technical equation.
R&D technology background "plus" support
Professionalism brings confidence
Behind the gorgeous stage performances is often the careful planning and preparation of the backstage. Focusing on the complementary food industry, in-depth R&D upgrades and breakthroughs are the value depressions that have long been ignored by practitioners, and there are few brands that are willing to spend a lot of money on R&D technology.
1) Early layout, long-term work, research and development is the origin and fulcrum
Since 2019, Yingshi has not hesitated to invest heavily in the construction of Yingshi Technology Center. In terms of structure and function setting, it refers to the laboratories of top food companies and professional food research and testing institutions, and carries out a new design based on user research, combined with their own business needs, and in accordance with the principle of application-oriented.
First, the strength of Yingshi's "backstage" highly educated R&D technical team should not be underestimated, and the team's professional and technical research covers food science and engineering, infant nutrition research, food safety and testing, quality management and other fields. Second, this team has strong new product research and development capabilities, and infant complementary food formulas are independently developed, and continuous technological innovation and process improvement are carried out. Up to now, it has developed and mastered the enzymatic hydrolysis process of rice flour, and has a number of production core technologies such as rice flour allergen-free ingredient technology, ultra-fine water refining technology, rice flour nutrient dry blending technology, fruit and vegetable product color protection technology, vacuum and dough technology, etc., and has participated in national standard discussions and the formulation of a number of group standards for many times, helping and leading the high-quality development of the infant and child complementary food industry.
Yingshi is well aware of the caution of novice parents for the baby's first bite of complementary food, fully considering the delicate characteristics of infants and young children's stomach, the starch enzymatic hydrolysis process used in rice noodles is not only more conducive to infant absorption, but also makes rice noodles better in preparation and more stable in nutrients. At the same time, in order to balance the freshness of fruit and vegetable products, Yingshi has also cleverly applied freeze-drying technology to complementary foods. In addition, Ying's innovation in product raw materials, packaging, form and specifications also adheres to the guidance of consumer demand, and constantly meets the refined feeding needs of consumers.
2) Deeply cultivate the internal strength and continue to evolve, and Yingshi has built a staged feeding center to accumulate scientific research strength
As we all know, scientific research is a gradual process, which is not achieved overnight, and requires long-term and continuous exploration, research and investment. In 2021, Yingshi also established a special step-by-step feeding research center, and added top-notch research and equipment to promote the more scientific and technological development of Ying's products, quality chain and operation system, and also provide technical support for the establishment and improvement of the upstream and downstream of the industry chain and the entire complementary food industry standard, and promote the standardized development of the industry.
It is reported that the sensory research room set up in the step-by-step feeding research center has more than 100 sensory evaluators, who further refine and digitize the traditional sensory indicators of sweet and sour, bitter, spicy and salty through their keen sensory evaluation feedback, so as to help the continuous optimization and innovative research and development of productsThe basic nutrient laboratory can make reasonable selection and ratio of food materials, and study the graded products with scientific nutritional ratio that are more suitable for infants and young childrenIn addition, the application development laboratory and the microbiology laboratory have a more scientific understanding and research on the stability and storage conditions of the product, which can realize the quantitative and qualitative quality of the finished product and ensure the final high quality of the product.
Ramming the foundation "minus" speed
Focus on long-termism and self-stumbling
At this time, as long as Yingshi keeps pushing new products, it is easy to make a lot of money, but in the face of **, Yingshi did not do this, but was willing to slow down and concentrate on polishing each product.
Yingshi builds the development logic of its products with a scientific 5-stage system, adheres to the bottom line of infant standards, and develops the first new process infant standard sandwich rice crackers, the first infant meat crisp, and infant tomato sauce ...... in ChinaBehind each product is a balanced contest between taste and baby label, and it shows the perseverance of "both want and want".
1) Ying's "sauce heart" and "innovation".
At this stage, infant standards (hereinafter referred to as infant standards) are gradually recognized by consumers, while in the complementary food track, many categories are in the initial layout stage, and qualified factories and technologies are very limited. Taking Ying's 2nd Order Infant Tomato Sauce as an example, there are only a handful of factories in China that can make baby tomato sauce, and most of them do not have small-scale production equipment. To be the first person to eat crabs, you always have to suffer a little before the sweetness. It took more than one year to negotiate and coordinate with the factory, and the factory was able to invest in new equipment, new production lines, and customize a new workshop. In addition, the ketchup "easy to tear" as a user experience detail, many attempts have been made to innovate the good-looking and easy-to-tear design with the prototype of Ying's small tongue.
2) Ying's Puree: Respond to the high-end needs of users with the whole chain organically
Consumers' demand for Ying's puree has been high, but the puree seems to be belated. The reason behind this is that Ying's R&D team is refining day by day and striving for perfection in order to meet the diversified needs of consumers as much as possible.
From the very beginning, "freshness" was the breakthrough of Ying's puree. Eliminate the long wait for the finished puree to drift across the ocean, and simply produce it in the factory at the "doorstep". The whole chain of China organic is destined to the high standard of fruit puree. The use of natural pollution-free fruit as the raw material of the puree, resolutely do not use chemically synthesized pesticides and fertilizers, follow the GB 10770 "National Food Safety Standard for Infant Canned Supplementary Food" to customize the baby's exclusive infant standard puree, without adding a drop of water, only for Chinese babies to eat "real fruit puree" in every bite. In terms of preservation, Yingshi is well aware of users' concerns about preservatives, and adopts advanced pasteurization technology and 4-layer oxygen-insulated fresh-locking packaging to lock in freshness layer by layer. In terms of grading, Yingshi selects a variety of flavors to match the different needs of babies at each stage. The first-order prune series is rich in dietary fiber, which can cope with the problem of constipation for babies who have just added complementary foodLevel 2 multi-dimensional vitality to explore a variety of fruit flavors;Level 3 grain energy, enhance satiety, and provide full energy for crawling Level 3 babies.
In this regard, the person in charge of the factory who has docked with Yingshi many times said that Yingshi is really "wear-resistant" and is willing to spend huge manpower, material resources and time costs for innovative products. This also means that Yingshi does not focus on short-term, short-term benefits, but more on long-term, strategic planning and investment.
"Ride" on the shoulders of giants
Hand in hand with academicians to seek breakthroughs
Ma Wenbin, chairman of Yingshi Holding Group, once said that the construction of product R&D innovation is the first strategy of the company, and the in-depth development of scientific research projects is the most critical step for Yingshi to further tap market demand and create high-quality products.
On the industry-university-research side, in November 2022, the Academician Shan Yang Innovation Team Studio of the Chinese Academy of Engineering settled in Ying's and established the "Academician Shan Yang Innovation Team Ying's Studio". Focusing on the research on key technologies and nutritional values of key category processing, we provide improvement directions from the professional perspectives of product raw materials, processes, flavors, storage, standards, etc., carry out technical research and industrialization exploration, and enhance the differentiated competitiveness of Ying's products.
It is reported that the cooperation between the two sides will cover infant nutrition, infant complementary food, scientific graded feeding and other health fields, learn from the technical achievements and research experience of Academician Shan Yang's innovation team in the fields of food processing, food nutrition, technology and other fields, accelerate the transformation and application in the field of infant nutrition industry, help scientific graded feeding, and promote the industrialization of scientific and technological achievements.
Clear the "elimination" of interference and keep the quality pass
Continue to provide consumers with safe, high-quality, high-value products
At the other end of the spectrum is safety, which is also the lifeblood of Ying's. Rooted in the corporate culture and business model, Yingshi has built a comprehensive and three-dimensional quality management system from the three dimensions of "product, management and collaboration".
The "Wugong Quality Management System" is applied and transported to upstream processing factories to improve the quality level of the complementary food industry, improve the ability and quality of employees, provide stable product quality guarantee for the Yingshi brand, and also deliver industrial quality standard templates for the entire supplementary food industry.
A few days ago, Ying's complementary food production factory once again passed the European IFS (A+) and BRC (advanced) double certification, achieving the highest level of EU double certification in the field of infant support in China, which once again verified that Ying's has always had high standards and strict requirements for food safety and quality.
In addition, in order to solve the bottleneck of production capacity of core categories and the industrialization of scientific research achievements, and help Yingshi make up for the shortcomings of production capacity, Yingshi did not hesitate to invest 1 billion yuan to carry out the construction of infant nutrition and health science industrial base.
Using the scientific research center of the new base, we will cooperate with relevant national departments and university research institutes to accelerate the research of cutting-edge technologies of infant and child food, accelerate the establishment of new standards, lay out the digital reengineering and intelligent empowerment of the whole ecological value chain, and promote the overall quality and upgrading of the industry with the new power of the brand, and occupy the leading position in the industry.
Drive the category with the brand upward
The core is still to take the road of 10,000-meter-deep scientific research
For Yingshi, technology and scientific research is a long march with no end, and it is also the most solid moat of the brand, and Yingshi will firmly go to the end of the "10,000-meter-deep road" of the 5th stage of science. Hu Wei, general manager of Ying's marketing, said: "Channel customers and industry friends often say that Ying's marketing is good and will make a brand. That's true to a certain extent!At the same time, rooted in users, deeply cultivated technology, to achieve the ultimate in products, regardless of the cost, these are the real considerations behind the brand. All the underlying efforts cannot be seen, and strategy, system, talent, investment, and determination ......It is the magic weapon for the brand to continue to improve. If you don't understand this, you will never be able to get better. "Returning to the industry level, the classification should not be a simple copy and paste of a set of numbers and stage naming, virtually causing confusion in consumer cognition, nor should it be the only solution to the growth of the complementary food industry. In the book "Is Japan Still Competitive?", strategic thinker Michael Porter once said that the innovation of Japanese companies is based on the imitation of American companies, and they lack the ability to innovate independently, so they will eventually lose their competitiveness.
It is foreseeable that the next industry competition must be brand, word-of-mouth, research and development, chain and other comprehensive multi-dimensional soft power, among which, only the blade inward, focus on research and development can accumulate superposition, do deep and thorough, to achieve enough professionalism and depth, in order to win respect, stand firm and stand at the forefront of the new stage of competition in the complementary food industry.
From the perspective of long-termism, it is necessary for more brands to be guided by consumer demand, jump out of homogeneous internal friction, explore innovative and diversified development, strengthen product and technical research, and do a good job in complementary food education and improve the penetration rate of supplementary food, so as to jointly expand the "cake" of the complementary food market as a long-term strategy.