Since entering 2023, floor scrubbers have gone from continuing to be hot in China's home appliance market. However, in the view of the home appliance circle, when many companies see the market cake and broad opportunities of floor scrubbers, the market traps and challenges of focusing on floor scrubbers in the first-line market are also increasing. 2024 will undoubtedly be a "watershed" for the cleaning appliance industry and the floor scrubber category, and differentiation will emerge in a new way.
Kong Yu |Written
Go to offline channels and dealer groups, grow space to low-end consumer groups, develop opportunities in the sinking market, find fulcrums for multi-category expansion such as washing machines, hair dryers, and water purifiers, and grab cake ...... with categories such as vacuum cleaners and sweepers in the market
Since entering 2023, the development of the online celebrity home appliance category floor scrubber, which has attracted much attention from the market, has ushered in a round of systematic transformation and ice-breaking in the development of the Chinese market. It is not that the market and user demand are gone, nor that the market competition is fierce, but that the sustained and high-speed growth lacks more fulcrums and hot spots. Including Ecovacs, Timke, Dreame, as well as Roborock, Cloud Whale, as well as Midea, Haier, Hisense, Gree, Joyoung, Supor, Lake and a large number of other companies, all present different ideas, layouts and actions.
In the view of the home appliance circle, this round of changes in the floor scrubber market is essentially the first batch of old users to complain about the poor experience and the new batch of potential user income decline caused by the conservative consumption, although the market prospect of cleaning appliances represented by the floor scrubber is no problem, but in the short term, the growth enthusiasm and lack of power of the floor scrubber market is a big problem. Specifically, it is mainly focused on three aspects:
First, in the first-tier market, it is necessary to shift from the sales of online platforms such as Jingdong and Tmall in the past, including companies such as Timke, Dreame, Midea, Haier, etc., to turn to offline channel dealers, especially to sink the market, and seek to grow from the primary market in counties, towns and villages to the young people in small townsTo put it simply, it is to demand growth momentum and space for more groups in more markets. However, in the floor scrubber market, the first batch of market speculators have withdrawn from the beginning of this year, and the speculative space has been compressed. Only speculators with low ** and no good products and good performance can only be helpless to get out.
Second, in the operation of enterprises, the main enterprises are no longer just blindly pursuing the best and high profits, but actively reduce prices to expand the needs of more low-end quality families, to promote the market popularization of floor scrubbers only a good product price reduction way. At present, the floor scrubber products have been reduced from 1,000 yuan at the beginning of the listing to 1,000 yuan at present. Some miscellaneous small brands of floor scrubbers have reached 1,000 yuan.
Third, in the corporate strategy, the head enterprises of floor scrubbers are carrying out a new round of strategic transformation and cross-border diversification. We are very well aware of the development space of floor scrubbers in the Chinese market and the ceiling of future growth, so whether it is Timco making efforts to make stir-fry machines and hair dryers, or Dreame has begun to expand to categories such as service robots, or Roborock has launched an all-in-one washing and drying machine, the essence is that related companies hope to find more business support. Diversified expansion will be the only way for all professional floor scrubber companies in the future, and washing machines will be the first choice.
It can be seen that in the process of more and more small and medium-sized enterprises increasing their weight and competing for the opportunity of the floor scrubber market, the market that has developed in just 4 years has also hidden various traps and crises.
The market ceiling, coming so soon?
On JD.com**, after entering floor scrubbers, more than 430 brands appeared, including household floor scrubbers and industrial floor scrubber products. In the entire home appliance industry, the number of existing brands of floor scrubbers ranks among the best in each category, and no household appliance category can surpass.
In just 3 years, the floor scrubber that has achieved leapfrog growth from 0 to 10 billion in China's home appliances, after entering 2023, although it includes Dreame Technology, Roborock, and Ecovacs, Timco and other leading enterprises continue to increase product iteration and market promotion, at the same time, the investment enthusiasm from comprehensive home appliance companies such as Haier, Midea, Hisense, Gree, Supor, and Fotile has not diminished, and a large number of cleaning appliance start-ups with floor scrubbers as the main category continue to appear, so to speak, "The category is very lively and the company is very excited." However, the consumer demand and manufacturer competition in the first-tier market are "involution upgrades".
The biggest pressure on the floor scrubber in China's home appliance market is mainly two: first, the oversupply has brought about uneven products, categories and products. The first batch of speculators has withdrawn, and the second and third groups of speculators are still running into it in high spirits
Second, the demand of mainstream user groups is weak, urban young people, quality families as the first batch of users of floor scrubbers, because of the different experiences of different products caused by complaints and praise, but the working class that occupies the dominant position of China's home appliances has not fully accepted this category, and high-end families are not just clean needs, products are trapped in a small number of circle users, and at this stage can not open a new consumption situation.
The "ceiling" of the market size of 10 billion yuan has appeared in front of many floor scrubber companies and businesses in just a few years, which is not surprising in the home appliance circle. In essence, the function and experience of the product have not gone out of the circle to win the favor of more users and groups, but the companies participating in the market "grabbing food" are disrupting the situation regardless of the operation.
On the one hand, although the development time of floor scrubbers is short, the cleaning appliances represented by sweeping robots and vacuum cleaners have cultivated users and markets for decades, forming a relatively mature user group and distribution system of cleaning appliances, and cognitive acceptance. It's just that the marketing of clean electrical products is mostly concentrated on online channels and live broadcast platforms, and the market is always a short board
On the other hand, the floor scrubber market has a low entry threshold, and a large number of 100-yuan and 1,000-yuan products emerge in an endless stream, using consumers' novel psychology to fool and mislead users, resulting in poor user experience, triggering the market's perception of the category and the decline of word of mouth. In the end, this also made the floor scrubber pit by a large number of "pig teammates".
Can diversification open up new horizons?
In the face of the approaching market ceiling, the floor scrubber enterprise group did not choose to "sit and wait" for business opportunities to appear again, but chose to break the ice. The home appliance circle learned that this round of market icebreaking is mainly divided into three dimensions:
The first is to expand from online e-commerce to offline dealer groups to expand the coverage of the market, so as to enhance the product and brand influence of user groups;The second is to focus on sinking channels, with the help of platform providers such as Jingdong Home Appliances and Tmall Youpin to seize the needs of young people in small towns, so as to realize the integration of products and brandsThe third is to focus on the low-end market, launch some cost-effective products, and seize the needs of low-end users through leverage, and cultivate users' cognition of floor scrubbers.
At present, the ice-breaking action, the home appliance circle found that more are only concentrated in the head enterprises of floor scrubbers such as Timke, Dreame, Haier, Midea, etc., as well as the platform faction of comprehensive home appliance giants, and there are a few changes that have found market changes and hope to make a breakthrough in differentiation. However, although this group currently occupies more than fifty or sixty percent of the market, it still cannot absolutely dominate the development and change of the floor scrubber industry.
At present, in addition to a number of companies that have achieved phased wins in brands and products in the market, such as Timke, Dreame, Stone, and Cloud Whale, there are also a large number of challengers such as Bisheng, Lake, Sirius, Philips, Mofei, Joyoung, Supor, Nei, Shunzao, Mibo, Xiyi, etc., and even a large number of leasing brands such as Zhigao, Westinghouse, and Antarctica speculate. If these enterprises are not reshuffled and rectified for a long time, they will also lead to chaos and fierce fighting in the industry within a certain period.
However, so that many enterprises and businesses can rest assured that the temporary market chaos will not change the trend of the industry, the future market size of cleaning appliances, user demand will be the same as dishwashers, there is more space and opportunities, but it does take time, and more manufacturers take the initiative to change. For example, from floor scrubbers to floor scrubbing robots, and then to home comprehensive cleaning robots, and even home service robots. However, for all participants in the clean appliance market, whether it is multi-category or diversified, it is necessary to grasp the needs of users and improve product performance. Because of any industrial competition, in the end, it must be the product strength within the enterprise and the trust of users outside the market.
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