Chao News reporter Zheng Yali.
Naais's technicians are conducting experiments. Courtesy of the company.
At the beginning of the Year of the Dragon, Naais Group has welcomed a new member in the catalog of more than 1,000 categories - natural laundry detergent.
The name seems to be ordinary, but it is a pioneering product in the industry, and it took Naais 5 years to engage in research and development. It is the first in the industry to achieve 90% natural origin of ingredients, the previous industry record was 70%; At the same time, effective decontamination has been realized, and two technologies have obtained national invention patents. "Natural + effective", this new product has been favored by consumers within a few days of its launch.
In the eyes of many people, the daily chemicals used to wash and wash are the most traditional and simple, and there is no technical content. However, as the name of the company is nice, the "small" industry represents an aspect of a good life. In today's increasingly segmented consumer demand, the more small products closely related to life, the more innovative they must be, and continue to iterate on technology and technology, so as to bring better use effects and experiences to everyone and every family.
At present, in the daily chemical industry with a market size of about 150 billion yuan, Naais ranks at the head of the industry, accounting for one-fifth. Rushing out of the traditional market, what does Naais rely on?
To create is to constantly overthrow oneself.
During the Spring Festival holiday, Liu Ying, executive vice president of Naais Innovation and Development Research Institute, returned to his hometown Anqing for the New Year.
An old friend who hadn't seen him for a few years teased his hair: "If you are less than forty years old, why is there so much white hair." "The pressure and sadness of the past five years have nowhere to hide in front of the familiar local sounds.
As the leader of the research and development of self-natural laundry detergent, he has boiled his head in five years, but he has also successfully developed a good product that is enough to put into the memorabilia of the industry.
Back in 2019, Liu Ying was deeply impressed, at that time, the company's latest green product APG laundry detergent had just been launched, and before he had time to celebrate the hot sales, he and his team received the task: to develop a new generation of laundry detergent.
At the beginning, everyone muttered in their hearts: in terms of trends, APG laundry detergent meets consumers' demand for green and healthy products; In terms of level, a kilogram of about 30 yuan ** belongs to the highest grade in the market.
How can such a good product "beat" itself?
That's when my hair turned white. Liu Ying said that they searched all over the domestic and foreign competing products, rummaged through dozens of databases in the industry, and had no clue about new products, and they couldn't sleep every day. In 2021 and 2022, he and his team proposed APG laundry detergent upgrades, all of which were rejected in the group's internal review for a simple reason: the product was not disruptive.
At NAES, the product is meant to be overturned. In the past few decades, Naais has gone all the way from a small factory that cannot pay wages to the "leader" of the national laundry industry, relying on constantly overthrowing itself
In 1992, Naais developed a blue packaged carved brand super soap, which not only tasted fragrant, but also increased its decontamination ability by three or four times, ending the history of "stinky soap"; In 2000, enzyme laundry detergent was introduced to replace phosphorus-containing laundry detergent to reduce the impact on the water environment; In 2002, natural soap powder was the first to use natural raw materials in the industry and create a new category in China; In 2011, water-saving laundry detergent was developed, and the water-saving rate of washing and rinsing was more than 30%, and the related technology won the first prize of scientific and technological progress in the industry; In 2015, it was the first laundry pod, which integrates multi-functional ...... such as laundry and smoothing
As Naais moves forward in the consumer market, the heavy responsibility of constantly overthrowing itself has also fallen on Liu Ying's generation.
Time waits for no one, and it's 2023 in a blink of an eye. At that year's workers' congress, colleagues from other departments straightened their backs, and Liu Ying, who has always been active, couldn't wait to find a crack in the ground to get into, "I couldn't develop new products, and I couldn't raise my head."
When confused and lost, a sentence from He Liming, chairman of the group at the meeting, woke up the "dream man": "To get out of the road of differentiated development, you must make the current situation of the market thorough and clear, see the essence of the market, and the difference will naturally be presented in front of you." ”
This sentence inspired him: "Yes, if you can't find the answer on the way, then go back to the beginning and the end, go to the market, find the consumer for the answer!" ”
In the following months, Liu Ying and her team interviewed customers to gain an in-depth understanding of consumers' needs and pain points. After accurate interview and analysis of more than 100 samples, they found their way: to make healthier natural laundry detergents.
The problem arises, although there are natural laundry detergents on the market, but most of them are concepts, and there are not many that can take into account natural raw materials and decontamination effects. Moreover, even if it does, consumers don't buy it.
Isn't the difficulty a breakthrough point? Consumers think that natural raw materials are not strong in decontamination, so they use molecular modification to turn the original linear structure of molecules into branched polymer materials, so that the stain removal ability is stronger. This technology has also allowed them to win a national invention patent.
Consumers don't believe in the washing and care power of natural products, so they judge heroes by their strength. Based on ISO international standards, get official certification; A third party was asked to test subjects with sensitive skin, and there was no adverse reaction ......
Looking back on the bits and pieces of natural laundry detergent developed from it, Liu Ying is overwhelmed with emotion. After returning to Hangzhou from her hometown, Liu Ying was not idle. Since the sales of natural laundry detergent are booming, he and his team members have started to develop the next new product.
NEW is all about prying the ceiling.
In the list of top 100 enterprises in Zhejiang in recent years, Naaisi ranks low.
Referring to this, He Liming not only did not shy away from it, but confidently said: "If one day Naaisi is not on the top 100 list, don't worry." Naaisi is developing healthily, not only to be bigger but also stronger. ”
As one of the industries with the fastest development and the earliest opening up after the reform and opening up, daily chemical is a fully competitive market-oriented industry. In the first decade of the last century, foreign brands entered the Chinese market, and national daily chemical brands survived in the cracks; In 2003, foreign brands launched the "Condor Shooting Action" ...... at low prices for Naaisi's carved brand series productsNaais has experienced ups and downs, and has fought his way out of the encirclement again and again.
He Liming knows that the daily chemical market is so big, and the industry is generally considered to have a ceiling, but the development of enterprises needs to constantly pry the ceiling in order to open up the second and even the nth growth curve. The key to success lies in whether the enterprise has a stable core - highly active innovation genes and teams.
In 2016, in order to make up for the geographical disadvantage of the technological innovation platform of the original Lishui headquarters, the group established the Naais Innovation and Development Research Institute in Hangzhou, recruiting many top full-time technical personnel in the industry, and laying the fire for the growth curve of Naais. The effect is obvious, and the new products are "blooming" for a while; Problems also arise, a large number of new products, enterprises do not have time and do not have enough energy to verify whether the products are marketable.
It's difficult to go from the top down, so it's from the bottom up.
Seeing the "consumption upgrade" of pet demand and creating a 100 billion-level growth space, a small team of Naaisi tried to launch the "Taodou Play Country" brand on the e-commerce platform to sell high-quality pet products and quickly win the trust of the "shovel official". In 2020, Smiley E-commerce Technology (Hangzhou)** was established.
Smiley's success inspired Naais. This new model of the company is like creating a team of "light cavalry" for the company, quickly cutting into the most potential market with agile skills, and creating a number of special products.
Since then, one of the strategies of Naaisi is to let new products in the subdivided field first test the water in e-commerce, and after being recognized by the market, then pull out the products and teams to set up brands and companies.
Nagu (Hangzhou) Life Technology, which focuses on baby and children's products, is one of them. Liang Guoxiong, the head of the company, has completed the identity transformation from a R&D person to the person in charge of a start-up company with annual sales of tens of millions of yuan.
New characters bring new experiences. In the past, most of the product research and development were fought separately, and everyone swept the snow in front of the door, but after the establishment of the new company, the research and development, production, design, and sales of products need to work together.
I'm not just a developer. In April last year, before each new product development meeting, Liang Guoxiong would repeatedly remind himself in his mind that they were preparing a children's moisturizer for autumn and winter.
The product composition should be safe", "the design should be different from the competing products in the market, otherwise there will be no advantages......".Liang Guoxiong remembers very well that colleagues from different positions at the meeting kept throwing out ideas, and this hot scene was completely different from the quiet when he was immersed in research and development before.
The finished product under the "crowd collecting firewood" is also not bad. Taking into account the user's habits and pain points, they designed the emollient cream as a hemispherical solid balm, which can be rubbed directly on the face with the bottom of the bottle in hand, avoiding secondary contact with the hands.
What Liang Guoxiong didn't expect was that as soon as this product was launched in October last year, it became a popular product, with sales of more than 20 million yuan in three months. Looking at the transaction data in the background, Liang Guoxiong had an unprecedented sense of accomplishment and surprise, and sighed again and again: The fruits brewed by the small team can also be very sweet.
In recent years, the incubator role of this model of the company has become increasingly apparent, and the Maternal and Child Safety Research Center, Pet Health Research Center, Beauty Industry Research Institute and related cutting-edge companies have been established successively, and have continuously launched a variety of new products full of ecological technology, which are favored by consumers.
It's not about what the product is hot to do, quality is the first. "In the process of exploring the path of the "light cavalry", Naais has been vigilant. The relevant person in charge of the research institute mentioned that a product company approached them last year and promised to help them create a batch of explosive products. After in-depth contact, they found that the other party was taking the path of low-cost and inferior products, and decisively refused. The market will not agree to a short-lived product, and Naais will never agree.
Whether it is the advent of natural laundry detergent or the highly active new model team, it is closely related to a major event that Naais is planning: the company is laying out the "whole chain ecological industrial system" at full speed, and establishing R&D centers in Northern Europe and other places. In the future, they will take the ecological industrial park under construction as the core block, extend more industries, and open up the primary, secondary and tertiary industries, integrate industrial development and regional development into a whole, and also open the nth growth curve of Naais's growth.
Innovation is the ability to see clearly, find another or even n growth curves, and meet challenges with fearless courage and courage, cross new fields and climb new peaks. He Liming said.
Short comment. Be "ruthless" to yourself.
Naais is ruthless.
This ruthlessness lies in the dissatisfaction with the product. Daily chemical products are different from other products, they are updated quickly, and with the improvement of living standards, the needs of consumers are constantly changing. Seeing this, Naaisi constantly overthrows old products with new products, and insists on developing green raw material products, leading the industry trend and maintaining freshness at all times.
This kind of ruthlessness lies in mind and vision. In the past, talents were reluctant to come to the mountainous areas, so they went to the cities where the talents were located. Enterprises that respect talents will naturally be favored by talents. A steady stream of ideas and new products is the best feedback on investment.
This ruthlessness also lies in the confidence of innovation. If you only look at the award for the breakthrough in technological innovation, you will suddenly think that this is a scientific research institute. Continuous research and development and continuous technological breakthroughs are the responsibilities of leading enterprises.
The development and longevity of an enterprise are never casual successes. "Ruthless enterprise" Naaisi, with its own ruthlessness, continuous self-revolution, iterative innovation, so as to prosper in the ever-changing market competition.
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