With the upgrading of consumption and consumers' pursuit of quality life, the transformation of consumption habits and consumption types has brought new opportunities and challenges to the FMCG industry, and at the same time, industry integration and survival of the fittest will continue. Therefore, for the FMCG industry, it is necessary to improve product quality, broaden marketing channels, pay attention to market changes, and continue to innovate in order to meet the growing needs of consumers, enhance the core competitiveness of brands, and cope with the changing market environment. Times are changing, the market environment is also changing, FMCG companies also need to assess the situation and change in a timely manner.
01 Haoliyou Tmall*** reopened
On March 20, 2023, more than three months after the store was closed, Tmall "Orion Haoliyou*** opened again. There are not many products in the reopened Haoliyou***, only a few pie products are on sale, puffing series, candy series, and biscuit series products have not yet been put on the shelves, and the number of fans in the store is only more than 200 people.
Holiyou is a large Korean integrated food company that entered the Chinese market in the 90s of the last century. On December 24, 2022, Haoliyou Tmall*** issued an announcement announcing the closure of the store and removing all products from the store. At that time, Holiyou responded that the closure was a change of operator. But under this store closure information, netizens not only did not feel reluctant, but instead said "the store is finally closed" and "I won't buy it again for a long time", and some netizens even said that "Haoliyou is no longer a good friend".
Netizens will have such a reaction, the reason is due to a "double standard" turmoil last year. On March 1, 2022, some netizens broke the news that the price of the Korean brand Holiyou is only in the Chinese and Russian markets, and the raw materials used in its representative product "Holiyou Pie" are different in China and South Korea.
During the suspension of Tmall***, Haoliyou was not idle, and said to its "Ah! Potatoes" and "Waves in the Waves" and other series have launched new products. In recent years, in addition to the original four major business segments of puffing, pies, biscuits and candies, Holiyou has added a series of protein nut bar products, and also launched Holiyo's "Jeju Lava Spring" high-end mineral water to expand the product category layout in China.
However, a series of new launches do not seem to have caused a big splash in the market. From the perspective of the industry, the aging of Haoliyou's products has been a stubborn disease for many years, and it has not kept up with the development of new retail channels such as e-commerce, so it will naturally gradually lose some consumers.
02 Zhong Sui was re-elected as the richest man in China
On October 24, 2023, the "2023 Hurun Report" released by the Hurun Research Institute showed that the 69-year-old chairman of Nongfu Spring, Zhong Sui, became the richest man in China for the third time in a row with 450 billion yuan, Tencent Ma Huateng returned to second with 280 billion yuan, up 3 places from last year, and Huang Zheng, the founder of Pinduoduo, increased his wealth by 100 billion yuan from last year, and entered the top three for the first time with 270 billion yuan.
As early as 2021 and 2022, Zhong became the richest man in China twice in a row with a net worth of 390 billion and 455 billion respectively. Specifically, Zhong's wealth in the past three years is relatively stable, and its Hong Kong-listed company Nongfu Spring has performed well in the first half of this year, and its stock price has not been affected by the overall downturn in the Hong Kong ** market, which is basically the same as the same period last year, and has benefited from the Hong Kong dollar exchange rate ** this year and the company's large dividend of nearly 6.5 billion yuan in 2023, which has increased compared with last year.
Another A-share listed company, Wantai Biotechnology, was affected by the overall adjustment of the pharmaceutical sector in the capital market, and the company's market value shrank by more than 40 billion compared with the same period last year. At present, the wealth of Zhong's Wantai biological part accounts for about 10% of the total wealth. Zhong has become the fifth entrepreneur to be the richest man more than three times (including three times) in the 25 years of the Hurun Report, the top four being the Rong Zhijian family, the Huang Guangyu family, the Wang Jianlin family and the Ma Yun family.
03 Mars enters the pre-made dishes
In July 2023, international confectionery giant Mars signed an agreement to acquire Kevin, a prepared food company headquartered in California, USA'S Natural Foods, which plans to operate as a separate unit of Mars Foods & Nutrition.
In recent years, Mars has always regarded diversified development as the key to maintaining the sustainable competitiveness of the brand, and after stabilizing the candy and snack sector, it has also cut into the pet hospital track, and joined Buffett to acquire Wrigley chewing gum, enter the pet track, and acquire Royal Pet Food. The brands familiar to the public, such as Dove, Snickers, Skittles, Yida, Wrigley, etc., all belong to Mars' products.
According to the data, Kevin'S Natural Foods is a pre-made food brand that focuses on deliciousness, health, and convenience, and the brand was founded in 2019. The main products are flavored chicken, beef and pasta dishes, as well as sauces, sauces and other products, and the products not only cover the American market, but also enter the European market, and at the same time, Kevin'S Natural Foods also focuses on online channels, selling through official channels**, Amazon and other channels.
For Mars's acquisition, a person familiar with the matter revealed that the follow-up market will be mainly in the United States, but it is not ruled out that it will also make efforts in the Chinese prefabricated food market in the future. In fact, this isn't the first time Mars has laid out pre-made dishes at Kevin'Before S, Mars has taken the Indian pre-made food brand Tasty Bite under its umbrella, and now in Mars's official ***, Tasty Bite is called a natural vegetarian brand.
04 Reignwood Red Bull Holdings, the former king of supermarkets, entered the hypermarket
On April 14, 2023, the long-lost South China Supermarket will be resurrected again. It is understood that the newly opened new supermarket store is located in Luohu, Shenzhen, the new store covers an area of 2,000 square meters, in order to stimulate consumer shopping, the new first store in Luohu is 20% off the whole product, some ** discounts, and even launched ** official tweets to send movie tickets, cash coupons and member recharge to send pick-up cards, **sightseeing tickets and other discounts.
According to the data, Reignwood Investment (China)**, a subsidiary of Reignwood Group, invested in Shenzhen Home Commercial Management *** in March 2021 with a 70% shareholding ratio, and the latter is a 100% major shareholder of Xinyijia Supermarket. In other words, Reignwood Group acquired Xinyijia, an old supermarket in Shenzhen that has long since withdrawn from the historical stage, as early as 2 years ago.
Founded in 1995 by Li Binlan, Xinyijia is a long-established supermarket in Shenzhen along with the listed supermarket chain Renrenle. According to the statistical list of the top 100 chains of the China Chain Store & Franchise Association, during the 11-year period from 2005 to 2015, the sales scale of Xinyijia climbed from 11 billion yuan in 2005 to 18 billion yuan in 2012, with a maximum of 116 stores and 14th in the top 100; At that time, Renrenle was ranked 30th. However, by 2015, its stores had slipped to 102, with sales of 15 billion yuan.
Since then, due to the impact of e-commerce, the new best company that failed to adjust its business in time began to decline. In 2016, Xinyijia caused large-scale layoffs and temporary closure of many stores due to the rupture of the capital chain. On June 19, 2017, the Changsha Intermediate People's Court issued an announcement to accept the bankruptcy liquidation case of Hunan Xinyijia Company, and Xinyijia came to an end.
Bill Gates spent 6.2 billion to acquire Heineken shares
On February 17, 2023, according to a document from the Dutch Financial Market Authority (AFM), Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft and former richest man in the world, bought about 10.8 million shares of Heineken Holding Company from Mexican beverage retailer FEMSA**, accounting for about 376%。At the time of the share price, the value of the shares was about 848.2 billion euros (about 6.2 billion yuan), 6.65 million shares in this transaction are in the name of individuals, and the rest will be met by Gates Melinda.
Heineken is a Dutch brewing company founded in 1864 by Gerard Adriaan Heineken in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. In 2015, Heineken had more than 165 wineries in 70 countries around the world, employing about 7With 60,000 people, the company brews more than 250 top-quality, regional and specialty beers. In 2020, Heineken produced 221 beers for the yearWith 6 million litres (hectoliters), it is the largest winemaker in Europe and the second largest in the world, ranking behind InBev. In addition, in the field of beer exports, Heineken ranks first in the world.
Bill Gates, whose full name is William Henry Gates III, was born on October 28, 1955 in Seattle, Washington, USA, and founded Microsoft Corporation in 1975 with his friend Paul Allen. In 2000, Gates founded the Bill and Melinda Gates** Association, and in 2008, Gates announced that he would donate $58 billion of his personal wealth to charities**. In October 2021, Bill Gates ranked No. 4 on the 2021 America's Richest List with a fortune of $134 billion.
06 Yuanqi Forest's former sales leader was detained for corruption
On the evening of January 19, 2023, Yuanqi Forest issued an internal notice to all employees, Ye Licheng, the former head of the Yuanqi Forest Marketing Center, who was suspected of major corruption and other economic crimes, and has been criminally detained in accordance with the law. Yuanqi Forest decided to expel Ye Licheng and will fully cooperate with the follow-up work.
It is understood that Ye Licheng used to be the marketing director of COFCO in the southwest region. After joining Yuanqi Forest, he served as the sales director of Yuanqi Forest Southwest Region, overseeing the sales of all Yuanqi Forest's products in the southwest region. Subsequently, at the end of 2021, Ye Licheng began to be in charge of the entire sales team of Yuanqi.
In addition, according to people familiar with the matter, Ye Licheng was previously unknown in the FMCG industry, but after joining Yuanqi Forest, he made achievements in the southwest region. In 2021, the sales performance of the southwest region led by him was comparable to that of East China and South China, and the products also entered the southwest sinking market, and then Ye Licheng was promoted to be responsible for national sales.
In fact, Yuanqi Forest has also spoken out publicly on anti-corruption issues before. In November 2022, Yuanqi Forest issued an internal announcement on the suspected corruption of employees. The announcement mentioned that "employees Zhang and Xu were suspected of corruption, and in the process of routine market inspection and internal audit, they were found to be corrupt and decided to transfer them to the public security organs for processing, and the public security organs have recently filed a criminal case and taken compulsory measures against Zhang and Xu." ”
07Procter & Gamble Chain Control Center will be relocated from Europe to China
On January 28, 2023, at the high-quality development conference held in Guangdong Province, Xu Min, global executive president of Procter & Gamble (China) and chairman and CEO of Greater China, said that it is planned to move the international first-class chain control center from Europe to Guangdong, responsible for the import and export business management services of RCEP, "Belt and Road" related countries and other markets.
China is P&G's second largest regional market in the world. In recent years, P&G has continued to increase its investment in China, built the largest production base in Asia in Guangdong, established a headquarters management team, and successively invested in the establishment of a digital innovation center, a new intelligent manufacturing center, and an intelligent technology innovation center in Guangdong.
Xu Min also said that in order to continue to optimize and improve its business in China, P&G will continue to increase its investment in digitalization, accelerate the launch of popular products, and lead consumption upgrades. Secondly, Procter & Gamble will enhance its brand power, omni-channel operation capabilities and chain level, strengthen brand building, broaden sales channels, and accelerate the construction of live broadcast e-commerce projects. In addition, P&G will also vigorously promote green and low-carbon development, and is committed to achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions from operations and the ** chain by 2040.
Starting from 2022, many international chemical giants have invested in building factories in China, including BASF, the world's largest chemical company of the same size as Procter & Gamble. In September 2022, BASF invested EUR 10 billion to build a new production site in Zhanjiang, the largest investment plan in BASF's 158-year history.
08 Unilever changed its coach
On January 30, 2023, consumer goods giant Unilever announced the appointment of Hein Schumacher as CEO. After a one-month transition period, Hein Schumacher will officially begin his role as CEO of Unilever on 1 July 2023.
It is understood that Hein Schumacher has worked for Heinz in the United States, Europe and Asia for more than 10 years, he has been based in the Chinese market and led the transformation of Heinz Group in the Asia-Pacific region.
Unilever Chairman Nils Andersen said: "Hein is a dynamic, values-driven business leader with a strong background of experience and an excellent track record of delivering in the global consumer goods industry. He has exceptional strategic capabilities, proven operational efficiency, and extensive experience in both developed and developing markets. ”
Hein Schumacher also commented: "I am delighted to be appointed as the head of Unilever. It's a business with an impressive global footprint, a strong brand portfolio, a talented team, and a reputation as a leader in sustainability. During my tenure on the Board, I have grown more confident in Unilever's fundamentals and clear growth potential. I will be very focused on working with the Unilever team to improve the performance of the business and serve the billions of people around the world who use its products every day." ”
Generally speaking, "the change of leadership of an enterprise is either in business adjustment or on the way to business adjustment." "Unilever's change of manager also sends a signal that in the coming years, Unilever should reform or adjust its business framework.
09 Kraft Heinz changed coaches
On August 15, 2023, Kraft Heinz said that the company's chief executive officer, Miguel Patricio, will leave his role from next year and will be replaced by Carlos Abrams-Rivera, president of North America, effective January 1, 2024. Until then, Abrams-Rivera has been the President of North America and has served as President of the company, effective as of the date of the announcement.
According to the data, Abrams-Rivera is already a "veteran" in the food and beverage industry. He previously worked at Kraft, where he managed several kitchen food brands, and later led Mondelēz's Latin American chewing gum and confectionery division and Campbell's snack business. In February 2020, he returned to Kraft Heinz to take on the role of head of the U.S. region in the midst of the pandemic, successfully rescuing the pandemic-induced demand crisis.
In the announcement, Patricio admitted: "He (Abrams-Rivera) has successfully withstood the tremendous pressure of the pandemic and achieved strong results during his tenure as President of North America. His ability and experience in dealing with diverse markets is complemented by our ambition to aspire to growth, and his strategy and innovative thinking are the ideal person to continue to drive Kraft Heinz forward in the next phase, and I am honored to hand over the leadership to him, and I am confident that Kraft Heinz will achieve even better in the years to come." ”
On the whole, Kraft Heinz's performance in recent years is not optimistic. According to its financial report information from 2016 to 2022, the change in total income is not large, but the change in net profit is large, which is 359.6 billion yuan, 109400 million yuan, -101900 million yuan, 193.5 billion yuan, 35.6 billion yuan, 101.2 billion and 236.3 billion yuan.
It is worth noting that in 2020, Kraft Heinz moved its Asian headquarters to Guangzhou, China, strengthening its strategic position in the Chinese market. At present, Kraft Heinz mainly has three tracks in the Chinese market: baby food, Western condiments and Chinese condiments, and has many brands such as Heinz, Weishida, Guanghe, and Meiweiyuan.
10. Coca-Cola Greater China changed its coach
In January 2023, Coca-Cola updated the lineup information of the senior management team on the official website of the headquarters, in which the president of Coca-Cola Greater China and Mongolia has been replaced with a new person - Gilles Leclerc, it is understood that this is the first time that Coca-Cola has changed its leadership in Greater China since 2020. The new president has been in office since January 1, 2023.
It is reported that before becoming the president of Coca-Cola Greater China and Mongolia, Ji Luke was the global president of the McDonald's division of Coca-Cola. During his tenure at McDonald's, Gillock led the global team to drive growth in Coca-Cola's nearly 38,000 McDonald's restaurants in more than 100 markets.
In this role, he is responsible for the overall strategic direction of the division, driving core project execution in key markets, resulting in revenue and profit growth for both Coca-Cola Systems and McDonald's Corporation. Before that, he was the global vice president of Coca-Cola's McDonald's.
In addition to food and beverage services, the veteran FMCG veteran also has extensive experience in the 2B business in the retail channel. According to the data, Gilluke joined the Coca-Cola Company in 1998 and has held important positions in France, China, Singapore, the United States and other markets. He has led global client teams for key clients such as Carrefour, Metro, and French retailer Système U.
Prior to joining The Coca-Cola Company, Gilluke worked in marketing, banking, and human resources, working in the United States and his native France. Gilluke holds an MBA from the Barney School of Business, University of Hartford, Connecticut, USA.