Chao News client reporter Chen Jie.
As China's beverage industry enters a new era, Wahaha Group once again shows its enterprising style. On March 6, Zong Fuli, vice chairman of China Beverage Industry Association and general manager of Wahaha Group, attended the annual meeting of China Beverage Industry Association and delivered a speech entitled "Buckle the chords of the times, practice new quality production, and build a new picture of the industry".
This is Zong Fuli's first public appearance since the death of her father. For her, attending the industry annual meeting is not only a tribute to her father, Zong Qinghou, a legendary leader in China's beverage industry, but also an expression of her determination to choose to dive into the industry. Based on the new development node of the enterprise and the industry, Zong Fuli, as a doer, analyzed the new environment, new trends, new momentum and new vision of China's beverage industry with pragmatic thinking.
Conform to the trend of health, and practice the "internal strength and heart method" of eating and drinking
In her speech, Zong Fuli mentioned that in recent years, from the classification of beverages in Singapore, the WHO's reminder of the use of aspartame, to the transformation of ready-to-drink products in streetside shops, it is clear that the beverage industry has ushered in an era of national health. Consumption orientation is slowly reconstructing, from the beginning of satisfying the needs of the mouth and stomach, to the pursuit of health value, people have given higher value to drinks, sugar-free, low-sugar, functional, plant-based and other emerging consumption hotspots have emerged, and the "health" of the industry has become the only way to meet the needs of consumers with scientific and technological innovation and bioengineering technology.
More than 30 years ago, in order to solve the problems of poor appetite and malnutrition in children, Wahaha's first product "Wahaha Nutrient Solution" was born. As one of the earliest beverage companies to enter the "big health" track, Wahaha has responded to the "Healthy China" strategy and shifted from focusing on product safety to paying equal attention to safety and health, and has cultivated "internal strength" in many fields.
In terms of sugar reduction, Wahaha continues to carry out sugar reduction and sugar reduction work on beverage products, focusing on the existing fist products, and developing and launching dozens of new and old products such as low-sugar version of Nutrition Express, sugar-free version of Very Cola, sugar-free soda, sugar-free pure tea, etc., to build a product matrix that adapts to the times and market demand.
In terms of biotechnology, Zong Fuli has always been proud of Wahaha's characteristic strain resource bank. It is reported that China's food strains have been monopolized by foreign countries for a long time, in order to break this situation, Wahaha began to work on probiotics research and development and industrial project layout more than 10 years ago, R & D personnel from the grassland to the mountains, from the snow to the plateau, to overcome a variety of harsh environments, to carry out the collection, development and production of strains. Now, Wahaha has established a strain resource bank with nearly 5,000 strains, and the amount of strains owned and resource collected is among the best in the domestic industry, breaking the shackles of relying on "foreign strains" and providing strong support for the research and development of probiotic series of health products.
Not only limited to raw material control and biotechnology, Wahaha also focuses on the research of traditional Chinese ingredients and characteristic resources, and interprets traditional food sources into modern beverages through advanced technology and technology. From the "Yellow Emperor's Neijing" to the "Compendium of Materia Medica", these ancient classics condense the countless efforts and experiences of their ancestors, and also show the unique advantages and charm of traditional Chinese ingredients. At the scene, Zong Fuli mentioned: "At present, we must base ourselves on the domestic market, tap the escalating health and delicious needs of consumers, find breakthroughs from traditional Chinese resources, and develop high-quality products." ”
Wahaha has established the Institute of Modern Bioengineering, which combines the traditional theory of TCM diet therapy with bioengineering, modern extraction and other technologies. Starting from children's nutrition solution, to tea drinks, to cereal products and the development of traditional food flavors, Wahaha continues to explore the needs and inspiration of product packaging and taste research and development, grasp the "new starting point" of traditional Chinese culture, and conform to the healthy trend of the beverage industry.
Digging inward into the traditional Chinese food source is not only to cultivate the "internal strength" of health, but also to cultivate the "heart method" of culture. Zong Fuli also hopes that the beverage carries the diverse expressions of Chinese culture, and consumers can see the rich "heritage" of Chinese food culture from Wahaha's products.
Embrace new quality productivity and create infinite "futuristic".
At the meeting, Zong Fuli also expressed her views on the recent hot word "new quality productivity". "New quality productivity" has attracted much attention since it was proposed, and it has also become a major keyword in the work report of the two sessions, but it often appears with future industries and cutting-edge technology, and few people will associate it with the "unpretentious" traditional beverage industry.
However, in Zong Fuli's view, "new quality productivity" also emphasizes the need to apply scientific and technological innovation achievements to specific industries and industrial chains in a timely manner, transform and upgrade traditional industries, and promote the deep integration of the digital economy and the real economy; In addition, the new quality productivity itself is green productivity, and it is necessary to strengthen the green manufacturing industry.
Although Wahaha is a food and beverage company, its growth process is also the epitome of industrial automation to intelligence. From the earliest introduction of foreign advanced production lines to the independent integrated automated production line, to today's self-design and planning of smart factories, Wahaha has initially realized the transformation and upgrading from automation to intelligence through the "three-step" strategy.
In terms of production, Wahaha has established the first digital and intelligent beverage production line in China, breaking the information silos of various equipment and realizing the interconnection of production data. At the beginning of this year, Wahaha Wencheng Company was awarded the "2023 Zhejiang Future Factory". Wahaha brings the most mature production lines and technologies to the mountainous areas, drives the development of the local industrial chain in the form of "technological hematopoiesis", and sows the seeds of scientific and technological take-off in the mountains.
Zong Fuli said, "The physical manufacturing industry is an industry full of infinite possibilities, and a small technological improvement or concept innovation will bring different surprises. ”
If you want to enter the stage of smart industry, you must pay attention to the innovation and upgrading of R&D and production, and form a set of "high coupling" model that can be embedded in the original business. In the future, she hopes to build a new digital ecological sample with hyperlinks between all ends in Wahaha. From procurement, manufacturing, warehousing and logistics and other business links, to B-end objects such as retail terminals, sales business and partners, and then to consumers who finally purchase products, a brand-new, end-to-end digital ecological manufacturing link is formed, connecting people, things, and fields, making "manufacturing" more empathetic.
To develop new quality productivity, we should also pay attention to the dual-carbon strategy and take the path of sustainable development. As the official non-alcoholic beverage sponsor of the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, Wahaha will carry out the establishment of the "Zero-Waste Asian Games Factory" in 2022 and 2023, and promote the source reduction and resource utilization of various types of solid waste in an all-round way through source and technical improvements, so that the concept of "no waste" can be integrated into production and life.
Using "new quality productivity", Wahaha is empowering itself to get rid of the traditional growth path through technology, achieve high-efficiency and high-quality growth, and continue to explore the key to moving from traditional manufacturing to intelligent manufacturing.
Let the service "on the tip of the tongue" be transformed into the temperature of "on the tip of the heart".
If building a brand is compared to building a house, the "hardware" of the product itself is the beams that support the erection of the building, and listening to the "voice" of consumers is to make it resist the wind and rain.
At the annual meeting, Zong Fuli shared a small discovery: Recently, on social platforms, a comment with a high number of likes posted various Wahaha cards that she collected when she was a child, saying that these cards were the source of happiness in childhood, which resonated with many netizens. She was both moved and relieved by this, and also pondered, "Why can the 37-year-old Wahaha evoke everyone's childhood memories?" And this memory is still alive today? ”
She believes that the secret is to integrate the "drumbeat" of corporate growth into the rhythm of the development of China's beverage industry, and continue to realize the resonance between brands and consumers. As a company founded in 1987, Wahaha started with the Chinese beverage industry in the 80s, and has spent 40 years witnessing China becoming an important force in the global beverage market, and also facing the increasingly complex market trend - consumer demand tends to be personalized and diversified; The advancement of science and technology, especially the application of digital technology, is deeply reshaping the production model, marketing strategy and even the entire industrial chain of the beverage industry.
Zong Fuli said firmly: "Although the times are changing, the ecology is changing, and the track is changing, Wahaha's original brand intention of communicating with consumers and creating value for consumers remains unchanged. "A variety of classic beverage products such as purified water, AD calcium milk, eight-treasure porridge, and Shuang Crooked have a strong appeal across the time dimension, making Wahaha no longer a brand to a certain extent, but an important witness of a life memory.
In recent years, Wahaha has actively expressed its value around user needs, added the cultural background of its products, and "multiplied" its brand influence. Taking AD calcium milk as an example, Wahaha has vertically extended to various circles such as the trendy play circle and the two-dimensional circle through the "big children" June 1st festival and customized packaging, so as to loosen the minds of big children of different ages and hobbies. At the same time, when domestic "trendy" products have become a new demand point, Wahaha also actively promotes the national style culture, co-branded with Dunhuang IP, and pushes the new version of the very cola national tide on the CCTV Spring Festival Gala, paying tribute to traditional culture in front of Chinese people around the world and showing cultural confidence.
Zong Fuli's brand play is not complicated, she just hopes to do things with long-term value in a long-term company, and one of them is to bring health and happiness to everyone, so that consumers can "taste on the tip of the tongue" service, and transform it into a temperature that touches the "tip of the heart" of consumers.
In the past 2023, the key indicators of China's beverage industry have been good, many companies have performed well, and the industry has been steadily improving. In Zong Fuli's view, what is inseparable behind this is the "good" heart of an enterprise: to do better than in the past, to do better than peers, and to do better than consumer expectations, which is a benign "involution".
At the scene, Zong Fuli humbly said that she was not only a "veteran" who had been groping in the industry for 20 years, but also a "new general" who took over the "baton" of business management. At the beginning of the year, in an exclusive interview with Chao News, she said frankly, "I think in addition to the company, I also bear the responsibility of the industry and do some good things for China's beverages, of course, it depends on fate, timing, and strength." Wahaha's latest thinking will be verified by Zong Fuli.
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