The role of the Internet is not only to sell goods, but also to create a use of big data to better discover new needs, create new needs, through this ability to quickly capture the new needs of the people, based on this, the creation cycle of new consumer brands has become shorter, and these brands can form a consumption boom among the people through the Internet.
In the new era of consumption, material materials are unprecedentedly abundant, and there can be sufficient information exchange between consumers and producers, consumers and consumers, and the "people-oriented" consumption relationship has been strengthened.
Text |"Lookout" Newsweek reporter Jia Wenjing.
Tourists visit Tianjin Ancient Culture Street (photo taken on February 10, 2024) Photo by Zhao Zishuo This magazine.
What's in the box?
The box can contain a book, a pen, a gift or a pair of sneakers......But there's more to the world in the box than that.
In Beijing's Chaoyang District, a huge "box" with a dark gray façade and sprayed with urban paint has broken the original pattern of Chaowai Street in Beijing, called the BOX Chaowai Youth Center.
This "box" often surprises young consumers - in the outdoor east side of the sports and leisure area, there is Beijing's first outdoor light and shadow basketball court, the court is surrounded by LED surround light strips and a large area of art painting, where ** festivals, watching parties, fan meetings, etc., young people can play here, socialize, shop, eat, and meet all kinds of needs in one stop.
The Box's outward-facing interior is designed in an industrial rough style, with an original steel frame structure and exposed concrete walls with a large number of dynamic screens that take turns showcasing new consumer brands in the mall. With hip-hop and electronic backgrounds, the young people who come here feel as if they are in the festival, relax and release stress in a relaxed atmosphere.
One-stop consumption, interactive consumption, and emotional satisfaction consumption ......These new consumption patterns indicate that China's consumer market is undergoing drastic changes.
Consumption, which is linked to the macroeconomy, is an important engine of economic growth; Connecting thousands of households at one end is a concrete manifestation of a better life. In recent years, China's consumer market has continued to recover, and the basic role of consumption has become more significant. At the same time, the spiritual needs are the new content; Take technology and innovation as the new driving force; Personalization and diversification are the new characteristics; The pace of development of new consumption in the new form of combining online and offline has accelerated.
As a new variable in the consumer market, new consumption on the one hand further stimulates the growth potential of the consumer market, and on the other hand, the new demand drives the change of supply, promotes the formation of new technologies, promotes the upgrading of the industrial chain, and smooths the industrial cycle, market cycle, and economic and social cycle. More importantly, new consumption is always on the road of innovation, and its connotation is constantly changing, which will provide a lasting development impetus for economic growth.
Why is new consumption "on fire".
In 2023, from the Zibo barbecue in midsummer to the Harbin Ice and Snow World in the cold winter, consumption explosion has become a hot topic.
According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2023, the total retail sales of consumer goods in China will 471495 billion yuan, an increase of 7 over 20222%, and final consumption expenditure drives economic growth by 43 percentage points, and the contribution rate to economic growth reached 825%。
Although there is no independent accounting for new consumption for the time being, behind the growth of consumption data, new consumption has played an important role. In the view of Wang Wei, former director and second-level researcher of the Institute of Market Economy of the Development Research Center, the new consumption can be "fired" in recent years because of the comprehensive effect of many aspects.
First of all, the increase in per capita income has promoted the optimization of residents' consumption structure, and development-oriented and enjoyment-oriented consumption has been increasing.
International experience shows that after a country's per capita GDP exceeds 10,000 US dollars, it will often enter the stage of consumption upgrading, and the consumption structure will undergo fundamental changes. The proportion of subsistence consumption, including food and clothing, has decreased, while the proportion of enjoyment-oriented consumption such as health, culture, sports, and entertainment has increased, and consumption has pursued more quality, individuality, and diversity, promoting the growth of service industries, digital consumption, and green consumption. Today, China's per capita GDP has exceeded 120,000 US dollars, the middle-income group continues to expand. Such an economic development background enables consumers to increase consumption, which is the basis for new consumption to catch fire.
Secondly, structural changes such as smaller families have made consumer groups more segmented, and multi-level and diversified consumer demand has been emerging.
Since around 2017, the first batch of post-95s graduated from university, and they have grown up in a more favorable environment, and as online natives, they have been exposed to a rich circle of people and have diverse interests. For example, they are willing to pay for health and exercise, which makes fitness classes and dance classes popular; willing to pay for high-quality content and promote audio books to become a new force in the publishing industry; From hot words such as "ice cream assassin", we can also realize that young people not only pursue quality, but also know how to "save money" in consumption.
In addition, the family structure in our country is also divided. Census data shows that in the decade from 2011 to 2020, there was a clear trend of smaller households in China. "New Consumption Trends of Tmall Supermarket*** Based on the structural changes of Chinese families, it is divided into four key groups of nuclear family groups: independent new youth, two-person teammate group, novice parents, and families with children. Families of different types of structures will form a multi-level and diversified consumer market.
For example, the long-term "independent" life of independent new youth makes them more eager for the fulfillment of the spiritual world; The duo is accompanied by lovers, enjoying the romantic atmosphere of the moment and eager to explore the world together. Novice parents have just unlocked a new role in life and are willing to choose high-quality products for their children; When children enter school, they also have more time to pay attention to themselves.
Finally, the application of new technologies efficiently meets consumer demand, making new product iterations with rich functions and different forms increasingly common.
Wang Wei said that the development of new consumption is a gradual process, in the past two years, the development of new consumption has accelerated, and the rapid development and application of technologies such as 5G, artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things have provided technical support for the development of new consumption, breaking the traditional consumption time and space boundaries, creating intelligent new consumption scenarios, and enabling new products with different functions to land.
For example, various places use AR, VR and other technological means to build smart museums, so that consumers can shuttle between the past and the present, and face to face with history; Another example is in the field of consumer electronics, science and technology promote the development of the concept of "intelligent manufacturing of the whole house", and the picture of intelligent life continues to appear, equipped with a display screen to watch the best gas stove to learn to cook, and smart home appliances such as laundry care machines that can not only sterilize ultraviolet rays but also gently dry into more families.
Han Dan, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and chairman of Jordan Health Industry Group, added that the emergence of new consumption is also due to the fact that after the new crown epidemic, consumers tend to choose a new environment and new channels to relax themselves, which has become a catalyst for new consumption to go out of the circle to a certain extent.
Where is the "new" of new consumption?
Celebrate the New Year, wear new clothes", continuing the national tide fever in 2023, and in the Spring Festival of 2024, more people will wear new Chinese style.
These New Year's robes include improved Tang costumes, horse-faced skirts, cheongsam, cloud shoulders, cloaks, ethnic minority costumes and other different styles.
Zhang Dandan, president of Changsha New Consumption Research Institute, said that new consumption is not a new concept, and its connotation is constantly changing, and there is no unified and clear definition. It is generally believed that new consumption refers to consumption that is affected by the new technological revolution and is different from traditional consumption content, form, scene and channel, which should be called new consumption.
Specifically, the "newness" of new consumption presents three major characteristics.
The consumer group has expanded from young people to people of all ages, from children to silver-haired people. At present, in Sanya, Hainan, it is difficult to find a room in a rehabilitation center for the elderly; In Chizhou, Anhui Province, more than 600 universities for the elderly provide a variety of courses for the elderly; In Shenyang, Liaoning Province, on the Yudaihe Natural Ice Rink, the ice hockey competition for the elderly is very lively ......
Chen Gong, director of the Institute of Population Research at Peking University, once said: "The consumption structure of the elderly is increasingly upgrading from daily necessities to health and smart products, and from product consumption to service consumption. Recently, the General Office of the People's Republic of China issued the "Opinions on the Development of the Silver Economy to Enhance the Well-being of the Elderly", the first national "Silver Economy" policy document, showing that the new consumption needs of the elderly in China should not be underestimated.
The category of consumer goods has expanded from the material category of "clothing, food, housing and transportation" to a broader consumption space including the spiritual domain and emotional domain. "At the end of last year, I received a souvenir with a calendar with a date underneath and a pattern on it. Ms. Zhang, from Beijing, recalled, "Every page of this calendar is an excerpt of a classic sentence from a famous book, and every day I will turn the inner page, which makes me feel the ritual of life."
At present, people's consumption concept is not only satisfied with the functional value of the product, but also pays more attention to emotional empathy, cultural resonance and spiritual resonance, and pays more attention to the spiritual symbols and cultural belonging of the product.
The consumer industry has evolved from an individual "fighting alone" to a model with the platform as the core and the main business entity developing together. In Changsha, the representative of the new consumer city, new consumer brands such as Wenheyou, Chayan Yuese, and Black Classic spontaneously established enterprise alliances to achieve mutual assistance and cooperation, and jointly launched new consumer products. Zhang Dandan said.
The team of the Institute of Consumer Economics of Xiangtan University concluded that behind these new characteristics is the reshaping of consumer relations.
In the era of relative scarcity of material materials, consumption is centered on "things", and the main driving force for market development is commodities. In the new era of consumption, the unprecedented abundance of material materials, coupled with the rapid development of new media, consumers and producers, consumers and consumers can have sufficient information exchange, commodities gradually take a back seat, consumers become the core, promote market development, and strengthen the consumption relationship with "people" as the core.
The impact of new consumption is geometric.
Consumption has been the primary driving force for China's economic growth for many years and an important engine for achieving high-quality economic development. A number of interviewed experts said that in the future, new consumption is one of the breakthroughs to promote the sustained, stable and healthy development of China's economy, and will become a new growth point for China's economy.
It is difficult to quantify the exact figures, but it is foreseeable that the economic growth brought by new consumption is not limited to the consumer market. Wang Wei said that the emergence of a new consumer brand will drive the supply of manufacturing industry, improve production capacity, drive service innovation, promote employment, smooth economic cycle, and drive economic growth. Typical examples such as take-out ordering have led to the development of the catering industry and the instant delivery industry, bringing a large number of flexible jobs.
In October 2023, the "2023 Instant Retail Development Trend***" jointly released by the China International Electronic Commerce Center, Jingdong Consumer and Industrial Development Research Institute and Dada Group Research Institute shows that the scale of China's instant retail market will exceed 590 billion yuan in 2022, equivalent to 14%；The instant retail market size is expected to increase to 36 trillion yuan, equivalent to 6% of the total retail sales of consumer goods in the same period, driving economic growth.
Zhang Dandan said that the spillover effect of new consumption is reflected in many aspects.
Demand drives supply, extends the industrial chain, and improves industrial resilience. The consumption upgrade on the demand side will be transmitted to the supply side, promote the elimination of excess capacity on the supply side, and achieve industrial optimization and upgrading in various fields and high-quality economic development.
For some time now, China's automotive industry has been in the stage of learning from abroad, and foreign brands have dominated for a long time. The emergence of consumer demand for new energy vehicles has broken this situation.
On the one hand, the development of new energy vehicles promotes the generation of new cutting-edge technologies and boosts industrial upgrading. In October 2023, a technology exhibition hosted by the Society of Automotive Engineers of China showcased a number of next-generation technologies related to new energy vehicles, such as the three-in-one electric drive system for new energy vehicles, a new generation of millimeter-wave radar, and a new generation of high-computing power intelligent driving domain controller. The emergence of these new technologies is the epitome of the times when the construction of a modern industrial system is accelerated and the industrial chain is more resilient.
On the other hand, a new track for the development of intelligent networked vehicles has been formed. This includes emerging industries such as intelligent operating systems, on-board intelligent equipment, Internet of Vehicles, cloud computing, and high-precision maps, which promote the integrated development of automobiles, information technology, transportation and other industries, and form a new growth pole for China's economic development.
Bring more new jobs, stabilize people's livelihood, and promote a virtuous cycle of economy and society. New consumption requires a large number of service-oriented talents, and may become an important carrying area for the migration of China's manufacturing employment population.
In the "Occupational Classification Dictionary of the People's Republic of China (2022 Edition)" revised by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, a total of 74 new occupations in 5 batches, including homestay housekeepers, family education instructors, and research travel instructors, have been included.
With the vigorous development of the homestay industry, tourists are more inclined to personalized experience, and higher requirements are put forward for the quality of homestay and butler service. According to relevant data from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, in just a few years, homestay housekeeper practitioners have achieved a leap from "0" to "million". Meituan B&B data also shows that in the first half of 2023, the number of homestay employees on the platform increased by 47% year-on-year, of which the post-00 practitioners increased by 140%, bringing new growth space for stable employment.
The brand goes out, promotes the introduction of talents, capital and other production factors, and promotes the sustainable development of the city. Taking Changsha as an example, many local brands have gone out with the help of the city's communication channels, so that more consumers yearn for the birthplace of the brand, attract consumers to the city, attract the first store resources to land in the city, attract young people to settle in the city, and give back the "dividend" of the brand going out to the city, forming a virtuous circle. In 2022, Changsha's population will grow by about 18130,000, ranking first among China's GDP trillion cities, the growth of popularity has promoted Changsha from "Internet celebrity" to "Changhong".
Relying on new consumer brands, we will promote the integration of excellent traditional Chinese culture into life and the hearts of the people in a way that the people like to see. More and more new consumption is incorporating traditional cultural elements. In the opinion of the interviewed experts, this is an important way of cultural inheritance and dissemination, which can integrate the values of the Chinese nation into the cultural products that people like to see, enhance the sense of cultural identity, promote the inheritance and development of culture, and make traditional culture glow with new vitality.
This collision of traditional culture and modern consumption is being staged during the Lantern Festival just past, where traditional programs such as folk music performances are very popular in the central square of Huangxing South Road Pedestrian Street in Changsha; In Shanghai Haichang Ocean Park, intangible cultural heritage performances such as "Iron Flower" set off the festive atmosphere ......The contrast between traditional culture and modern trends allows consumers to get a different feeling.
Where is the "road" for the development of new consumption?
According to the analysis of industry insiders, today, new consumption has passed the initial stage of development of savage growth, and business entities should be encouraged to cultivate and incubate more high-quality new consumer brands in the future.
At this stage, "the ability of new consumption is more important is the insight of the consumer market, the ability to develop products, the ability to mobilize the first chain and the ability to reserve talents." Zhang Dandan said.
First of all, we should make efforts from the top-level design, and improve the new consumption policy system according to local conditions.
In recent years, the policy orientation of the consumer market has become clearer and clearer. From the first to the local level, all levels encourage new consumption and provide policy support and institutional guarantee for the development of new consumer brands.
*At the level, since 2015, policy documents such as the "Guiding Opinions on Actively Playing the Leading Role of New Consumption and Accelerating the Cultivation and Formation of New Supply and New Power", "Opinions on Supporting the Healthy Development of New Business Formats and New Models, Activating the Consumer Market and Expanding Employment", "Opinions on Leading the Accelerated Development of New Consumption with New Formats and New Models", and "Outline of the Strategic Plan for Expanding Domestic Demand (2022-2035)" have been issued one after another, leading industrial upgrading with consumption upgrading.
At the local level, Beijing has put forward specific measures around "cultivating new consumption models", which will accelerate the creation of a smart new life in the new consumption era; Sichuan has launched an action plan for cultivating and developing new consumption, clearly cultivating and expanding new formats, new models and new orientations for consumption; Hunan has launched 15 measures to promote the consumption of automobiles, restaurants and housing, and leveraged the ...... of the consumer market with a number of policies
At present, there are not many people who have raised the importance of new consumption to the city level as a whole. Zhang Dandan suggested that each city should improve the top-level design of new urban consumption according to its own regional characteristics, industrial structure characteristics, and new consumption industry base. At the same time, policy formulation is not a matter of a single department, and multiple departments need to form a joint force to promote the reallocation of industrial resources, market resources, and human resources.
Second, optimize the business environment for the development of new consumption and stimulate new vitality in the consumer market.
On the supply side, the interviewed experts said that in the future, new consumer enterprises will enter the market more in the form of light assets, and for this type of enterprises, there is a greater need for an open, transparent, inclusive and non-discriminatory industry development ecology.
In terms of cultivating new consumer brands, it is necessary to further innovate the system and mechanism to optimize the business environment, improve service levels, improve work efficiency, and promote the facilitation of registration of business entities; In terms of the protection of new consumer brands, it is particularly necessary to further improve the intellectual property protection system to promote the long-term and healthy development of new brands.
On the demand side, in recent years, as the consumption environment has become more healthy and orderly, people's awareness of independent consumption and ability to identify problems have been continuously improved. According to the statistics of the China Consumers Association, in the first half of 2023, the National Consumers Association accepted a total of 615365 consumer complaints and resolved 497142 cases, with a complaint resolution rate of 8079%, recovering 590.64 million yuan of economic losses for consumers.
Therefore, while cultivating new consumer brands, it is necessary to further smooth the channels for the protection of consumer rights and interests, take multiple measures to resolve consumer disputes first, reduce consumers' worries, continuously release consumption potential, and promote the continuous recovery of consumption.
Thirdly, we should pay attention to the supply of high-quality service talents, "gather popularity" for the new consumer market, and cultivate long-term development momentum.
In the face of the insufficient supply of high-quality service-oriented talents in China, the interviewed experts suggested that the education reform should be continuously promoted, the modern service industry talent training system should be built, the corresponding disciplines and majors should be scientifically set up in colleges and vocational colleges, and the continuing education platform should be built by joint enterprises, and professional social training institutions should be established to gradually establish a high-quality service talent team.
In addition, the number of flexible employees in China has reached 200 million. For this group of people, while building a good platform to achieve fast and accurate employment, we should increase protection and make good use of policy tools such as insurance to provide more comprehensive and high-quality protection for flexible employees and empower the development of new consumption.
Finally, enhance the innovation ability of enterprises and create new consumer products that truly meet the needs of the people.
Han Dan said that from the perspective of enterprises, to promote the development of new consumption, we should return to the essence of consumers, accurately locate consumer needs, experience consumer feelings, provide customers with truly valuable products and services, do a good job in fine service and rapid response, and adhere to long-termism.
The more the new consumer market develops, the more it is necessary to fight for the comprehensive ability of products, and the core is to enhance the ability to innovate. The relevant person in charge of OPPO said that in the new mobile phone consumption track, the future mobile phone competition is no longer about the size of the mobile phone screen and the amount of memory, but more on whether its AI capabilities are smart enough.
Focusing on new needs, OPPO has launched a layout around two "new", one is the layout of a new form of folding screen mobile phones, and the other is the layout of OPPO AI, performance, communication, privacy and security in four major areas, including the first handset of a smartphone, hands-free dual-mode satellite call, the first end-side application of 7 billion parameter large model, the debut of the tidal architecture and many other cutting-edge technologies, bringing consumers a new experience.
At the same time of precise positioning, enterprises should also operate in compliance, make the market information of new consumer products more transparent, let the people have a full understanding of related products, put the interests of the people in a more important position, and truly realize that new consumption comes from consumers and goes to consumers. Wang Wei said.
Outlook, No. 10, 2024).