The cake in the industry is not enough, and the marketing depends on the head anchor … What is the reason why it is ＂difficult＂ to make up domestic products？

Every reporter Shu Dongni, every intern reporter Huang Hai, every editor Liang Xiao　　　　

The public opinion storm caused by 79 yuan Huaxizi’s eyebrow pencil has not stopped.

On September 14th, some event-related entries, such as "Netizen explodes Hua Xizi’s five makeup brushes for 919 yuan", "What eyebrow pencils are more expensive than Hua Xizi’s" and "Yu Meijing’s powder rose by 320,000 a day", were posted on the hot search, which triggered a total reading volume of over 200 million times.

Consumers who questioned the price of Huaxizi poured into traditional Chinese beauty brands with more cost-effective performance. Since September 12, brands such as Bee Flower and Yumeijing have been on the hot search in turn, becoming the "new favorites" chosen by consumers.

In the transformation from "online celebrity" to parity, there may be a consumption trend that cannot be ignored — — It seems that the first generation of online celebrity beauty brands represented by Hua Xizi and Perfect Diary can’t be sold in Amoy’s base camp. According to the data of the third-party research report, the reporter of national business daily found that the total GMV of Huaxizi had a high year-on-year decline for several months since December last year on the Alibaba platform, the base camp where Huaxizi started.

"It has never been used, and the price/performance ratio is average." Yemeng, who lives in Foshan, Guangdong Province, bought Hua Xizi’s makeup remover, cosmetic eggs and eyeliner two or three years ago.

For yemeng, who didn’t have a job at that time, the singer Charlie was the only reason for her to buy Hua Xizi. She was a hardcore fan of Charlie. "In fact, even if I knew that Charlie had become a brand friend, I hesitated for a long time before buying it, because I knew that it was low in cost performance, mainly in marketing. So I didn’t buy its ace product, but bought something I thought I would use. "

When it comes to lipstick and honey powder with a "good" reputation, yemeng, who has always been careful in skin care, bluntly said: "Honey powder lipstick is a bit ‘ Wrong species ’ … …” Yemeng’s experience is not unique. On social media such as Weibo and Xiaohongshu, there are many discussions about the quality and price of Huaxizi.

On September 13, the related terms of Hua Xizi’s eyebrow pencil were more expensive than gold on the hot search.

Taobao platform shows that the price of Huaxizi Shouwumei chalk in Huaxizi’s official flagship store is one replacement in 89 yuan, with a net content of 0.08g. After conversion, the average price per gram is 556.25 yuan, which is nearly 20% higher than the latest published unit price of gold in China and Shanghai Gold Exchange.

Image source: Weibo @ Hua Xizi Florasis

Is Huaxizi expensive?

"The price of Huaxizi is in the upper-middle price range among domestic products (beauty products)." On the afternoon of September 14, a person who was responsible for the live broadcast of a domestic brand e-commerce told reporters. However, the person also said that when calculating the price of eyebrow pencil, consumers should also take the replacement into account. Take the price of Hua Xizi’s live broadcast room in Li Jiaqi as an example. 79 yuan buys one and gets two replacement clothes, with an average price of 329.17 yuan per gram.

Compared with mainstream makeup brands on the market, the unit price of this eyebrow pencil of Hua Xizi is in the upper-middle level of the industry. In fact, entering the mid-to high-end market has always been the business goal that Hua Xizi is laying out.

According to several authoritative sources, Hua Mantian, the founder of Hua Xizi, once bluntly said: "For a long time, the high-end market of China cosmetics has been monopolized by international brands. But today, many products of Huaxizi have cut into the middle and high-end price belt and achieved certain success. "

However, for price-sensitive consumers, domestic beauty products with rising prices seem less attractive.

According to the latest research report of China Merchants Securities, in the nine months from December 2022 to August this year, the monthly GMV (total turnover) of Huaxizi products on Ali platform only increased in three months. In December 2022 and January 2023, the overall GMV of Huaxizi on the Ali platform dropped by as much as 45% and 56%.

Not only Hua Xizi, but also the perfect diary that ran out almost at the same time as Hua Xizi has a similar situation — — In the past nine months, the GMV of Perfect Diary on Ali platform has declined year-on-year almost every month.

The trend of pressure may have appeared in 618 last year. According to the research report of Guoyuan Securities, during the period of June 18, 2022, the brand growth rate of Huaxi Zi failed, with a drop of 41%.

On the afternoon of September 14th, the reporter sent an interview request to Hua Xizi on the issue of sales volume. As of press time, the other party has not responded.

"The research data is also biased. As far as I know, there is more than one channel for brands now. Taobao, Shake (sound), Fast (hand) and Little Red Book all need marketing costs. Brands may focus on Taobao at this stage. If other sales channels perform well, they may focus on other channels (such as marketing costs). Brands don’t want to be monopolized by the platform, making themselves very passive. "

On the evening of September 14, an e-commerce industry practitioner bluntly told reporters: "To be honest, we don’t know whether the sales volume of the brand is rising or falling, because the industry of live e-commerce may find many anchors to bring the goods, and all the sales data are in the hands of the boss or the corresponding merchants’ meeting knows that the company’s data has a wall."

However, in Wang Kai’s perception, the overall beauty is indeed on the decline in the past two years.

Wang Kai had previously worked as a "friend" in the head live broadcast room. He analyzed to reporters: "One is because there will be more new products of beauty, and now both domestic products and big brands are actually rolling … … For domestic products, it is more powerful in cost performance, but many of them have no brand power to support, so if it is not a very classic product, its product life cycle will be shorter. "

"Now it doesn’t cost too much to build a brand and make a product, so it won’t have long-term vitality."

It is not difficult to make products, and marketing has become the "number one project" of the brand. In the process of industry involution, the live broadcast room of the head anchor still has great appeal to domestic beauty brands.

Everyone is criticizing Hua Xizi, but almost all brands want to be Hua Xizi. Since I started to contact Li Jiaqi Live Studio in 2018, in just five years, Huaxi’s revenue has achieved a leap from tens of millions to billions.

"Lick" — — Wan Qing, who was in charge of the live broadcast of a domestic beauty brand, used this word to describe the company’s dependence on the head anchor. Wan Qing’s brand has appeared in many popular variety shows, but its dependence on the head anchor is not much different from that of small brands. "Sometimes it is a loss, because self-broadcasting is not necessarily so good."

Wan Qing told reporters that the cooperation between his brand and the head anchor often adopts the model of pit fee plus commission. Wan Qing recalled that the price of cooperation with a head anchor at that time was about 300,000 to 400,000 pit fees, plus a certain percentage of commission. "There is also a molecular parent link. If it is a parent link, it is more links, and it will be more expensive."

Wang Kai provided a set of data to the reporter. In the beauty industry, there are two main ways to cooperate with the live broadcast room. One is a pure maid, which is about 30% ~ 50%; The second is the pit fee plus commission, but the commission is probably between 30% and 50%, depending on the cooperation rules between the product and the anchor. "If you are like the previous top anchor, his commission will not be lower than 40% or 50%."

Image source: Weibo @ Li Jiaqi Austin

In the face of such a high proportion of commission, why are brands looking for goods in the live broadcast room still "endless"?

"Live broadcast is a must for domestic beauty."

Wang Kai gave a view similar to Wan Qing’s. He thought there were two main problems: exposure and transformation.

"If you have a deep cooperation with the head anchor, the head anchor will give you a video, and its broadcast volume may reach several million, which is equivalent to your exposure of several million in the whole network; If there is a super head anchor, there may be tens of millions in one game, which means that your product has tens of millions of exposures. " In terms of transformation, "a small-headed anchor, if it sells well, will bring you an output of about one million. Although you said that you paid a commission of 30% to 40% to this anchor, you still earned it."

In Wang Kai’s view, the brand’s choice of head anchor has hidden benefits. "First of all, this is an increase in exposure. There is no way to calculate the income, but it is indeed a relatively large hidden income. If Tik Tok has these exposures on Taobao, it will correspondingly increase the search volume of keywords on Taobao … … After the product goes on the market, there will be more things to consider, which will definitely be much better than yourself.

Cover image source: vision china -VCG41N171299989