Where is the future consumption headed? The scenery here is uniquely beautiful.

"The greatest hidden danger for an enterprise is the disappearance of the spirit of innovation."

This statement by Peter Drucker, the father of modern management, is particularly applicable to today's consumer industry, and the market risks are far greater than those of an enterprise.

Comparing the brand lists of major promotions this year and last year, there are very few categories with obvious changes.

It has to be admitted that after several rounds of reshuffles, the solidification of the brand hierarchy has finally emerged.

Some people say that this is the end of an era. But more important than recognizing the reality is to know what has ended and what kind of brand era will be opened.

For this reason, Yibang organized a "2024 Yibang Future Consumption Conference" with the theme of "Patient Growth", and invited a group of "new unicorns" to participate, including Eno Cultural Play Bead Jewelry, OKENSHO, Zhihu Home Furnishing, UPO Yuanben Life, Amo Handmade Women's Shoes, DearIrean, ffit8, Xiangdangdang, Tineco, Tencent Cloud, Jolie Jewelry, Beiyangle, Life on the Left, Tsingtao Beer, Nowwa Coffee, STC&WeCycle, wow'zakka, Miniso, Pagoda... Focusing on various stages of brand growth such as nascent, prosperous, long-lasting, and reborn, they discussed the future of consumption.

They may not be unicorns in the traditional sense, but in their own unique ways, they have occupied a special position in the hearts of users. Their stories are allowing the industry to see that the consumer market is not only about big rivers, but also about a steady stream; and also allowing the industry to know that innovation can also occur in every new lifestyle.

01 Category Blurring? Collisions Spur Innovation

"Today, there are many living scenarios that may not have existed before. For example, many young users share apartments. What new consumption scenarios will shared apartments bring? For example, many people pursue outdoor activities. What new scenarios does this bring?" Wei Zhe, Chairman of Jiayu Capital pointed out that category innovation is not about working in isolation. Instead, in the newly emerged scenarios, we should reverse-engineer to find categories that fit this scenario.

"Only when lifestyles change can there be opportunities for category innovation." Zhang Guangming, Founder & CEO of ffit8 also holds a similar view.

The birth and growth of ffit8 stem from a series of changes observed by Zhang Guangming. For example, weight loss has gradually become a normalized lifestyle for people. What they need is no longer "losing five pounds in three days", but healthy food that is burden-free for every meal and has a taste that can be maintained for a long time. Another example is that fitness is no longer exclusive to muscular men. When more women participate, what they need is not just professional protein powder, but healthy and good-looking protein bars.

Therefore, based on protein bars, ffit8 began to extend to more snacks such as protein wafer biscuits and protein sandwich rolls to help users solve the psychological and physical burdens that every bite of delicious food may bring.

A detail is that when a brand begins to respond extremely to the needs of users, it often becomes more difficult to classify. Is healthy snack a meal replacement or a snack? Is sports underwear for sports or underwear?... Many brands are moving towards "category crossover" in the process of evolution, and some brands have mastered this code from the very beginning.

For example, Eno Cultural Play Bead Jewelry.

Cultural play emphasizes the quality of materials and the process of playing with them, while jewelry pursues design on the basis of materials. However, Eno Cultural Play Bead Jewelry presents the familiar cultural play materials in a refreshing way, and redefines cultural play bead strings with aesthetics and high-end materials. As a result, the users of this type of product have directly changed from middle-aged men to senior middle-class women.

"Aesthetics can stimulate demand. In China, there are numerous functional products. The younger generation of consumers firmly believe that appearance is justice, so design has become our innovation driver." Facts have also proved the judgment of ENO, the founder of Eno Cultural Play Bead: Last year, the annual transaction volume of Eno Cultural Play Bead Jewelry exceeded 100 million yuan, and the unit price of the design style exceeded 15,000 yuan.

Beiyangle is also a typical representative.

When it comes to beauty, people tend to think of skin care products, tonics, and even medical aesthetics. However, Beiyangle chose to innovate the oral part of the traditional "oral external nourishment", combining oral and beauty to create the first popular product "Photon Filter Pill".

"Which is more important for women, health or beauty? After communicating with our users, we found that without exception, users chose beauty." Ao Wen, the founder of the Beiyangle brand and the chairman of Molecular Spirit pointed out that today's women are confident, self-pleasing, and pursue a youthful lifestyle. They are moving from pursuing ingredients to pursuing new technologies. Therefore, Beiyangle will continue to explore opportunities to provide better services to users.

Indeed, compared to discussing whether to occupy a track and category, in today's context, it is more important to truly capture and respond to the new pursuits of users.

"Nowadays, when users buy a bed, it's not just about 'going back to sleep', but 'going back to decorate'." The original designer brand Zhihu Home Furnishing mainly focuses on soft furniture. Nie Ping, the founder found that the long-term home-stay situation due to the epidemic has made consumers pay more attention to the design sense of furniture. At the same time, they also expect to return to nature. This has allowed Zhihu to clarify its own design concept, satisfying users' feelings of 'going wild' and 'returning home', and creating a relaxed and comfortable state of coexisting with nature for users. In just three years since its establishment, Zhihu has achieved an annual sales of over 100 million yuan.

"Why can't I find a good-looking sofa offline? Why can't I find a sofa that is cost-effective and distinctive at the same time? All I can find are imitations of foreign brands." The pain point in the industry that the designer furniture brand OKENSHO sees is the "mismatch between supply and demand". Consumers have individualized needs for furniture, but the domestic innovation environment cannot meet them.

Therefore, OKENSHO, which is committed to "future mid-century furniture", emerged. Lance, the founder of the OKENSHO brand, pointed out that he believes that good design is the basis for a product to pass the test. On this basis, it should follow the "three nos": not similar, without the shadow of big brands; not deliberate, not deliberately creating a design for the sake of a design sense; not discordant, not feeling discordant when placed in any style. And the so-called "future mid-century furniture", Lance hopes that the design of each product can pass through the cycle and become a mid-century furniture in the future.

About three years ago, in addition to the stain removal, sterilization, and fragrance retention features that traditional big brands of clothing cleaning focus on, UPO Yuanben Life provided consumers with a new choice with the characteristics of natural plant extracts and mildness. Wu Huaiqin, the founder and CEO, introduced that in line with the trend of concentration of washing products, UPO Yuanben Life has mainly focused on laundry detergent pods, continuously breaking through through component concentration and multi-chamber technology, maintaining the "we have it and it's better" of the product. Today, the brand has become the TOP1 in the video account washing and care industry.

02 Environmental Changes? Emotional Value Remains Forever

"In all industries, the value brought by emotional companionship can no longer be measured by cost performance." Li Guoqing, Chairman of Xiangdangdang, who is engaged in the field of live-streaming with goods, said so.

And returning to the brand role, when asked "What progress can your brand bring to users", the answer of Hong Jun, the founder of Jolie Jewelry is simple and powerful: "Happiness".

"Beautiful jewelry can reflect (the wearer's) own value and ability, making oneself happy. You should know that jewelry itself is useless. It needs to be good-looking, needs to be well-spoken, and can also be expensive. These characteristics can create emotional value." Hong Jun admitted that in the jewelry field, emotional value can account for more than 80% of the shopping decision.

Emotional value is quietly becoming the "pillar" of many brands.

"Our brand is called Life on the Left. The heart is on the left. We hope that women can listen to their own voices more, control themselves, and have the power to reach the places they want to go, and truly achieve spiritual freedom." Lin Qi, Executive Director of Huimei Group and the founder of Life on the Left shared the origin of the brand name and also the brand's value proposition.

"The design of the horse-face skirt in each dynasty in the past carried a certain male perspective or social examination. Today, we hope that the design of the horse-face skirt enables women to have the ability to reject others and become a better version of themselves." Lin Qi pointed out that women of any age have the demand for "youthfulness", and new categories do not necessarily have to capture young users.

Unique Irene, which has been established for four years, has become the TOP1 domestic body care brand in Tmall Double 11. Zeng Liuxian, the co-founder of the brand pointed out that to provide emotional value to users, the brand concept should be integrated into the users' lives through products, giving users a sense of substitution, desire, and ritual. "Do you know why we are called Unique Irene? Because every girl is unique, and girls should learn to love themselves well and have a sense of worthiness."

It is reported that in order to bring the brand spirit to users, Unique Irene specially went to Altay to shoot beautiful scenery, so that every user who purchased the product can receive a postcard from Altay, and establish an emotional connection with users in a practical way.

Xiao Long, the founder of Amo Handmade Women's Shoes' way is to continuously provide emotional value to users through content. "I often tell many girls that you live for yourself. You need a pair of good shoes to go where you want to go and see the people you want to see. Amo Handmade Women's Shoes is love for all girls."

Rarely, this emotional value is not just talk. Xiao Long introduced that most of the long boots on the market are only suitable for girls with thin legs. After discovering the needs of more girls in the live-streaming room, he actively improved the product. Currently, this pair of shoes has sold more than 100,000 pairs, becoming one of the popular products of Amo Handmade Women's Shoes that was generated by listening carefully to the voices of users.

To some extent, experience is also an emotional value that consumption can provide. It can be seen that since this year, many emerging stores are bringing consumers back offline.

"Good-looking and fun, always new and interesting." Liu Xiaobin, Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Miniso Group summed up the reasons why stores continuously attract customers in eight words. And beyond the product level, he also values the emotional value that stores can bring to customers. "We call our business philosophy the Happy Philosophy. We hope to use high-quality, creative products, combined with affordable prices, to bring consumers a happy experience and make them feel satisfied the moment they leave the store."

Zhao Peng, the founder of the wow'zakka brand creates a reason for customers to come to the store: There are enough interesting things. "The store should allow customers to always find some unusual small pleasures when shopping." For example, wow'zakka will let customers participate in a rock-paper-scissors mini-game at the entrance. If they win, they can get a special product discount. Maybe customers don't care about this discount, but they will definitely enjoy the happy process of playing rock-paper-scissors.

"We define ourselves as a brand that promotes a healthy lifestyle." STC&WeCycle is a cycling lifestyle collection store brand. Hu Zhang, the co-founder introduced that one of the core operating concepts of STC&WeCycle is experiential sales, and the other is community-based operations.

Specifically, STC&WeCycle will build various scenarios, such as outdoor camping scenarios, taking customers to camp by the river, and for example, allowing customers to experience the riding fun of Bompton folding bikes through activities. STC&WeCycle will also deeply exert the social attributes of outdoor life, organizing community activities in every store every weekend, so that the customer's experience is not just a simple contact with the product, but also a spiritual interaction with like-minded people.

It is worth noting that the offline business format is not only bringing new experiences to consumers, but also injecting vitality into brands that originated offline.

Wang Chunsheng, the co-founder of Nowwa Coffee revealed that Nowwa Coffee has completed an innovation in the offline channel. Currently, Nowwa Coffee has reached a strategic cooperation with nearly 10,000 domestic chain convenience store brands, entering convenience stores in a store-in-store cooperation manner, and this new attempt has constituted a new growth curve for Nowwa Coffee.

03 Positioning Failure? Brand is Life

When a group of highly distinctive, yet not easily definable new brands become the choices of users, it is difficult not to re-examine whether the once-popular "three-board axes" of creating a brand have become ineffective.

The previous "positioning" ideology was to find a way to be the number one in a sufficiently segmented track. In an era when the total industry volume is growing rapidly, segmenting the track may indeed present opportunities. But now, as we enter an era of stock or even shrinking volume, higher-dimensional opponents will obviously not be as lax as before.

After hearing the stories of these "new unicorns", a new idea is discovered: New brands may not need to disassemble the space that may belong to them in traditional categories. In the infinite lifestyles, there obviously exist broader opportunities.