Difficult to burst money?

To challenge the status of a mature enterprise in the beverage market, there is still a lot to do in Yuanqi Forest.

The ambition of Yuanqi Forest is getting bigger and bigger.

At the end of last year, Tang Binsen, its founder, declared at the dealer conference that the sales target for 2021 would be expanded by two and a half times to 7.

5 billion on the basis of 2020.

Roughly estimate, to complete the annual sales target of 7.

5 billion yuan, the average monthly sales of Yuanqi Forest need to reach 625 million, which is equivalent to its total sales in the first five months of 2020.

With this ambitious goal, Yuanqi Forest once again attracted the attention of the capital market.

On January 25, Bloomberg announced that Yuanqi Forest is considering a new round of financing, seeking to raise 500 million US dollars, and the valuation after financing will reach at least 4 billion US dollars.

However, the news was quickly denied by Yuanqi Forest.

Rumors aside, the capital recognition gained since the establishment of Yuanqi Forest is obvious to all: 5 rounds of financing have been completed in six years.

The last two rounds were October 2019 and July 2020 (the latter was not disclosed).
After only nine months, the valuation rose from nearly 4 billion yuan to 14 billion yuan, an increase of 3.
5 times.

Investors can give such a high valuation, to a large extent, they believe that they can replicate more successful cases.

The high valuation is gratifying, but it is not easy for Yuanqi Forest to achieve a 250% increase in sales within a year: the explosion after the bubble water has not yet appeared, the recognition of the sinking market is still being verified, and a large number of opponents have begun to launch various products.

Similar products entered the game fiercely.

There are many problems that need to be faced in front of the vitality forest.

Capital is a sharp tool to solve problems, but only capital and past successful experience is obviously not enough.

Sugar-free track C

Sugar-free track C

Stepping on the sugar-free high-quality track, the core competitiveness of Yuanqi Forest is still being shaped.

More and more people are discovering that sugar brings "addictional happiness" to people.

But at the same time as sugar candies, the global rate of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, overweight, obesity and dental caries is also on the rise.

As the concept of health and weight loss has taken root in the hearts of the people, consumers who used to be sweet-hearted are beginning to join more and more of the ranks of sugar abstinence and abstinence.

The emerging demand for "good drink but not fat" has given rise to the sugar-free market, and more and more beverage brands have begun to study low-sugar and sugar-free beverages.

In 2014, the market size of China's sugar-free beverage industry was only 1.

66 billion yuan, and by 2020 it has grown to 11.
78 billion yuan, with a compound annual growth rate of 38.
69%, far exceeding the overall demand growth of the beverage industry.

The success of Yuanqi Forest is precisely at the starting point of the trend of young people to de-saccharify consumption.

In 2018, the vitality forest sparkling water that strengthened the concept of "0 sugar, 0 fat, 0 card" opened a hole in the originally stable beverage industry and became one of the most watched products in the past two years.

In 2019, Yuanqi Forest (total refers to the brand, including its multiple sub-products) reached nearly 1 billion in sales;

In the first May of 2020, the sales performance of Yuanqi Forest reached 260 million yuan, exceeding the total sales of the whole year of 2018, with an average daily sales of 4.
4 million yuan, and sales in 2020 are expected to exceed 2 billion yuan.

The rapid growth of Yuanqi Forest has set off a sugar-free storm throughout the beverage industry.
Coca-Cola (NYSE:KO), Nongfu Spring (SEHK:09633), Wahaha and other traditional beverage giants have all launched a series of sugar-free beverages in 2020, and even Tsingtao Beer and Yili have added sparkling water brands.

Hey Tea and Nai Xue also entered the market to launch bottled beverages.
Hey Tea launched the slogan "Drink Hey Tea like drinking water".
The first batch of products focused on soda drinks with 0 sugar, 0 fat, 0 calories + dietary fiber, and set foot in the whole family.
Convenience stores such as 711, Hema, and supermarket channels seem to be fighting against Yuanqi Forest.

It is worth mentioning that the sweetness of the sub-brand Xixiaocha soda also comes from the sugar substitute erythritol, and this is the key to the victory of the Yuanqi Forest taste.
The product is priced at 5.
5 yuan, which is almost the same as the price of Yuanqi Forest Bubble Water.

All the information seems to convey a signal: Xixiaocha soda is coming from the forest of vitality.

Today, no one can shake the dominance of Nongfu Spring and Coca-Cola in their respective fields.
This is not only about natural water and Coke, but more about the diversified product matrix and multiple explosive products.

At present, Yuanqi Forest can only rely on sparkling water with a sugar-free concept.

The concept and positioning of "sugar-free" represents the future of the beverage industry.
However, Yuanqi Forest needs to use more explosive products to prove its dominance in this field.
This is also the core competitiveness that Yuanqi Forest needs to continuously shape.

Difficulty of Explosion

Difficulty of Explosion

It is almost impossible to replicate the success of an explosive product.

The era of orphans fighting the world has passed.

Nowadays, the beverage giants are building their own products in different categories by building sub-brands, such as Nongfu Spring’s tea π series and Coca-Cola’s zero series.

In contrast, Yuanqi Forest has a relatively short start-up time and is still in the stage of relying on large single products.

Yuanqi Forest, established in 2016, already has a variety of products under its umbrella, but the two categories of sparkling water and burning tea account for less than 90% of the company's sales.
Among them, sparkling water accounts for about 60%, and burning tea accounts for nearly 30%.

To complete the 7.
5 billion sales target, it seems unrealistic to rely on only two single products.

In addition, the length of the popularity cycle of Internet celebrity products is still uncertain, and it is forcing Yuanqi Forest to jump out of the single-explosive model as soon as possible and cultivate more profitable businesses.

Yuanqi Forest has successively launched new products such as milk tea, pet muscle collagen water, and functional beverages.
Such as the first juice sparkling water "full score microbubbles", as well as "alien" functional drinks, electrolyte water and so on.

In December last year, Yuanqi Forest also entered the field of health food, launching a new light food and healthy product "Chicken Breast Sausage".

According to Tang Binsen, 95% of Yuanqi Forest's products have not been launched, and the R&D expenses and R&D personnel in 2021 will be three times that in 2020.

Yuanqi Forest Drink Matrix

But so far, these new products have not been able to replicate the success of sparkling water.

According to the popular logic of previous popular products, popular products mainly found a relatively vacancy or a field with bonus attributes, and players rely on keen perception to perceive the future trend of the market, and they have the ability to empower and extend the brand.
, In order to quickly push the product to consumers.

In the past, when large single products were made, the information was asymmetrical, and the market was not changing fast.
Enterprises used a lot of resources to promote large single products, and the product life cycle would be very long, which can continuously create profits for the company.

But the new situation in the current information age is that launching a single product requires more capital investment than before, and even after it is built, the dividend period has become shorter.

Especially for new products that are not significantly different from other popular products, the bonus period is shorter, and the stock market is cut into after launch, which is fundamentally different from the incremental market that comes with popular products.

This kind of phenomenon that new products are difficult to explode is also the norm in the industry, and products that have been abandoned after a mediocre response after being put on the market on a large scale are everywhere.

Take Nongfu Spring as an example.
In the 25 years since its establishment, the most active products on the market are still pure water, water-soluble C, and Scream, but these items have been around for some years: Scream was launched in 2004.
It has been more than 16 years, and water-soluble C was launched in 2008, and it also has 12 years.

In the past ten years or so, Nongfu Spring has always wanted to "surprisingly win" once again, attacking carbonated drinks four times, but all new products have come back.

Coca-Cola is no exception.
Starting in 2019, Coca-Cola has cut more than 600 sluggish drinks, including the more famous ZICO coconut water products.

It's not that there are no new items that have been successfully launched.
Wahaha's Nutrition Express and Nongfu Spring's Tea π are typical cases.

To create a successful large single product requires long-term operation of the company.
Wahaha and Nongfu Spring have established a market foundation for many years.
After the product is launched, it can quickly penetrate from the first- and second-tier markets to the lower-tier population, and this will make the nutrition fast line tens of billions.
Yuanhe tea has a scale of 5 billion yuan.

For Yuanqi Forest, the market foundation formed by the first explosive model is much weaker than that of farmers and Wahaha.

R&D speed is slow, and it is difficult to replicate explosive models, and more capital is needed to promote it.
It is not easy to achieve a 250% increase in sales within one year.
Founder Tang Binsen has stepped up the investment layout.

Not long ago, Yuanqi Forest invested in Baiyun Guanjiu, and the capital of the challenger behind it has gradually emerged.

In 2014, Tang Binsen, who had not yet established Yuanqi Forest, established Challenger Capital.
Up to now, there have been 76 public investment incidents of Challenger Capital, focusing on consumption and TMT.
It has invested in more than 100 startup companies including Tiger Securities, Hometown Interactive, Huo 28, Ramen Talk, Panda Brewing, and Cannibal.

It is clear at a glance that the layout of light meals, coffee, energy drinks, and the now-invested liquor are all paving the way for sales of 7.
5 billion this year.

Not easy to sink

Not easy to sink

，。

，。

，、、，，，。

，。

，。、，711、、、。

。711，204088%，。

，。，3-3.
5，5。

，。

，711，300；，2000，1000。

，。

，，。，，。

“”，，，，，。

，，，，。

2020，、，。

，。

、：“（），、，。”

，。

，，Perrier。，，，5-7，。

，。，，、、、。

“”，。，，。

：Foodaily

：，！

xianjichina.
com">，