Haoliyou Group, which runs well-known brands such as Haoliyou School in China, is stepping up its firepower to attack the healthy food and beverage markets such as bottled water and nut bars, although it will face the competition from many industry giants in these newly entered sub-categories.
"We have about 8,500 employees in China, only about 30 Korean employees, and the other employees are from China." Recently, Li Yuhong, general manager of China Haoliyou, told Snack Generation that the company has four factories in China, and the top leaders of two of them are from China. "Haoliyou is committed to developing into a comprehensive food enterprise."
After entering the China market for 25 years, this Korean snack giant has completed the development layout of pies, biscuits, puffs, sweets and imported products. At the just-concluded China International Import Expo(CIIE), Hao Liyou, who participated in the exhibition for the first time, brought three series of imported products, namely Lava Spring, Dr.You and Boss Zi, which are "new sectors" of her business in China.
"We want to develop lava springs into high-end bottled water products like Evian (owned by Danone)." Li Yuhong said. In recent days, he also talked about the new layout of Haoliyou's business in China, business growth and adjustment under the epidemic situation, and future development planning.
More than snacks
"In the past, in the cognition of many consumers, Haoliyou was a snack company. But we are now entering the healthy food and drinking water market, so we also want more people to know that we are a comprehensive food company, which is the main reason why we participated in China International Import Expo(CIIE) this year. " Li Yuhong told the snack generation.
Snack generation introduced that last year1February, Haoliyou launched its first drinking water product "Lava Spring", which was officially listed in China in July this year. It was imported from Jeju Island with a specification of 530ml. At first, Lava Spring was sold in Luckin Coffee stores, but now it has entered convenience stores, e-commerce flagship stores, cinemas, vending machines and other special channels.
Like many other packaged drinking water, water source is regarded as its biggest selling point. "The lava water of Jeju Island in South Korea contains many minerals and the water quality is stable." Li Yuhong said.
Before being sent to China as the general manager in 20 17, he was the general manager of the lava spring project. Li Yuhong said that in the future, he hopes to make Lava Spring, the original imported drinking water, "a relatively high-end water product like Evian". "Now, our terminal retail price is about 4.5 yuan to 5 yuan per bottle." He said.
Hao Liyou seems to be patient enough to enter the bottled water market in China where there are many strong players. "Water is not an industry that can be developed in the short term and needs long-term development. Compared with short-term goals, Haoliyou Group is more inclined to develop this brand for a long time. " Li Yuhong said.
"healthier"
Li Yuhong told the snack generation that, except for water, other products have received "very good response" in China International Import Expo(CIIE), and during this period, he has reached initial cooperation intentions with more than 100 partners from 20 Yu Sheng cities across the country.
These include Dr.You Nut Bars, which were also listed in July last year, and Thais boss Zaihai seaweed, which was included in the business map of Haoliyou China this year.
Snack generation introduced that at the end of 20 19, Haoliyou reached a strategic cooperation with Thai boss Tsai, and obtained the exclusive agency right of its products in China, selling seaweed rolls, seaweed slices and other products. This also means that Haoliyou's own product line is further extended to seaweed products.
As people's consumption of snacks is more healthy, and the demand for "meal replacement" is rising, "nut bars" products have also begun to rise in recent years. Although the fight is not as fierce as the bottled water market, Haoliyou is also facing a lot of competition in this newly entered sub-category.
Snack Generation searched the e-commerce platform today and found that the "Nut Bar" category ranked first in terms of sales volume on the two platforms was a product sold by Mars in China, while Haoliyou ranked second. If you search for the similar keyword "energy bar", you will see more similar products of emerging start-up brands, such as the new sub-brand launched by Liangpin Store this year, and a protein bar that has officially completed tens of millions of A-round financing.
In addition to these two new categories, Li Yuhong told Snack Generation that many products of Haoliyou are "not completely commercialized" and will continue to introduce new products every year in the future.
Epidemic situation and growth
This year's outbreak has impacted many food companies, but Haoliyou has achieved good growth.
"In the first 10 months of this year, the sales performance of Haoliyou China increased by 15% compared with the same period of last year." Li Yuhong revealed to the snack generation, "Among them, the greatest contribution is the Good Friends School and' Ah! Potato' these two series of products. "
According to the financial report read by Snack Generation, in the third quarter of 2020, the sales of Haoliyou in China market was 306.3 billion won (about RMB18.1400 million yuan), an increase of14.4% year-on-year; The profit was 58.5 billion won (about RMB 347 million), up1.6% year-on-year; Operating profit margin was 19. 1%, down 2.4% year-on-year.
In the third quarter of 2020, the zero food category (i.e. puffing, accounting for 44.7%), which accounted for the largest proportion of sales of Haoliyou in China, increased by 9.9% year-on-year, while the pie category, which accounted for 33.7%, increased the most, increasing by 26.4% year-on-year.
According to the latest financial report, in the first nine months of this year, Haoliyou China's income was 826 1 100 million won (about RMB 4.9 billion), up14.8% year-on-year; The profit was148.7 billion won (about RMB 8.8 1 100 million yuan), up 28% year-on-year.
"During the epidemic, we launched some family-packed combined packaging of meal replacement products, which was specially designed for e-commerce channels, and the sales volume was not bad." Jiang Qiming, deputy general manager of Haoliyou China, told Snack Generation that in the past, it could only be bought in traditional shopping malls. Now there are more and more circulation channels, and Haoliyou will develop more channels for products.
"Especially in the case of this epidemic this year, the trend of non-contact purchase has become more prevalent, and the exclusive products of Haoliyou e-commerce are also very helpful for our performance improvement." He said that in the post-epidemic period, the company will continue to increase the multi-channel layout.
Strategy in China
At present, China is the world's largest market for Haoliyou.
Li Yuhong told Snack Generation that since 20 10, China has surpassed South Korea to become the world's largest market of Haoliyou Group, and currently accounts for about 50% of its global sales. According to the financial report read by Snack Shop, in 20 19, the sales of Haoliyou in China market was 976.8 billion won (about RMB 57.9/kloc-0.1 billion yuan).
In this important strategic market, Haoliyou is maintaining a fairly good growth rate. "Our current growth rate is about double digits, and the average growth rate is about 5%-6% in the whole market industry." Li Yuhong said.
In Hao Liyou's view, the most important thing to maintain rapid growth in China is to be able to continuously introduce products with popular tastes.
"We produce foods that consumers pay more attention to taste. If people feel bad, they will choose other products. There have always been many competitors in the market." Li Yuhong said.
When talking about the product selection strategy, he told the snack generation that Haoliyou "won't cast a net in a large area at one time", but "is very strict and serious" in choosing products that China consumers may like.
"For example, when Haoliyou has a new product developed, we will first conduct consumer tasting activities. At the same time, we will put these products into the target channel for data collection. For example, we will look at the POS data that people buy by credit card, and then we will decide how to plan and market this product in the next step. " He said.
In addition, Li Taohong believes that it is very important to localize the products when introducing them into China. "When we introduce some Korean products into the China market, we will make some improvements and research and development to design products that are more in line with the tastes of China consumers, and the pricing is more in line with the China market."