When it comes to "pot-bellied" porcelain yogurt with round mouth and rubber band, many Beijingers have a feeling that they can't give up. The heavy touch and sweet and sour taste have accompanied them for decades and have been integrated into the life memories of generations.
You can always see this kind of gray-white round-bellied porcelain bottle in cold drinks shops in the streets of Beijing. There is a piece of paper tied to the bottle mouth with a picture of a cow and the product name "Honey Yogurt" written on it. Simple shape; For young people who grew up in Beijing, this cold drink not only looks like a day for decades, but also tastes like a child and becomes a nostalgic memory when they grow up.
"Yogurt" is the so-called yogurt in Chinese mainland and Taiwan Province Province. Li Bihua, a Hong Kong writer, once wrote an article entitled "Yogurt in Beijing Carrying Homesickness", describing her special liking for "Honey Yogurt" and the homesickness caused by a wanderer who grew up in Beijing.
Although the taste has not changed for decades, "honey yogurt" is still very popular with local people; Xiaomei, a cold drink shop opposite the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, said that this kind of yogurt can sell about 3,000 to 4,000 bottles every day, and the buyers are mostly Beijing locals.
"I remember missing this old yogurt at that time. When I was a child, there were always vendors pushing cars in the hutongs. I often buy a bottle to play at this time. Yogurt at that time was different from now. It's very thick and sweet, and you have to suck it up with that thick straw. It tastes sweet. I think it smells like honey. Yogurt sold everywhere is like this, 1 yuan. I can only see it occasionally in front of some shopping malls, but I will definitely come to a bottle after seeing it. The taste is not as good as before, and the price seems to be above 2 yuan. But I don't remember what brand this yogurt is. It seems that I have never noticed it, but the mellow fragrance has spread to the end of the world and has been recalled until now. "
Interestingly, due to the heavy texture and high cost of porcelain bottles, customers have to pay 5 yuan more to 2 yuan if they carry them with them; Therefore, in front of a cold drink shop in Beijing, you can often see people standing at the door drinking yogurt and putting bottles on the refrigerator at the door of the cold drink shop. Round and ancient porcelain bottles have also become a landscape at the door of the shop.
However, with the emergence of plastic box yogurt, the market share of porcelain bottle yogurt has been greatly divided due to the gradual decline in business philosophy, scale production, advertising and cost. The number of factories producing magnetic bottle yogurt in Beijing has also dropped sharply from more than 30 in its heyday to two. Zhenhuan Dairy, one of the only two, also encountered a new entry threshold in the process of demolition approval and fell into a crisis of survival. The survival of old Beijing porcelain yogurt is facing a great threat.
At present, when large dairy enterprises produce plastic boxed yogurt, they usually add additives such as pigments, flavors and preservatives to the yogurt. It has become a hidden rule of dairy industry to reduce the product cost by adding thickener to yogurt, and then occupy the consumer market through low price. The porcelain bottle yogurt in old Beijing retains the most traditional technology, does not add preservatives and thickeners, and maintains a healthy original flavor, which also makes its cost relatively high. Due to the price and other reasons, high-quality porcelain yogurt is gradually replaced by plastic boxed yogurt in the market competition.
Should we think about how our favorite time-honored brands should adapt to modern production and increasingly strict market requirements?
It seems that it is not enough to rely solely on the enthusiasm of consumers. There are more challenges in management and manufacturing. Things are good, but the old model has gradually lost its advantage in today's market. These problems may not be what I should consider or what I can solve, but from the perspective of never wanting it to disappear, these problems have to be faced. These time-honored brands are closely related to people's lives, and a mechanism should be created to spread them.
Porcelain yogurt in old Beijing, memory of old Beijing.
When will the breeze come again and the bright moon come again?