Image source @Visual China
Article | Finance and Economics, Author | Xu Yuanxuan
On July 2, Zhong Xuegao, the representative of “Ice Cream Assassin”, went on the hot search again: “Zhong Xuegao does not melt at room temperature of 31 degrees for 1 hour” and rushed to the top of Weibo hot search. Some netizens found through experiments that the Zhong Xuegao they bought had not completely melted after being placed at room temperature of 31 degrees for 1 hour.
Therefore, netizens and the media questioned whether Zhong Xuegao’s products contained additives, so that “non-melting ice cream” appeared. In response to doubts, Zhong Xuegao responded by forwarding an article on the “China Food Safety Network” at 9 o’clock in the evening.
However, this is not the first time that Zhong Xuegao has been on the cusp of brand reputation. In fact, since the launch of the brand, high single product pricing, false product promotion, online celebrity product marketing routines, and the founder’s high-minded attitude have all made Zhong Xuegao face many public opinion crises to a certain extent.
This time, can Internet celebrity Zhong Xuegao survive the crisis again? How far can the most expensive ice cream brand in China with Internet celebrity physique go?
01 Ice cream can’t be melted, is that still ice cream?
Let’s focus on the hot spots of the first two days.
This time, netizens used Zhong Xue Gao sea salt ice cream for the experiment. The ingredients of the ice cream are listed in order of added amount: milk, cream, coconut milk, sweetened condensed milk, whole milk powder, white sugar, instant coconut flour, Ice egg yolk, skimmed milk powder, seaweed syrup (starch, water), etc.
For example, the penultimate “compound emulsification thickener” in the ingredient list is mainly mono- and di-glycerol fatty acid esters, sodium alginate, locust bean gum, carrageenan, guar gum, etc. Among them, carrageenan is an important additive that causes ice cream to melt slowly.
Zhong Xuegao’s response to this was that the content of all additives met the national food safety requirements.
Caijing Wuji found by searching public information that carrageenan is commonly used in the industry as a thickening agent, gelling agent, suspending agent, emulsifier and stabilizer, etc. Carrageenan is widely used in the manufacture of jelly, ice cream, cakes, soft Sugar, canned food, meat products, eight-treasure porridge, Tremella bird’s nest, soup food, cold food, etc.
In addition, adding carrageenan to ice cream is indeed not only Zhong Xuegao’s family. According to previous public information, many high-end ice creams under Mengniu and Yili contain carrageenan.
On the night of the hot search, Zhong Xuegao reposted the title “The sooner the ice cream ice cream melts, the better? “The article comes from the “China Food Safety Network”, which states that there are many factors that affect the melting speed of ice cream, and ice cream with high content of raw materials such as milk, cream, and whole milk powder melts slower than ice cream with water as the main raw material.
In addition, the article emphasizes that “the scope of application and usage of food additives are clearly stipulated in the national standard, and it is safe to use food additives within the scope specified in the standard.”
The national standard “GB/T 31119-2014 Frozen Drink Ice Cream” requires solids to be greater than or equal to 20%. Some netizens did a rough calculation based on the formula on the nutrient composition table of sea salt ice cream, and found that the solid content in Zhong Xue Gao sea salt is about 40%, which is much higher than the national standard. This may be the reason that affects the melting speed of ice cream. one.
In addition, this article also pointed out that carrageenan plays a “thickening” role in ice cream, “carrageenan often used in ice cream, according to the requirements of GB 2760-2014 “Standard for the Use of Food Additives”, in ice cream, ice cream frozen In beverages, it can be used as a thickener ‘in appropriate amount according to production needs’.”
Although the source of the article came from the “China Food Safety Network”, Caijing Wuji found that the article was published at 3:00 pm on July 2. If Zhong Xuegao reposted an archaeological article to prove his innocence, it would be fine, but the publication time of the article was shortly after the hot search, and it was impossible not to make people think about it.
Quoting an “official” article to justify his name, but netizens don’t seem to buy it. “It turns out that the price is all on additives, so what about no additives?”
Perhaps because of fear of another adverse impact, the reposted Weibo comment function was officially closed by Zhong Xuegao.
02 Frequent operation of Tianxiu
However, this is not the first time that Zhong Xuegao has stood in the spotlight.
In 2018, Zhong Xuegao’s “Ecuadorian Pink Diamond” came out of the circle due to the “astronomical price” of 66 yuan, and claimed that only 20,000 pieces of this ice cream were produced in total. Therefore, Zhong Xuegao was known as the “Hermes” in the ice cream industry.
In 2019, Zhong Xuegao received two administrative penalties for false propaganda: on April 3, 2019 and August 8, 2019, Zhong Xuegao was given administrative penalties of 3,000 yuan and 6,000 yuan twice.
In the administrative penalty decision issued by the Shanghai Huangpu District Market Supervision and Administration Bureau, it was determined that Zhong Xuegao’s promotion of a light cow milk ice cream product “without adding a drop of water, pure cow frankincense” is false propaganda.
And the “baby-grade degradable straw” stick stick that best represents Zhong Xuegao’s “cultivation” was identified by the Municipal Supervision Bureau and found that it was only the most common disposable material stick stick.
In addition to false propaganda, Lin Sheng, the founder of Zhong Xuegao, left a sentence in an interview last year, “I love to buy or not”, and also branded Zhong Xuegao the image of “high above”.
In 2021, Zhong Xuegao launched a new ice cream, priced at 68 yuan, which is only sold online, and only accepts package sales, and cannot be bought alone.
Hunger Marketing has indeed made this “Apricot Yu Nian” popular, and the original price of 68 yuan was once raised to 368 yuan by the scalper price.
Faced with such a situation, Lin Sheng said in an interview, “Even if I sell it at the cost price, or even at half the price, some people will still say it is too expensive. Making ice cream also requires machinery, water, electricity, coal, raw materials and labor costs. The price must keep going up.”
03 Internet celebrity Zhong Xuegao, how far can he run
In fact, there are certain reasons for Zhong Xuegao’s success under the “word and pen attack” by the netizen media.
Caijing Wuji believes that when we study the rise and fall of a brand, we must not miss the person behind the brand.
Lin Sheng, the founder of Zhong Xuegao, gave life to this brand. Now Zhong Xuegao’s disturbances are inseparable from this brand trader who has been “immersed” in advertising and marketing for many years.
Lin Sheng, who was born in the advertising industry, has a lot of experience in the operation of cold drink brands before he created the “Zhong Xuegao” homophonic brand of “Chinese ice cream”.
As a history graduate, he couldn’t find a job until an advertising agency offered him an offer.
After years of struggle in the advertising industry, Lin Sheng has a deep understanding of product marketing.
After going south to create his own Shengzhi advertising company, in 2015, Lin Sheng received the case of Harbin Madiel by chance.
During the Republic of China, the brand that supplied ice cream products to the upper class had an annual sales of 40 million. However, except for the Northeast market, Madiel was not well-known. Therefore, Lin Sheng, who is experienced in the operation of consumer goods brands, was hired to give the brand a new lease of life.
Lin Sheng lived up to expectations and built Madele into a century-old brand, and at the same time achieved a new situation for the opening of Madele stores.
The success of Madeleine has made Lin Sheng famous in the industry. Another old cold drink brand also hopes to replicate the success of Madeleine. He is Shenyang’s “Middle Street”.
This time, Lin Sheng designed a new idea for the regeneration of the “Zhongjie” brand: taking “Zhongjie 1946” as the new core of the brand, targeting first- and second-tier independent women, and creating a mid-to-high-end cold drink brand.
Lin Sheng’s strategy was successful again, and “Middle Street 1946”, which met the target consumer group, quickly opened up a new situation for “Middle Street” revenue.
During the case of Zhongjie, Lin Sheng actually participated in the whole process of the ice cream industry supply chain, which gave him a new understanding of the potential of this industry.
In 2017, Lin Sheng found that my country’s ice cream industry lacks high-end brands, and more brands focus on the operation of mid-end products, such as Mengniu and Yili.
And Lin Sheng, who has two successful experiences in the marketing of large ice cream brands, is confident in creating a high-end ice cream brand that belongs to the Chinese, and “Zhong Xuegao” comes from this.
Looking back at the development route of Zhong Xuegao since its official launch in 2018, Caijing Wuji believes that Lin Sheng has done the following things right:
First of all, the brand positioning is accurate, accurately positioning the high-end market, and locking in profit margins. Before Zhong Xuegao, the high-end brands of Chinese ice cream were always in the hands of foreign brands such as Haagen-Dazs and Baxi. The appearance of Zhong Xuegao broke the dominance of foreign brands in one fell swoop.
Secondly, the exquisite packaging satisfies the consumer mentality of consumption upgrade and status symbol. Caijing Wuji found in the previous product promotion of Zhong Xuegao that “high-end atmosphere”, “Chinese style”, “high-grade health of raw materials”, and “full of literary flavor” are the keywords that best reflect the characteristics of Zhong Xuegao’s brand.
In the design of ice-cream, the tile-shaped ice-cream is added with the “hui” character pattern, which has a strong national flavor, and every time consumers eat an ice-cream, creative words will appear on the stick immediately, making consumption like blindness. The box-like experience of secondary consumption has hit the G-spot of the new generation of consumers.
In addition to the product design of “beauty is justice”, Lin Sheng knows how to use the communication channels closest to young people to “plant grass” for consumers. Caijing Wuji opened Xiaohongshu and searched for “Zhong Xuegao”, and there are still more than 40,000 related notes.
Using the latest media, KOLs, and appearance designs in line with new domestic products, Zhong Xuegao has repeatedly won the “top sales” of his own track.
But all of this is too much in line with the characteristics of an Internet celebrity brand. Now that the “ice cream assassin” has been scolded recently, can consumers continue to “pay”?
The answer is not that simple, but it is not difficult either. Today, when the epidemic is fluctuating and the economy is changing, more consumption upgrades are just words.
Can it really bring more pleasure to consumers to eat an ice cream that can’t be melted in an hour at a price that is 4 or 5 times higher than the original market price?
Previously, in a Weibo poll of 20,000 people, “What is the price of the ice cream you usually eat?”, nearly 15,000 people ate ice cream between 1 and 5 yuan, followed by 5 to 10 yuan During this period, there were only 836 consumers who often bought ice cream of more than 10 yuan.
Caijing Wuji interviewed some consumers, and the feedback was “I wouldn’t choose Zhong Xuegao in particular, because the taste is just like that”.
Consumer Xiao Q (pseudonym) thinks, “I have enough wallets, maybe I will buy one or two to try. As for the shape, the first time it was very fresh, but the second and third time I bought it was not because of its shape. “
It can be seen that the essence of ice cream is still the taste, which is the foundation of all food products.
Perhaps, interesting marketing that hits the new generation of consumption hotspots can bring a certain marketing boom to the brand, but when the boom fades, the brands that can truly stand in the market are often the ones with both product quality and price advantage.
According to data from CBNData, in 2019, the number of online ice cream brands increased from more than 60 in 2018 to more than 140, but most of them did not last for a year.
Zhong Xuegao, who took off the traffic coat, what should he do to face the doubts of consumers, maybe time will give us all an answer.
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- 2022-07-05Zhong Xuegao , who can’t be transformed , can’t escape the life cycle of Internet celebrity products
- 2022-07-02 Zhong Xuegao responded that “ice cream does not melt for 1 hour”: it is viscous due to more solids in the raw materials
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