In May, Chengdu's stall economy seemed to restart overnight. This was once the focus of urban management. It became a window for the official certification to promote the employment of 100000 people. Other regions of the country immediately followed suit and reached the battlefield. At the same time, the city's pyrotechnics returned, which showed that the methods to stimulate domestic demand were being relaxed, The rising unemployment rate, the decline of national income and consumption degradation are affecting the whole consumption market in the post epidemic era.

  Refrigerator: in the new cycle of downward price, industry price approaching the survival line

  A few days ago, a news that "Americans have been queuing up for three months to buy refrigerators, while overseas orders for Chinese refrigerators are scheduled to August" was posted on Weibo. More than 120 million people read about the topic and more than 4000 people participated in the discussion. The black swan incident of the epidemic situation brings the supply and demand relationship back to the previous understanding. However, what the news represents is only the extreme market performance in stages and regions.

  The current situation of the U.S. refrigerator market may recall the nostalgia of the domestic refrigerator industry for the popularity of open-door refrigerators around 2007. In those years, the introduction of open-door refrigerators became a high-end representative by virtue of its super large volume and atmospheric appearance. The price of 10000-30000 yuan seems to be extremely high now. The appearance, door body and volume of traditional two or three door refrigerators have been subverted by the popularity of double door and three door refrigerators. The high-end demand brought by product innovation has driven the prices of refrigerators to go up periodically.

  However, with the financial crisis sweeping the world in 2008, the prices of raw materials continue to decline. In addition, most of the changes in products are limited to the appearance, and the technology is not difficult to popularize. As a result, the price level has rapidly changed from prosperity to decline, and has declined all the way. Up to now, it is only one tenth of the peak.

  Let's look at a refrigerator price change caused by the rise of raw materials. In October 2016, the chain effect caused by the soaring prices of raw materials of refrigerators is still fresh in my memory. At that time, all raw materials were supplied at the "current price", with the increase of black materials exceeding 100%, the increase of white materials by more than 30%, the rise of plastics by more than 40%, and the increase of steel by more than 40%. Even cartons were hard to find For the refrigerator, which is in the era of meager profit, this is the test of survival.

  However, under the fierce rising tide of raw materials prices, taking advantage of the trend did not immediately become a collective behavior of the refrigerator industry. Most enterprises were caught in the dilemma of "no price increase, no loss" and "fear of losing orders after price increase". Until the first enterprises introduced a new price system at the beginning of 2017, the general price rise officially began, and the price increase range was mostly 3% - 8%, far less than the huge increase of raw materials, And it's just a periodic callback.

From the price changes of the refrigerator industry in recent years, it can be seen that the price trend of the refrigerator industry can not completely follow the conventional pricing rules due to the continuous downturn of the refrigerator industry. In the era of meager profit, it relies on the rule of money explosion, the competitive ecology of the industry and the price traction of leading enterprises.

  "In fact, the current ecology of the refrigerator industry has been very cruel. Now, the sales prices of many brands are close to the cost line. Refrigerators are not as expensive as clothes. Some small brand refrigerators can only sell for 3-5 yuan per liter. The profits are extremely meagre and they can only support workers. The economy is not good this year, but the prices of leading enterprises in the industry are all so low, We can't survive without an orderly spread. " According to the head of a refrigerator brand, the average market price has shown a downward trend in recent years. Some enterprises can only use the brand matrix to divide the labor for different brands: some are used to account for the loss, some are used to protect their lives, and some are used to grab the high-end market.

  Indeed, the refrigerator industry is expected to remain in a new cycle of price decline in 2020. On the one hand, the formation of the new cycle is due to the downward price of raw materials to ease the cost pressure, while the e-commerce is sinking to tap the demand of the third and fourth level markets. The middle and low-end products are used to grab market share, which leads to lower customer price. On the other hand, the refrigerator product structure is stable and the technology driving force is weak, The internal price competition in the industrial structure is fierce. The average prices of the key markets headed by French style, cross and opposite directions show a negative growth trend. The product prices continue to decline. In addition, the space for the upgrading of refrigerator product structure is narrowed, so the industry will continue to be in the state of price degradation.

  AVC online push total data also confirmed this point: in April 2020, the online refrigerator market retail sales increased by 13.4% year-on-year, and the retail sales increased by 9.5% year-on-year. However, the price competition remained unchanged. Except for French products, the average prices of various doors still kept a sharp decline year-on-year. Among them, the average prices of air-cooled 23 doors decreased by 12.1% and 9.6% respectively, and the average prices of cross and opposite doors decreased by 6.8%.

  In the post epidemic era, it is not without demand highlights. For example, "health" and "housing economy" have become the key words of consumer demand. Consumers are more eager for large capacity demand, especially the demand for zoning and healthy fresh storage, so as to promote the development of refrigerators to large capacity and fine storage. As the dark time of the market gradually passes, it is crucial to grasp the potential demand for new products brought by the epidemic and continuously leverage the stock market, Midea refrigerator "weiguojing" series has steadily increased the proportion of high-end sales in the May 1 market with its user-centered health function.

Demand for healthy fresh storage in refrigerator industry

  However, there is also a gap between the demand highlights and the new growth explosion points. The refrigerator industry is in a state of high guaranteed quantity. In the future, the demand structure will be "mainly updated demand, supplemented by new demand". The price drop will help to release the demand. At present, the healthy demand of the industry is enlarged, but the subversive selling point is weak, the technology driven price rise is weak, and the overseas market is gradually recovering, but there are still variables, It is expected that there will be greater pressure after H2 in 2020, so the refrigerator market price front will be further extended, and the era of meager profit will continue.

Washing machine: online and offline differentiation intensified, online price war normalized

  Cygnet, a 25 year old user, once said that the automatic washing machine was a luxury in the 1990s, which could not be bought with money, so we had to rely on the relationship. At that time, the price of an automatic wave wheel washing machine was about 2000 yuan. At that time, the market relationship of short supply made the price of a washing machine equal to the income of an ordinary family for half a year.

  Back to June 2020, the number of washing machines in the top 10 sales by sales volume of some treasure washing machines has reached 80% with the price of about 300 yuan. However, in 2019, the per capita disposable income exceeded 30000 yuan, and the change in the relationship between supply and demand can be described as earth shaking.

Comparing the CAGR value of the washing machine retail market before and after 2012, it is not difficult to find the profound meaning. The growth rate of the washing machine market experienced a precipitous decline, from 16.4% in 2007-2011 to 3.2% in 2012-2019. After the policy of "home appliances going to the countryside" was withdrawn, the average number of washing machines per 100 households in China was more than 95, and the washing machine market entered the stock cycle.

  Indeed, around 2012, the washing machine market was particularly lively because of the multiple subsidy policies of the state. In 2010, Midea reduced the price of a drum with more than 2700 yuan to 1499 yuan, causing a price shock in the drum market. Two years later, at the end of 2012, Galanz directly reduced the price of drum washing machine to 999 yuan (after the national energy saving subsidy), pushed the roller down from the altar and entered the era of less than 1000 yuan. It was called setting off the price revolution of drum washing machine and breaking the hidden rule of high-end profiteering. The shocking price and the smashing of washing machine at the press conference really earned Glanz enough attention.

In 2012, Galanz launched the price revolution of drum washing machine