Original title: Starbucks Corp, Coca-Cola Company, Mengniu, Yili, why are they all seizing "plant milk"? Source: 36Kr Holdings

Editor's note: this article is from the official account "Whale Merchant" (ID:bizwhale) of Wechat, by Wang Xiaoxuan, 36 Krypton.

In 2020, sugar-free drinks frequently "out of the circle". However, low-sugar, low-fat, has been unable to meet the needs of consumers, people want not to be fat at the same time, get adequate nutrition.

Plant-based drinks meet consumers' demand for low sugar and nutrition. According to the research of Mintel, there are 378 new oatmeal beverages released in the world from 2019 to 2020. This plant-based trend has attracted a large number of beverage giants and new consumer brands.

Recently, dairy giant Mengniu launched high-fiber oatmeal beverage "Yi Duomai" to enter the oat beverage market. PepsiCo, a multinational company, has also announced a partnership with artificial meat manufacturer Beyond Meat to launch new plant protein products.

Two months ago, Coca-Cola Company launched the first oat cereal beverage and soy milk plant protein beverage, officially setting up China's plant-based beverage market. Starbucks Corp launched eight new plant diets in 2020, among which oat lattes are often out of stock in stores.

Although the food and beverage giants have collectively entered the plant-based market, Zhang Tao, founder of Taozi, a professional investment agency specializing in plant-based and alternative protein foods, told whales that Chinese consumers do not know enough about plant-based drinks.

While chasing the tuyere and carrying out health "innovation", the new and old domestic brands can make plant-based drinks become a trend from a minority and fill the gap in the domestic market, which is still in its infancy.The three "battlefields" of plant-based drinks

In 2020, the development of plant-based drinks is very fast, and the sales volume of plant-based drinks is much higher than that of carbonated drinks, fruit and vegetable juices, functional drinks and so on.

According to the "2020 Innovation trend of Plant protein Beverage" released by Tmall New Product Innovation Center, the growth rate of plant protein beverage market in 2020 is as high as 800%, and the growth contribution in the beverage market is 15.5%, which is the high-speed engine of beverage market growth.

At the audience level, the main consumer groups of plant-based drinks are young urban women aged between 18 and 34, such as cutting-edge white-collar workers, urban blue-collar workers, college students, exquisite mothers and so on. They mainly live in first-and second-tier cities and prefer oatmeal and nut-based drinks, while people in third-and sixth-tier cities are less receptive to prices and prefer traditional soy-based drinks.

Traditional soy-based drinks can account for half of the country, and Chinese like to drink soy milk, walnut milk and other drinks, involving Yangyuan-six walnuts, vitamin milk and other plant-based drinks. From the perspective of subdivision, the traditional legume-based drinks can be called the "first battlefield" of plant-based drinks.

Due to consumers' aesthetic fatigue, brand aging, lack of innovation, excessive marketing and other factors, these established brands have reduced their market share, but they still rank as TOP5 in sales.

In order to "save themselves", take Yangyuan as an example, having ploughed more than 20 years of offline channels to make Yangyuan in front of the "pure e-commerce" brand, had to increase Internet marketing efforts. It calls out the high-end and young slogans of the brand to create a product innovation matrix based on six walnuts, including plant yogurt, plant milk, 2430 and other products.

In 2019, the sales cost of Yangyuan is as high as 1 billion yuan, and the R & D cost is only 57 million yuan. In research and development, Yangyuan has six major technology research and development platforms and a national laboratory, which has achieved good results, but also has some deficiencies.

Coincidentally, the veteran Wa is now starting to catch up with the trend, developing "oats + coffee + energy drinks". Silver heron accelerates the market for soy milk and plant milk.

In the past two years, however, in addition to the traditional plant-based beverage market, plant-based yogurt has also been an exciting segment for beverage giants.

At the beginning of 2019, other brands of plant-based yogurt launched by NONGFU SPRING CO., LTD. have joined the "second battlefield". Dairy enterprises, including Yili, Mengniu, Sanyuan and so on, have launched the same type of products.

Dou Ben Dou also launched room temperature fermented soy milk to occupy the plant-based yoghurt market.

In December 2020, Yili's new brand, Plant selection, also announced the launch of two new products-oatmeal dew and plant-based yoghurt.

There is also a company called fresh Food in Shenzhen. Zhen Zhi, a brand headquartered in Shenzhen, is the first batch of enterprises to enter the Taoist incubator. After five years of research and development, its products are aimed at fitness and white-collar workers, and have been put on the shelves in Shenzhen Grand Runfa and local convenience stores.

Zhang Tao believes that yogurt has been listed as one of the six major foods for Chinese families, so plant-based yogurt has greater growth potential in China.

However, the big-name move is more defensive strategy, "people do not have, people have I have." Professional plant-based yogurt brands are not yet popular. after all, plant-based yogurt involves high-price research and development, warehousing, cold chain transportation, shelf life and other issues, which is not an easy field for entrepreneurs to set foot in.

In order to consolidate their "jianghu position", these old brands can launch new legumes or seize the plant-based yoghurt market. In 2020, the highest concentration of the market, but also the "third battlefield" of oat milk.

Since the Swedish brand OATLY entered China in 2018, it has been climbing, and its sales are second only to Yangyuan. And it has led to the outbreak of oat milk in China. In 2020, there were not only OATOAT and wheat Oyer specializing in oat milk, but also more differentiated brands, such as functional plant-based drinks for children, such as Frog Plant drink.

But how do they make "plant milk" a trend?Technology to build the "moat" of oat milk

Founded in 1994, OATLY currently sells oatmeal beverages, oatmeal and ice cream in more than 50000 locations in 20 countries.

At the beginning of product development, OATLY formulated products to meet the nutritional needs of the human body through a large number of laboratory studies and clinical trials, as well as referring to the nutritional indicators of a number of international health institutions. Its core selling point is to protect the environment and solve lactose intolerance.

In production, in order to ensure product quality. OATLY has also insisted on building its own production line and has not cooperated with other factories.

But before 2013, OATLY was also a mediocre plant-based brand. Later, they re-positioning the brand, so that the brand value of environmental protection and saving resources is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. It satisfies the preferences of quality people and middle class in European and American markets. Led by talk show host Oprah Oprah, actress Natalie Portman and rapper Jay-Z, drinking OATLY oatmeal milk has become a new type of "social currency".

In terms of channels, OATLY abandons a wide range of retailers' super channels and product lines and gives priority to moving into Starbucks Corp. Many Chinese consumers know about oatmeal milk from boutique coffee shops. In April 2020, OATLY became Starbucks Corp's plant milk supplier in China, which is regarded by many as an important step for OATLY to move from a "boutique niche" to mass retail in the Chinese market.

OATLY's concept of environmental protection and health is not only reflected in the products, they will also hold offline activities to expose the products, and build the brand in the way of "content + function + scene + social". For example, sponsoring sports parties, building silent cafes with Ikea and holding breakfast parties on the Shanghai Bund, participants can enjoy freshly cooked food and add to the ritual of life.

Now, OATLY has launched a vegetarian vegetable ice cream based on oats and free of animal fat and lactose on Tmall. Further expand the category and market in China.

While OATLY is doing oatmeal milk science popularization for the domestic market, under the trend of consumption upgrading, a number of new plant-based brands have been born.

In March 2020, Ozak, a cereal brand, launched the OATPLUS oatmeal milk brand, and its annual revenue is expected to be 1-150 million yuan. In September, "Wheat Ouye" received angel round financing two months after the product was launched. In October, the plant protein drink brand OATOAT has received tens of millions of Pre-A round financing since its establishment five months ago.

These new brands also let the "OATLY" smell the crisis.

In the face of a large number of new plant-based brands, consumers are more informed and smart than ever before. They have higher expectations for the origin, taste, composition and nutrition of the products.

Take wheat Oyer as an example. One of the co-founders of Mai Ouye has a PhD degree in food engineering from Wageningen University in the Netherlands. Since the establishment of the brand, the team has set up a R & D studio in Chengdu with a R & D team of 10 people. ensure the sustainability of core technology and product research and development.

In practice, the enzymatic hydrolysis process of oat is difficult to make its system stable, so oat drink has a high technical barrier in plant milk. Wheat Ouye's products use enzymatic hydrolysis technology, which removes allergen gluten and starch, releases wheat aroma and makes the taste smooth. The production of wheat Ouye uses international UHT sterilization technology, aseptic filling, without adding preservatives, can also be stored for a long time.

After ensuring the quality of the products, wheat Ouye entered the channel for sales. Similar to OATLY, wheat Ouye is also to B and to C. B-end products are settled in boutique cafes and boutique light-food restaurants, C-end products online are mainly in Taobao, Tmall, Youzai, offline is mainly box horses and other boutique merchants super and agent distribution.

The monthly marketing input of the brand accounts for 20%, 30% of the online turnover. Because it is in its infancy, wheat Ouye uses the way of cooperation with excellent MCN institutions to do the launch. At present, the proportion of Little Red Books is 60%, Bilibili Inc. 30%, and the others 20%. In the small red book put fans in about 10, 000 boutique small KOL and thousands of fans KOC shop volume. Teach you how to use wheat Ouye to make Carmelo lattes and snow-top oat lattes on the video number.

In terms of products, its co-founder Wang Xin once said that wheat Ouye is now building products based on oats, while the brand is positioned as plant milk. Plant-based drinks such as almonds, soybeans and rice are in the long-term plan. The brand also plans to expand its potential partners to the mother-to-child market, airline meals, pension, and tea markets.

Domestic oat milk continues to raise money and come out of the circle. While more entrepreneurs enter the plant-based field to fill the domestic gap, what are the opportunities and risks?Plant-based "Internet celebrity effect" is easy to deviate.

The Chinese market has always had a vegetarian basis, paying attention to meat and vegetarian meals. The European and American markets have a greater demand for plant bases than the Chinese market, and many people are flexible vegetarians. Because many environmental protection agencies and animal protection organizations are spreading the corresponding ideas. This is currently lacking in China, and many entrepreneurs and industry organizations are needed to popularize the plant-based concept.

Domestic entrepreneurs also have the advantage of doing plant-based areas, that is, they have stronger executive ability. Local companies have the advantage of localized transformation for consumers in different regions and categories, and the response speed is often faster than that of international companies.

"the current state of China is very similar to that of Europe and the United States seven or eight years ago," says Zhang Tao. "at that time, Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat were just beginning. Chinese entrepreneurs are learning, but they should learn relatively quickly. It may take three or four years to reach the situation of Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat in Europe and the United States. The premise is that Chinese consumers have a high degree of acceptance of product categories. "

After nearly a decade of development, Impossible Foods (vegetarian meat manufacturing company) is still recruiting hundreds of scientists from around the world to develop milk-free milk and meat substitutes. 80% of its financing is also spent on basic research and product research.

Secondly, in the plant-based field of enterprises, do not blindly pursue the network celebrity effect. At present, there is a big gap between some domestic OATLY imitations and OATLY in terms of nutrition and technology.

Zhang Tao stressed that price is also a factor of concern for domestic consumers. as the research and development and marketing of plant-based products require a lot of money, the current domestic demand is not large enough to reduce costs. If low prices are pursued, enterprises will only have short-term benefits and will be short of resources and funds for a long time.

Prices such as Beyond Meat and OATLY are on the high side, but they do not affect the popularity of consumers in first-tier cities. If domestic entrepreneurs start with technology, they may be able to reduce costs and gain price advantage.

Thomas Colopoulos wrote in his book "Circle effect": "in the face of the strong rise of groups, future business can be successful only if we understand the business logic of the main consumer force and know how to gather this generation of young people."

Domestic entrepreneurs need more links such as deep tillage technology, raw material production and procurement, industry chain management and so on.

From the point of view of the first category, the taste of milk is less than fruit drinks, yogurt and milk drinks, and the original taste is the favorite of consumers. Whether plant-based drinks can be a better substitute for milk in taste and taste is the premise to attract consumers.

So entrepreneurs need bean-based drinks, oatmeal-based drinks in taste and flavor close to the original milk, coconut, white peach flavor and so on. In plant-based yogurt, there are many flavors to choose from.

Overall, price advantage may be one of the primary indicators for domestic plant-based entrepreneurs to attract consumers, and the repurchase rate of products and users' perception of brand tone still need entrepreneurs to work harder.