Titanium media note:This article comes from WeChat WeChat official account Red Star Capital Bureau (ID: hxzbj 2020), written by | Qiang Yaxi, Wang Tian, Zhang Luxi, Xie Yutong, edited by | Ren Zhijiang, Peng Jiang, and published by Titanium Media with authorization.
The Mid-Autumn Festival is approaching, and the moon cake market is also lively, but there have been new changes this year.
In June, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Commerce and the State Administration of Market Supervision jointly issued a related announcement to curb the "sky-high" moon cakes, demanding that the boxed moon cakes with a unit price exceeding that of 500 yuan be supervised. Under the new regulations, the "sky-high" moon cakes on the surface have disappeared. On the e-commerce platform, the highest-priced moon cake is stuck in the "red line" and sells for 499 yuan.
However, the investigation by Red Star Capital Bureau found that,The "sky-high" mooncake gift box still has a gray living space, and the trading method is more hidden. Some merchants said that they can add WeChat to buy (moon cakes above 500 yuan); Some merchants said that Taobao can’t go above 500 yuan, and bird’s nest and abalone (high-priced moon cakes) can only go offline. In addition, some merchants were exposed to have put a 499 yuan mooncake gift box on the shelves, but consumers had to pay 600 yuan freight to make up the difference.
In addition, the Red Star Capital Bureau searched a online celebrity moon cake and found that it was not clearly priced, but sold by taking ten copies, paying a deposit and the balance. It is understood that most of these sellers are mooncake scalpers. They have obtained mooncake gift boxes that are difficult to buy and are on fire through snapping up and internal channels, and even doubled their prices. For example, the original price of a box of Maotai moon cakes in 380 yuan has been sold to 680 yuan and even 780 yuan, and "the price is still rising".
A circle of friends with mooncake scalpers said that on September 3, the order volume exceeded 200. It is said that in the Mid-Autumn Festival last year, he earned more than 100,000 yuan by selling moon cakes, and he said in another circle of friends, "If there is a warehouse this year, one NUDAKE moon cake is enough to earn 100,000 yuan."
"In recent years, the moon cake market has been generally standardized and orderly, and the prices of most moon cakes are close to the market demand. However, some enterprises still speculate on the price of moon cakes in various ways, and the problem of sky-high prices still exists." Jin Xiandong, director and spokesperson of the Political Research Office of the National Development and Reform Commission, pointed out at the press conference in August that market supervision and inspection will be intensified before the Mid-Autumn Festival this year, and violations of laws and regulations will be severely investigated and publicly exposed, while high-end hotels, restaurants and e-commerce platforms will be the key areas.
The relevant person in charge of the National Development and Reform Commission once said that the main purpose of issuing the Announcement is to promote mass consumer goods such as moon cakes to return to the traditional cultural origin, advocate thrift and oppose waste, form a broad social consensus, and curb the phenomenon of "sky-high prices" of traditional holiday-related commodities.
Following the launch of the Announcement in June, the National Development and Reform Commission carried out research, publicity and industry guidance for two months. At the beginning of August, the General Administration of Market Supervision decided to organize a centralized rectification campaign in two months. At the end of August, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) issued another document, saying that it would extensively collect clues from all aspects, quickly push relevant parties to carry out rectification, and hand over suspected violations of laws and regulations to relevant departments for verification and investigation.
In the process of investigation, some high-end hotels sold mooncake gift boxes mixed with high-grade tea and tea sets, and some online merchants, who were more concentrated, mixed mooncakes with red wine, and raised the price of 499 yuan plus 600 yuan freight in disguise. The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said that they all urged rectification and removed the illegal products.
On September 1st, the National Development and Reform Commission issued another document to disclose the progress of the joint inspection of the moon cake market by the Price Department of the National Development and Reform Commission, the Law Enforcement Inspection Bureau of the General Administration of Market Supervision and the Bureau of Price Supervision and Competition. According to the data of the General Administration of Market Supervision, as of August 31, the national market supervision department dispatched law enforcement officers to inspect operators for 150,000 times, and inspected more than 30,000 market entities such as hotels and supermarkets around the price issue.
The Red Star Capital Bureau learned from the relevant person in charge of the National Development and Reform Commission that the reason for the announcement was that the problem of sky-high moon cakes showed signs of rebound. These phenomena not only deviated from the origin of traditional culture, but also encouraged extravagance and waste, which had a negative impact on the social atmosphere, and may even be alienated into a carrier of corruption.
Bai Wenxi, vice chairman of China Enterprise Capital Alliance, told Red Star Capital Bureau that although the situation has improved in recent years, the mooncake market has been over-packaged and over-marketed under the pressure of competition for so-called innovation and profit, and the situation of over-pricing is still relatively common. Strengthening supervision at this time is to prevent the same problem from flooding again.
Previously, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Commerce and the General Administration of Market Supervision jointly issued an announcement, clearly stipulating that the boxed moon cakes with a unit price exceeding that of 500 yuan should be subject to key supervision.
After the publication of the new national standard, some mooncake packaging manufacturers changed their previous sales model, and took out some packaging boxes that were originally only supplied to mooncake manufacturers and sold them separately, directly facing consumers or consumer enterprises.
The Red Star Capital Bureau noticed that recently, there are many novel and diverse mooncake gift boxes on e-commerce platforms such as Taobao and JD.COM. There are mooncake gift boxes that can be used as shadow play light boxes, hollowed-out paper carving gift boxes similar to those in pop-up book, and gift boxes that can be folded into lunar exploration rockets, etc., and the sales volume is considerable.
A seller of mooncake gift boxes told Red Star Capital Bureau that all kinds of mooncake gift boxes in the store can be sold separately.
Take one of the mooncake gift boxes named "Flying to the Moon" as an example, which is embedded with multiple layers of drawing boards with different moon patterns, and can rotate gears to change different pattern combinations.
The customer service staff of this merchant said that the price of the creative mooncake gift box of "Flying to the Moon" is 188 yuan, including 8 mooncakes, but if you only buy the packaged gift box, the price will be 100 yuan, and the bulk purchase price can be as low as 80 yuan.
How much is the production cost of the "Flying to the Moon" mooncake box in 100 yuan?
The merchant did not disclose its production cost to the Red Star Capital Bureau, but Mr. Liu, the head of another merchant specializing in packaging paper products, said,The cost of packaging paper moon cakes is about ten yuan, and the cost of packaging with flip cover and magnetic attraction is also around 20 yuan. "The production cost is very low, mainly because the design creativity is expensive, ranging from thousands to tens of thousands."
Mr. Liu told the Red Star Capital Bureau that in the past, mooncake gift boxes for enterprises were more business-oriented. "There are more dark blue and big red, and the gift boxes should be simple and tall"; The gift box that individual merchants like is actually more similar to Wenchuang’s works. "The appearance should be exquisite and special, and it is best to reuse it."
The Red Star Capital Bureau noticed that the sales of such enterprises that "make money by paper" are considerable. On the Alibaba platform, the turnover of a variety of mooncake packaging gift boxes in the past 30 days was as high as one million yuan. Search for "moon cake packaging box" on Taobao, and the monthly sales of various products are also above 5000.
In fact, as a seasonal food, the gross profit margin of mooncake gift boxes is quite high.
Take the moon cake giant Guangzhou Restaurant (603043.SH) as an example. In 2021, the moon cake business income of Guangzhou Restaurant was 1.521 billion yuan, the cost was only 662 million yuan, and the gross profit rate was 56.46%, which was the highest among all businesses. This is still the data after the decline in gross profit due to factors such as rising raw material prices. Previously, the gross profit margin of its moon cake business exceeded 60%.
Another listed company, Yuanzu Co., Ltd. (603886.SH), has merged the mooncake gift box business with the Chinese and Western pastry business since 2020. Last year, the gross profit margin of its "Chinese and Western pastry gift box" sector was 51.51%. In 2019, the gross profit margin of its mooncake gift box reached 65.85%, and the gross profit margin in previous years also exceeded 60%.
Attracted by high profits, more and more enterprises enter the field of moon cakes. According to the consulting data of Ai Media, the number of mooncake enterprises in China has doubled in the past ten years. As of July this year, the number of registered mooncake enterprises in China has reached 40,478. The size of the moon cake market is also rising, from 13.18 billion yuan in 2015 to 21.81 billion yuan in 2021. It is estimated that the sales of moon cakes in China will reach 24.38 billion yuan in 2022.
The "sky-high-priced" moon cakes on the surface have disappeared, but the investigation by Red Star Capital Bureau found that the "sky-high-priced" moon cake gift box still has a gray living space, and the trading method is more hidden, resulting in the phenomenon of "underground" trading of sky-high moon cakes.
On August 30th, Red Star Capital Bureau asked several home appliance merchants if there were any more high-grade mooncake gift boxes for sale. One of them made it clear that there were, and sent a micro-signal, indicating that Red Star Capital Bureau used WeChat to communicate.
Subsequently, the merchant sent a "2022 Mid-Autumn Festival Gift Box" form on WeChat, including 15 moon cake brands, such as Nantaiyue, Hibake, Daoxiang Village, Jinhua, Maxim’s, and Haojiaxiang, all of which are well-known brands in the market.
The Red Star Capital Bureau found that,In the table provided by the merchant, the price of most mooncake gift boxes is between 100-300 yuan, but there are also many mooncake gift boxes above 500 yuan. Among them, Hibake, Happy Family, Jinhua, Good Hometown, etc., the price of some gift boxes ranges from 540 yuan to 888 yuan. There are also more expensive ingredients such as abalone, black truffle and sea cucumber in moon cake stuffing.
A merchant selling high-priced moon cakes told the Red Star Capital Bureau that the price of online moon cakes could not exceed 499 yuan this year, so there was no link, and it was directly connected with the manufacturer, "absolutely authentic, with sufficient supply".
Another food franchise store replied to the Red Star Capital Bureau that bird’s nest and abalone (high-priced moon cakes) can only be taken offline. When the Red Star Capital Bureau further inquired about how to buy offline, the other party did not reply.
In view of the moon cake brands that surpassed 500 yuan in the above table, the Red Star Capital Bureau consulted a number of official flagship stores, and the relevant staff all said that there was no such high-priced gift box.
Among them, the customer service of Haojiaxiang flagship store said that there is no "Moonlight Box" gift box online this year (699 yuan), and the table is last year’s model. The customer service of Jinhuali Food Flagship Store also said that the "815 Premium Pack" (658 yuan) gift box in the form had already been removed.
However, the Red Star Capital Bureau consulted several Taobao stores that sell brands such as hometown, and some stores replied that there is a "Moonlight Box" for sale at 699 yuan, but Taobao can’t go above 500 yuan. If you want to buy it, just take other links and change the price.
Mr. Zhang is a professional food purchasing agent in online celebrity, also known as scalper. Two months ago, he began to drink moon cakes in his circle of friends.
Hongxing capital bureauOn August 31st, I asked Mr. Zhang about the price of Maotai mooncake with yolk and flowing heart, which is hard to see in the market. The price given was a box of 680 yuan. Compared with the scalper in 780 yuan, Mr. Zhang’s price is relatively cheap, but compared with the original price of a box of 380 yuan, its gross profit can also reach 300 yuan.
Mr. Zhang "calculated" the record of purchasing moon cakes during the Mid-Autumn Festival last year. He wrote in a circle of friends: "It lasted for two months, counting online stores, small programs, WeChat ordering and other channels, and earned more than 100,000 yuan."
In another circle of friends, he also said: "If there is a warehouse this year, relying on a NUDAKE moon cake is enough to earn hundreds of thousands.
For the phenomenon that the number of mooncake gift boxes purchased by luxury brands is decreasing, Mr. Zhang put a picture to explain the reason. The picture shows the new regulations of the platform for mooncake merchants. The first one is "The release price of mooncakes for sale shall not exceed that of 500 yuan (inclusive)".
The new regulations have affected the sales of luxury brand mooncake gift boxes, and also affected the way scalpers sell high-priced mooncakes on e-commerce platforms.
Searching for mooncake gift boxes in Taobao, we can’t see mooncake gift boxes whose price exceeds that of 500 yuan. However, high-priced moon cakes are still traded privately in a few shops on the platform.In Mr. Zhang’s shop, the price of Lady M mooncake gift box is 98 yuan, but when you click to buy it, you need consumers to take ten copies, totaling 980 yuan/set.
In another store, the price of Lady M mooncake gift box is 499 yuan. Click to buy, and there will be a down payment of 499 yuan, and the difference between the last payment is 499 yuan, totaling 998 yuan/set.
In the Announcement, it is proposed that more than 500 yuan’s boxed moon cakes should be supervised. Operators are required to keep the transaction information that the unit price of mooncakes sold exceeds that of 500 yuan boxed mooncakes for the relevant departments to check according to law.
Why is 500 yuan the price red line? The Red Star Capital Bureau has learned that the National Development and Reform Commission has conducted cost surveys on more than 30 moon cake enterprises, and combined with industry organizations and e-commerce platform data to draw conclusions.
"From the market situation for many years, the average production cost of boxed moon cakes is about 70 yuan/box, the sales of boxed moon cakes with a unit price below 200 yuan account for more than 80%, and the unit price above 500 yuan accounts for about 1%. The unit price of boxed moon cakes does not exceed the high degree of social acceptance in 500 yuan. " The relevant person in charge of the price department of the National Development and Reform Commission said.
In order to curb the "sky-high" moon cakes, the Announcement proposes that when selling boxed moon cakes with a unit price exceeding that of 500 yuan, operators should keep the transaction information legally obtained in the transaction, such as the transaction date and payment records, for the relevant departments to check according to law.
Not only that, the National Development and Reform Commission will also conduct cost surveys for enterprises that produce and sell "sky-high" moon cakes when necessary.
This series of actions are aimed at compressing the living space of "sky-high" moon cakes. Regarding the key supervision of "single price 500 yuan" moon cakes, the person in charge of the above-mentioned price department said that it also drew a clear red line of supervision, defined the behavior boundary of moon cake production and sales enterprises, and released clear expectations to operators, which was conducive to guiding operators to rationally set prices, operate in compliance with laws and regulations, and consciously maintain market order.
"In the short term, it may have an impact on related production and sales enterprises, but in the long run, it will help promote the healthy and sustainable development of the moon cake industry.Xie Xiaowen, a well-known commentator, told the Red Star Capital Bureau that the introduction of relevant policies and the tightening of supervision have all given moon cake enterprises a "signal" — — If we want to devote more attention to the R&D and sales of the products themselves, we must transform the products and reduce the burden of packaging to meet the regulatory needs.
Previously, the relevant supervision of sky-high moon cakes has also achieved certain results. A few days ago, China Bakery and Sugar Products Industry Association released the report "Development Trend of Moon Cake Industry in China in 2022", which showed that under the requirements of a series of new moon cake regulations, the "sky-high" moon cakes with prices exceeding 500 yuan this year will be greatly reduced, and the packaging of moon cake gift boxes will be further "slimmed down", with prices mainly concentrated between 80 yuan and 260 yuan.
Will other manufacturers of moon cakes be affected? In this regard, the person in charge of the above-mentioned price department clearly pointed out that the price of moon cakes is formed by the market and decided by the operators themselves, and the price will not interfere within a reasonable range.
The supervision of sky-high moon cakes is also expected to form a long-term mechanism in the future. According to the National Development and Reform Commission, the Announcement focuses on the whole chain of production, supply and marketing in the moon cake market, studies and establishes a regulatory system that combines prevention, supervision and punishment, and at the same time emphasizes the coordination of enterprises, industries, governments and society, and supports industry organizations to play the role of industry self-discipline.
In fact,Not only moon cakes, but also the national standard "Food and Cosmetics for Restricting Over-packaging of Commodities", which was officially implemented on August 15 this year, further strictly requires the core indicators such as the number of packaging layers and porosity coefficient of moon cakes and zongzi, and stipulates that precious metals and mahogany materials should not be used in packaging.
The document also puts forward requirements for packaging costs. For example, for moon cakes and zongzi whose sales price is above 100 yuan, the proportion of packaging cost in the sales price will be reduced from 20% to 15%.
Many interviewed experts believe that the problems of "sky-high" moon cakes and zongzi are expected to be gradually solved under the advocacy of new regulatory regulations and new consumption trends.
"As far as consumer psychology is concerned, gift consumption does exist ‘ Overpackaging ’ This feature is related to the gift attributes of moon cakes. It is also a consumer psychological problem that industries and enterprises must face up to, face and guide. " Bai Wenxi said.
He pointed out that the problem of over-packaging should be strengthened from two aspects: production and circulation, and the mandatory standard propaganda and punishment should be eliminated at the source. "The relevant laws and regulations were introduced to regulate the industry. The strong supervision of mooncake gift boxes will help mooncake manufacturers to return to the initial intention of pleasing the market with product quality and service quality, and return to the path of healthy competition and development in the industry. "
From the perspective of public psychology, Wang Peng of China Renmin University pointed out to the Red Star Capital Bureau that it takes time for policies to be implemented. "In this process, we should increase publicity and guidance, such as how to report, supervise, safeguard rights and enforce the law once such behaviors are discovered. This should be that all sectors of society can participate. "
