2021 is the year of the blind box breaking, and the trend of "everything can be blind box" has long been blown into the card world.

  "There are 1 yuan package and 10 yuan package offline, and the most expensive one is 999 yuan package." Du Du, who is in the second grade of elementary school, holds the Ultraman card that he has accumulated for a long time, and talks about how to get it all together. Not easy: The more expensive the card pack, the higher the probability of drawing out rare cards, and a "top-match" ZR card often requires frequent opening of blind boxes to obtain.

  Expectations in the process of buying and unpacking blind boxes can easily lead to addictive stimuli.

The Beijing News Shell Finance reporter learned from an interview that Ultraman cards are divided into 8 categories from R to ZR. Among them, the Ultraman card pack priced at 10 yuan, 8 cards may only have one ZR card, most of the time There will only be LGR cards and UR cards of lower value.

  The "Krypton Gold" game of cards is much more than that.

At present, Douluo Dalu, Ye Luoli, etc. have launched IP peripheral cards. Unlike the Water Margin cards, many cards belong to collectible games, which can not only be used for competition, but also continuously introduce new series and styles. .

For players, they are always on the way to collect, but they are "unfinished".

  In response to the blind box market routine, at the beginning of this year, the China Consumers Association said that merchants are over-marketing, and consumers are addicted to the easy-to-use box.

Some use players to share, discuss, exchange, etc., to arouse consumers' collection psychology and show-off psychology, and stimulate consumers' purchasing motivation and desire; some create the concept of "series" and set up a hidden item that is the most difficult to obtain. Hunger marketing, the probability of winning is mostly "one in a hundred".

Especially the youth group, because of their strong curiosity, like to compare, and not yet sound consumption concept, it is very easy to become addicted to the blind box, and some even directly "end the box" in order to win the hidden money.

The China Consumers Association reminds that there must be a sense of risk prevention and a rational consumption concept.

  Rare card temptation: who is more dazzling

  Cards are not unfamiliar among children, and can even be described as fashionable.

  "Of the students in my class, it can be said that 9 and a half out of 10 play Ultraman cards. Boys are more fascinated." A primary school Chinese teacher in Tianjin told Shell Finance reporter that he had confiscated a set of cards. , and learned that it was worth two or three thousand yuan.

  Du Du, an elementary school student, estimated that most of the boys in his class were collecting Ultraman cards, and "playing secretly after school, or exchanging" became an essential activity.

  Ultraman cards are endowed with many functions, and socialization is only one of them.

Among the children, who has a ZR card with a high rarity index means more popularity.

  "Offline purchases include 1 yuan package, 2 yuan package, 5 yuan package, 10 yuan package, and the most expensive one is 999 yuan package. I don't recommend buying 1 yuan package, because those are all 'waste cards', and I usually have If I have change, I will buy a 5-yuan pack or a 10-yuan pack." Du Du was already familiar with the marketing routine of cards, but this made him determined to buy more expensive card packs.

"The more expensive the card package, the higher the probability of rare cards appearing in the package, and sometimes it can make money. For example, a ZR card was issued in the 10 yuan package I bought. I can take this card to the store for recycling, and the store will recycle it. Give me two packs of 10 yuan."

  Shell Finance reporters noticed that the value of rare cards is often linked to money.

Among them, the "Card Tour Ultraman Glory Edition Card" priced at 179.9 yuan, a box includes 18 Ultraman card packs, and each card pack has 8 cards.

Card Games said in the description that each box must contain a random ZR card (or LGR card), a random SHR card (or HR card), 0 to 1 SSR card, 2 SR cards and 3 to 4 R cards Card.

  In contrast, a box of "Ultraman Cards Deluxe Edition Card Tour" priced at 59.9 yuan includes 30 Ultraman card packs. Due to the relatively cheap price, each card pack will have 7 R cards. , leaving one chance to draw rare cards from "SR" to "SSR".

  Ultraman cards are divided into 8 categories from R to ZR, and the card rarity is divided into four levels from two stars to five stars.

As for how difficult it is to collect ZR cards, Shell Finance reporters searched the card pack burst rate data and saw that there are 8 cards in the Ultraman card pack with an average price of about 10 yuan, and often only one card is ZR. card, most of the time this card will be a card with lower value than the ZR card.

For card packs with lower prices, the probability of ZR cards appearing is lower.

A video of a content creator at station B shows that he bought all the card packs in a nearby store, but did not draw a ZR card.

  Share, exchange, etc., arouse players' show-off psychology and stimulate the desire to buy.

Du Du said that most of the students around are just for collection. The "attack power" and "defense power" of ZR cards are not particularly high, but they are more "dazzling".

This has become the reason for its popularity. "General card backgrounds cannot be moved, but ZR card backgrounds will move."

  "The 3D cards that come out now are all three-dimensional, and you can compare your classmates with better-looking and rarer cards." About two years ago, Dudu saw his classmates collect Ultraman cards, and he started collecting cards himself.

The most expensive one cost 325 yuan to buy four packs of cards in the physical store, and each pack of cards can contain ten rare cards.

Today, he has hundreds of Ultraman cards and a three-dimensional card book in his hand.

  There are routines in the exchange type, and the card "fancy" is new

  Children are addicted to cards, and the offline "battle" gameplay has also become a major incentive.

  Shell Finance reporter learned that in addition to rarity, each Ultraman card also has card effects, attack power, support power and other data.

Card Tour (Shanghai) Culture Communication Co., Ltd. (referred to as: Card Tour) is the Chinese agent of Ultraman cards. According to its official website, players can prepare a set of 40 Ultraman cards before they can compete.

  A reporter from Shell Finance browsed the official account of Card Tour and saw that Card Tour has held many large-scale events for Ultraman cards. The cost of the "Nanjing Open" event in January this year is 100 yuan per person, and the championship bonus is 5,000 yuan. and corresponding prize packs.

Some netizens described the scene of watching the Ultraman card game with their children: "I watched it for a while, and I was dizzy with the terms attack, defense, and support, and my son who seemed to understand was very excited. The battle time can be over in six or seven minutes if it’s fast.”

  "The card game competition has already had the national championship finals. Not only students are participating, but there are also adult competitions. The essence of the business model is to sell cards and open blind boxes. But in the form of events, parents will not be too disgusted. ," the parent said.

  A reporter from Shell Finance once saw an officially organized Ultraman card battle in a shopping mall in Tianjin, and nearly a hundred children or parents participated in it.

A teacher told Shell Finance reporters that sometimes students are seen playing poker against each other with these cards.

In addition to showing off whose cards are beautiful, they also have to compete with each other in terms of attack power.

  For the more popular collectible cards in the current market, rarity and randomness are the main reasons to stimulate players' desire to buy, and they are distinguished by functions such as attack power in gameplay.

  Shell Finance reporters combed and saw that most cards are generally divided into N (normal), R (rare), SR (very rare), SSR (super rare), etc. according to their rarity, which is similar to the above classification of Ultraman cards Slightly different, but much the same.

This rarity classification model is more common in card games, and even in games operated by NetEase and Tencent, the random items offered to players will be sorted by similar types.

  Creating a "series" concept and hunger marketing boosted player enthusiasm.

Therefore, many merchants continue to introduce newer and rarer cards to maintain their popularity.

  Shell Finance reporter saw in Ye Luoli's official flagship store on JD.com that in addition to the regular R card, SR card, and SSR card, Ye Luoli's Wonderland Collection Card also launched a vivid three-dimensional HR card, a bright star diamond UR card, and a hand-painted comic-style MR card. Cards, Shining Gold Stamping SGR Cards, Star Magic Crystal TCR/TSR/TGR/TR Cards, etc.

  The more levels, the higher the player's enthusiasm for "krypton gold".

"In the beginning, I collected SR and SSR cards, and later there were more rare cards, such as flash cards, clear cards, and even 9 puzzle cards that could only be collected one. Children can't always collect these cards. Qi, even if we get it together, the merchant will soon launch a new set." Ms. Liu's son is in elementary school, she told Shell Finance reporter, "Sometimes a package is opened, and the child says that all these cards are already there, so Leave it alone. Isn't that a waste?"

  According to a research report released by Caitong Securities, because the card packs purchased by players will be randomly matched with cards of different rarity, this random experience similar to "opening a blind box" stimulates players' desire to buy.

At the same time, some very rare cards have generated high circulation value in the second-hand market, which makes high-quality trading cards have the attributes of collection, which further stimulates the purchase of card packs by players.

  Shell Finance reporters saw on the Wuhan city message board that many parents believe that the cards are sold in a way similar to the blind box lottery, which is specially sold to primary and middle school students.

"Relevant departments can clean up the channels for selling such cards around the campus", "Schools strengthen special education and publicity, and work with parents to guide students" have become the expectations of some parents.

  Capital competition, blind box mode is named

  Cards are all the rage, and the company behind it is undoubtedly the winner.

  At present, the domestic companies that Ultraman cooperates with mainly include Kayou and Huali Technology.

Among them, in addition to Ultraman, the animation IP cards purchased by Huali Technology also include image cards such as Mecha Heroes and Doll Academy.

However, the sales revenue of Ultraman image cards in Huali Technology's animation IP derivative product business has risen from 28.4% in 2018 to 69.57% in the first half of 2020, and it has always been the sales of Huali Technology's animation IP derivative products. The most important "money attracting" product in the business.

Huali Technology said that Ultraman image cards are well received by the market and are the main driving force for the company's animation IP derivative product revenue growth.

  How much revenue can an Ultraman card bring to Holley Technology?

Shell Finance reporters have seen through the announcement of Holley Technology that for Ultraman cards, Holley Technology sells the highest price to the playground at 4 yuan per card (tax included), and its main downstream customers are big players, Le Culture, Fengyun The sales price of the amusement park stores of Restart, Aeon Fantasy, Cartoony and Tom Bear to consumers is generally 6 yuan/piece to 8 yuan/piece (tax included), "The amusement park has a reasonable profit margin under this business model. "

  Huali Technology mainly sells exclusive animation IP derivative cards through amusement machine equipment.

In 2018, the company's "Ultraman" fusion animation and cartoon equipment for fierce battles was well received by the market, and the sales of "Ultraman" image cards grew rapidly.

From 2017 to 2019, the company's animation IP derivative product sales revenue increased from 20.4073 million yuan to 65.5866 million yuan, with a compound growth rate of 79.27%.

In 2021, Holley Technology's animation IP derivative product business continued to grow rapidly. During the reporting period, the company's animation IP derivative product operating income was 175 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 156.52%.

In addition, in 2021, animation IP derivatives will account for 27.91% of Holley Technology's total operating income, an increase from 16.05% in 2020.

Huali Technology said that as of the end of 2021, the company has put nearly 10,000 sets of animation and cartoon equipment, reaching 32 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) across the country, covering more than 2,000 playground stores.

  In contrast, the Ultraman card makes the card game more profitable.

The reporter searched for Ultraman cards on major e-commerce platforms and saw that the products sold by the top-ranking merchants are basically from card games, and their official flagship store cards are also relatively popular.

  Shell Finance reporters opened the card travel JD.com flagship store and found that the evaluation of the top 12 Ultraman card products in the comprehensive ranking exceeded 500,000.

Among them, the "Card Tour Ultraman Glory Edition Card", which sells for 179.9 yuan, ranks first in the "Cartoon Peripheral Toys List".

  In addition to online, Kayou also has more than 100 offline dealers, and its products are distributed in 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities across the country, with a coverage rate of more than 90%.

  Compared with the listed company Huali Technology, Kayou has not disclosed its operation data so far.

It has been reported that the annual revenue of Kayou Culture can reach 1 billion to 2 billion yuan, while the annual revenue of the second-ranked card brand may only be tens of millions of yuan.

  Capital has already smelled the prospect of this market.

According to public information, Kayou received financing from the investment fund of Hongbin Capital in the second half of 2021, and it is speculated that the valuation will reach the level of 1 billion US dollars.

  In fact, capital has long favored the "open blind box" business model of cards.

  In December 2020, Bubble Mart was officially listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and became the first stock of the blind box. Among the new consumer stocks, there are no two bright spots.

Sequoia is also one of the investors of Bubble Mart.

However, Wind data shows that the year-on-year growth rate of Bubble Mart's net profit has shown a downward trend from 2018 to 2020, and the growth rate in 2021 is not so impressive.

At present, the company's share price has fallen from highs to around HK$30.

  "Blind box economic model is being put to the test."

This year's CCTV 3.15 party revealed the chaos of the blind box industry, and Bubble Mart was named.

At the beginning of the year, Bubble Mart and KFC launched a joint blind box, including six regular models and one hidden model. The probability of hidden models appearing is only 1:72.

In order to gather the whole set, even the food-replacement business was derived.

There are also consumers who purchased 106 packages at one time, with an amount of up to 10,494 yuan.

To this end, Bubble Mart said that in the future authorized cooperation with the food industry, all customized blind box business will be suspended.

  In addition, CCTV also revealed the issue of low cost and high pricing of blind boxes.

The price of blind boxes continued to rise, and the product premium was serious. A product with a production cost of only 30 yuan was made into a blind box, and the price soared to seven or eight hundred yuan in the second-hand market.

  There are exaggerated propaganda in the business, and it is necessary to recognize the risks and consume rationally

  As early as the beginning of this year, the China Consumers Association named the Bubble Mart and KFC blind box packages, arguing that the sales of limited-edition blind boxes is to stimulate consumption by means of "hunger marketing", which will easily lead to impulsive consumption by consumers in order to obtain limited-edition blind boxes.

This is not the first time that the China Consumers Association has named a blind box.

In January 2021, the China Consumers Association issued a warning for the blind box market, which continues to grow in popularity, saying that problems such as excessive marketing by merchants, suspected false propaganda, difficulty in guaranteeing product quality, and difficulty in resolving consumer disputes cannot be ignored.

  "Compared with ordinary products, blind boxes have strong information asymmetry. Consumers can only rely on the advertisements of merchants to buy, which is easy to be exaggerated by merchants' product value, fictitious winning probability, inconsistent color and style, etc. Misleading by false propaganda." The China Consumers Association reminded that we must recognize the risks, consume rationally, consume in moderation, and do not blindly follow the trend.

  In fact, the blind box "routines" sold by cards are a temptation that is difficult to resist for children with weak self-control.

  In this regard, Zhao Hu, a lawyer from Beijing Zhongwen Law Firm, told Shell Finance reporter that the supervision of cards can be considered from the perspective of consumer rights protection. It is the obligation of businesses to ensure consumers' right to know. This is the point of card manufacturers. Special attention should be paid.

  "Like the hidden 'blind box', how many 'good cards' with high scarcity and high level are there? Are they really there or not at all? This is due to information asymmetry between consumers and merchants." Zhao Hu said that merchants are using this information asymmetry to trigger consumers' "winning" psychology, so that they will never be able to buy them, which is suspected of defrauding consumers.

  "From the perspective of protecting minors, cards are indeed likely to lead to irrational consumption of minors, but it seems that there is no legal conclusion." Zhao Hu said.

  Beijing News Shell Finance reporter Luo Yidan