White Rabbit Toffee, Arctic Ocean Soda, Wahaha AD Calcium Milk, Panpan Sweet Potato Chips... These domestic snacks have accompanied the growth of generations of children.

At the same time, the snack companies that have created these classic products are upright and innovative, constantly chasing new trends, and "growing up" with children, so that the taste of childhood will stay on the tip of the tongue.

　　part of childhood memories

　　Taste buds can always evoke memories of childhood, and the older generation has a soft spot for White Rabbit Toffee.

In the 1960s and 1970s, when supplies were relatively scarce, White Rabbit Toffee was a "luxury" for children, and eating one was like a New Year's Eve.

After the children peeled off the candy wrapper, they were always reluctant to eat too fast, but chewed and tasted carefully. After the toffee melted in the mouth, the milky aroma was still entangled on the tip of the tongue.

　　In the early days of reform and opening up, children had more snacks, but domestic snack brands were still in their infancy and could not compete with foreign brands in terms of capital and technology. The mid-to-high-end snacks on the market were firmly controlled by foreign brands.

In this case, Wahaha was established in 1987.

　　"Post-90s" Mr. Yang is a loyal fan of Wahaha.

When he was a child, he didn't have much pocket money. A plate of 6 small bottles of Wahaha AD calcium milk cost four or five yuan.

At that time, he often saved enough pocket money for a week, went to the canteen in front of the school to buy a board of Wahaha AD calcium milk, drank bottle after bottle, and looked forward to saving enough pocket money next week.

"This is part of my childhood memories. Now, sometimes I see Wahaha AD calcium milk on the supermarket shelves, and I will buy a board." said Mr. Yang, who is nearly 30 years old.

　　The Wahaha AD calcium milk, which Mr. Yang has never forgotten, was launched in 1996 and was loved by children as soon as it was launched. This is inseparable from Wahaha's innovation in product concepts and production processes.

"At that time, a large number of foreign brands on the market did not provide a wide range of products, mainly limited to three flavors of beverages, namely cannabis, lemon juice and orange juice, and children had little choice." Zong Qinghou, chairman of Wahaha Group, accepted Our reporter said in an interview, "Wahaha AD calcium milk tastes sour and sweet, taking into account both taste and nutrition. Because we adopted a new production process at that time to ensure the stability of protein and vitamins A and D in the beverage."

　　When Wahaha launched AD calcium milk, Fujian Panpan Food Group Co., Ltd., which specializes in snack food, was established in Jinjiang, Quanzhou.

Talking about the original intention of entering the snack food industry, Cai Jinan, chairman of Panpan Group, told this reporter a short story: In 1995, Cai Jinan saw a seven- or eight-year-old boy pestering his mother to buy shrimp sticks in a store in Tianjin. , his mother didn't buy it at first, and the little boy cried, until he was satisfied to get a few packets of shrimp sticks he wanted.

This made Cai Jinan realize that the snack food industry such as shrimp sticks had a broad market at that time. As long as products more suitable for Chinese children were produced, they could "overtake" foreign brands.

　　After preliminary market research, Panpan developed the first batch of products "Panpan White Potato Chips".

Different from the popular potato chips on the market at that time, Panpan white potato chips have bright yellow color, low oil content, long shelf life and tighter internal fibers, which are very popular among consumers.

Cai Jin'an said: "At that time, the company had a lot of orders and often worked overtime to produce, and there was a long queue for transportation outside the factory." This product is enduring and can still be seen in supermarkets today.

"The potato chips I used to eat when I was a kid still taste delicious now." Some netizens commented.

　　Innovative and rich snack product line

　　The children's snack market is highly competitive and new products are emerging one after another.

How to make a brand evergreen?

Zong Qinghou believes that quality and integrity are the foundation of an enterprise.

To this end, Wahaha has established a food safety risk assessment system, a quality traceability system and a graded quality supervision system to prevent food safety issues.

　　Innovating and enriching product lines and creating "star products" is a magic weapon for domestic snack brands to become bigger and stronger, but Panpan has encountered a lot of setbacks for this:

　　After Panpan's white potato chips became famous, Cai Jin'an wanted to take advantage of the victory and make potato chips both delicious and nutritious, so as to further occupy the potato chip market.

After technical research by the R&D team, Panpan added eggs and milk to potato chips to develop "custard potato chips".

However, this product, which put a lot of advertisements and laid out the market in advance, has not been recognized by consumers, and a large number of products have been unsalable.

"The production of this product ended up with a loss of 20 to 30 million yuan, which caused huge difficulties for Panpan Foods, which was just established." Cai Jin'an said, affected by this, Panpan Foods did not dare to make too much market moves in the following years. .

　　Since the beginning of this century, due to the continuous improvement of people's living standards, baked goods have become the "new darling" of consumers.

Panpan Foods, which has recovered its vitality, noticed this change, focused on the baked goods track, and developed Panpan French buns. This bread has a good taste and is the first domestic bread that can be kept fresh for a long time.

"We use high-quality milk powder and wheat flour, and the buns are full of materials. Each bun has to go through 120 minutes of slow fermentation and traditional rotary oven baking to ensure that the baked bread is full of color and fragrance." Cai Jinan said.

This small bread has become another "star product" of Panpan Foods, driving the company's revenue to increase by more than 300% and stabilizing the brand image.

　　In order to respond to market changes in a timely manner, Wahaha has established a complete industrial chain including R&D, production, sales, transportation and other links, and has its own food research institute and mechanical and electrical research institute. Once consumers have new needs, Wahaha can quickly New products are developed and put on the market.

Taking Nutrition Express as an example, this product mixes milk and juice for the first time, and adds 15 nutrients at the same time, with a maximum annual sales of 20 billion yuan.

　　Today, low-sugar and low-calorie healthy food has become a new trend. In the blue ocean of sugar-free food, domestic snack brands are not far behind.

Panpan is no longer limited to snack foods, and has developed "Leopard Power" functional drinks with 0 fat, 0 preservatives, and 0 sweeteners and raw coconut juice.

Wahaha, which has technical advantages in the beverage industry, has launched a low-sugar nutrition express, a sugar-free version of very cola, quinoa milk porridge, etc., and established a modern bioengineering research institute, focusing on probiotic research and development and industrial project layout.

At present, Wahaha has a strain resource bank of more than 4,500 strains, and has built an intelligent strain production workshop, successfully building a first-class intelligent strain production line in China.

　　"In the future, we will combine the traditional theory of traditional Chinese medicine diet therapy with bioengineering, modern extraction and other technologies to develop large-scale health products with high technological content and high added value." Zong Qinghou said.

　　Continue to explore the infinite possibilities of old flavors

　　With the improvement of the consumption power of the younger generation and the enhancement of cultural self-confidence, "national trend" products that conform to Chinese aesthetics have become the choice of more and more people, and old-fashioned snack companies are also actively embracing the new needs of consumers.

　　In addition to satisfying the taste buds of consumers, it is also necessary to use the appearance to attract the attention of young people.

Quanzhou, where Panpan Group is located, is the starting point of the ancient Maritime Silk Road. Taking this as inspiration, Panpan has launched a gift box of Guochao fresh coconut juice. Embellished in the meantime, the picture is exquisite and the design is beautiful.

　　Wahaha will launch a national trendy version of Very Cola on the Mid-Autumn Festival in 2021. The packaging is based on the themes of "Hundred Deers Welcome Backward Fortune" and "Thousands of Carps Share Chanjuan", and is designed with deer and koi, which have beautiful meanings in traditional Chinese culture. main body.

According to the voting results of netizens, the three sugar-free Cokes, ginseng, oil orange and huamei, are very sweet and have a strong "Chinese style" in packaging and taste.

　　Only improving the packaging is not enough to make young people pay the bill. Domestic snack companies are also actively co-branding with well-known IPs to promote products to "break the circle" and win more consumers.

Panpan launched the Dunhuang·Guochao commemorative gift box containing protein drinks. The design contains Dunhuang cultural symbols such as the Mogao Grottoes and the Nine-colored Deer, which are exquisite in appearance and rich in cultural connotations.

"We hope that through the launch of the Guochao gift box, the product will become the carrier of Chinese traditional culture, so that consumers can have a deeper understanding of Chinese traditional culture." Cai Jinan said.

　　Co-branding with the Chinese animation "Douluo Continent" to launch Nutritious Express flavored yogurt, entering the two-dimensional circle and harvesting more young consumers is a brilliant move for Wahaha.

Nutrition Express has designed two flavors, Qingti Xuanbingcao and Rouwuxianmimei, according to the animation plot, which are loved by anime fans. There are a lot of information on social platforms such as Weibo, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, and Station B. The unboxing videos, taste evaluations, and related texts and videos of the product have reached 26 million views and views.

　　Wahaha AD calcium milk and very cola, which have grown up with a generation, also have the potential to become a big IP.

Wahaha has launched a series of products around AD calcium milk, not only AD calcium milk moon cakes and rice dumplings, but also AD calcium milk anthropomorphic images, emoticons and peripheral products, as well as AD calcium milk theme song "Be a Child" and so on.

"Since Wahaha adopted the IP-based marketing strategy of AD calcium milk in 2018, the sales of AD calcium milk have maintained double-digit growth for three consecutive years." Zong Qinghou said, "We will continue to explore the infinite possibilities of AD calcium milk, and hope it It can become a classic product that accompanies generations of consumers.”

Zhao Hao

Zhao Hao