The Qatar World Cup held not long ago ushered in a wave of consumption boom for high-definition and large-screen color TV sets.
Many people have found that the TV that used to be a "big piece" for the family has now been continuously improved in performance and size, but the price has been falling all the way. There are many big-brand TVs in the market.
Why are TVs getting cheaper?
Is it oversupply or cost reduction?
Where will the industry as a whole go?
40-inch TV enters the 100-yuan level
"The World Cup is a carnival for fans every four years. Watching equipment is very important. I started to buy it during the '6.18' shopping season last year." Veteran fan Zhang Hao bought a game TV on an e-commerce platform some time ago. "Usually it can be used to play games and watch videos. During the World Cup, it can be used to watch games through the Internet TV function."
When purchasing, Zhang Hao discovered that TV sets are "really cheap" now.
"I seldom watch TV, and I have never bought a TV before. When I was a child, the TV was a big item at home. I remember that the picture tube TV my parents bought cost at least 3,000 yuan. If you buy an LCD TV, it will be more expensive. Ten thousand yuan. After looking around this time, I realized that the price of TVs has dropped so fast, and you can already buy a 70-inch high-definition LCD TV for more than 3,000 yuan."
Televisions are getting bigger and cheaper, and many consumers feel similarly.
"You can buy a 55-inch LCD TV with good performance for about 1,500 yuan. If it is a small one that hangs on the wall, you can buy one for a few hundred yuan." Li Xiaowen, a Beijing resident who is decorating a new house, said.
Older people feel this change more deeply.
Grandma Sun, a resident of Shenyang, is 75 years old. She recalled that it cost nearly 4,000 yuan to buy a 21-inch picture tube color TV at the end of the last century, and 6,900 yuan to replace it with a 42-inch LCD TV in 2009. , the price has dropped to more than 2,000 yuan.
"Nowadays a big TV only costs a few hundred yuan, which was unimaginable before." She said.
On the JD.com platform, the reporter saw that Hisense’s 55-inch 4K HD TV is priced at 1,299 yuan, and Changhong’s 65-inch 4K HD TV is priced at 1,699 yuan; there is no shortage of major TV brands at the 100-yuan level, such as Xiaomi’s 43-inch full-screen TV. The price is 749 yuan, and the Skyworth 40-inch high-definition TV is 699 yuan.
Data show that from 2015 to 2021, the average size of color TV products in the domestic color TV market has increased from 44.5 inches to 54.4 inches, but the price per unit area has dropped from 75.58 yuan/inch to 61.79 yuan/inch.
Most TV brands are cutting prices.
When Xiaomi launched its first 55-inch LCD TV in 2015, it was priced at 4,999 yuan, compared to 1,499 yuan for products of the same size today.
Every year during the "Double 11" and "6.18" shopping festivals, TVs often usher in a wave of price cuts.
"I want to install a TV in the guest bedroom for my parents. Last year's 'Double 11', I found that the brands and sizes I liked were reduced to just over 500 yuan, which was cheaper than expected." Ms. Cui, a Beijing resident, said.
TV sales are booming ahead of the World Cup in Qatar.
According to the relevant person in charge of Suning.com, the prices of large-screen TV products are generally reduced. "8K high-definition, large-screen TVs above 85 inches, laser TVs, frame TVs, rotating screen TVs and other TVs have a lot of discounts, and the transaction volume has also increased significantly."
Costs fall, demand weakens
Why Are TVs Getting Cheaper?
Manufacturing cost reduction is the main reason.
According to reports, the panel is an important part of the TV.
With the advancement of technology, the production cost of LCD screens continues to decrease.
At the same time, because the LCD screen has the advantage of being cut, it can be adapted to TV screens, laptop screens, mobile phone screens, and various smart home appliance displays.
A wide range of application scenarios has attracted a large amount of capital to pour into the field of R&D and production of LCD screen production, and the scale effect brought about by the expansion of production capacity has "flattened" the unit cost.
According to Liu Fei, Research Director of the Consumer Electronics Division of Aowei Cloud Network, the price of TVs is greatly affected by changes in the cost of upstream panels.
In recent years, the production capacity of upstream panels, especially large-size panels, has increased, and the demand for color TV industry has tightened during the same period, resulting in an oversupply of panels and a drop in prices, driving down the retail price of downstream TVs.
Since 2018, the average size of TVs sold in the domestic market has increased by nearly 10 inches, but the average price has remained at around 3,000 yuan.
"Especially during the 'Double 11' period, when the panel price dropped to a low point, the supply of large-size panels increased, and finally the situation in which the size of TVs in the Chinese market is getting larger and the price is getting lower and lower."
Weak demand in the TV market is an important factor.
According to reports, TV is one of the few categories in the domestic home appliance industry that is experiencing negative growth, and has been at a low ebb in recent years.
In 2021, the retail volume of China's color TV industry market will be 38.35 million units, a year-on-year decrease of 13.8%, reaching a 12-year low while falling below the 40 million unit mark.
China's color TV sales will fluctuate from 157.2 billion yuan in 2015 to 128.9 billion yuan in 2021, and the same is true for the international market.
Global TV shipments in 2022 are expected to reach 202 million units, a record low in 10 years; among them, global TV shipments in the third quarter of 2022 will be 51.39 million units, a year-on-year decrease of 2.1%, which is the lowest quarterly shipment record since 2014 .
Behind this, on the one hand, the information carrier function and entertainment function of TV are being replaced by smart phones.
Small screens such as mobile phones and computers are replacing the large screens of televisions.
In the homes of many young people, the TV "eats ashes" all the year round.
According to survey data, the viewing rate of TV sets in Chinese households is declining year by year, and the turn-on rate will drop from about 70% in 2016 to about 30% in 2022.
On the other hand, the TV market is highly saturated.
The TV ownership rate per 100 households in China has already exceeded 100 sets/100 households, and will be 121.8 sets/100 households in 2021.
Many households own more than one TV, and there is not much demand for new TV purchases.
Facing the stock market with weak demand, TV companies "dare not raise prices" and "cannot raise prices", and often rely on low-price competition to maintain market share.
Color TV industry is facing "breakout"
Will the color TV industry fall into a long-term depression due to the loss of users, low price competition and the squeeze of similar products?
Many people in the industry are still full of confidence in the "breaking" and "breaking out" of the TV industry.
Reversing the situation of user loss is the primary task of the industry's "breaking the game".
Industry insiders believe that TV manufacturers should work hard to improve the audience's viewing experience.
Why don't you watch TV much?
Many consumers are very dissatisfied with the lengthy, repetitive and unskippable start-up advertisements commonly found in TV sets, and believe that it affects viewing experience and start-up rate.
A survey in 2021 showed that 89.9% of consumers used smart TVs with startup advertisements; 55.58% of consumers believed that "whether there are startup and shutdown advertisements" is one of the most important factors for purchasing smart TVs, and 72.73% of consumers "I can't bear it for a second" for boot ads, and only 20.2% of consumers can tolerate boot ads of less than 30 seconds.
At the same time, advertising revenue is still a "difficult to give up" profit item for TV manufacturers.
It is estimated that in 2020, the total revenue of China's Internet TV advertising operations will reach 12.1 billion yuan. Giving up this part of "fat meat" means that manufacturers need to find new profit growth points.
This reminds manufacturers to pay attention to consumer dissatisfaction and find ways to solve it.
To "break through" the industry, it is necessary to get rid of low-price competition and expand rigid consumer groups.
In addition to fierce competition within the industry, televisions are also facing competition from alternative products such as projectors and personal computers.
A survey on Qatar World Cup viewing equipment shows that, in addition to the fans returning to the big TV screen, more than 40% of the interviewed fans choose computers, mobile phones, projectors and other equipment to watch the World Cup.
It is worth noting that while the sales of color TVs are declining, the Chinese projector market is developing rapidly.
In 2021, domestic sales of projectors will reach 4.7 million units, almost double that of 2016.
"In the past, I had no choice but to bite the bullet and watch TV commercials. Now the projector can also realize the function of TV, and can also play slideshows and movies. Just need power, WiFi and a white wall, you can put the big screen Take it with you. Take a step back and say, I can buy a screen directly without watching advertisements. With the same budget, why buy a TV?” Zhou Yunping, a Shanghai citizen, believes that if we want to attract consumers to return, the new generation of TVs must be able to achieve the same level of performance. Functions that cannot be replaced by the product.
How to bring the user back from the small screen to the big screen?
Zhang Jianfeng, secretary-general of the China Household Electrical Appliances Business Association, believes that whole-house intelligence and smart homes will become the development direction of the TV industry.
"If TV manufacturers can rely on the industrial Internet and improve their interconnection capabilities, it is possible to bring users back through new scenarios and technologies," Zhang Jianfeng said.
In addition, although the color TV market as a whole has fallen into the dilemma of "volume and price drop", not all categories are on the track of "low price".
Ultra-large screens such as TVs with hundreds of inches, and high-end products such as ultra-high-definition and full-color lasers are still popular, and the prices are mostly tens of thousands of yuan.
"When visiting relatives and friends 20 years ago, if someone had a 'home theater' and a 'rear-projection TV' in the living room, the owner's family would be very respectful." Li Xiaowen believes that the satisfaction of "bringing the cinema home "The demand for high-end TVs is still quite attractive to middle- and high-income consumers.
Industry insiders pointed out that TV products are showing a trend of differentiation, with the prices of entry-level products constantly falling, while the prices of high-end TVs of well-known brands are higher and relatively firm.
It is expected that large-screen, entertainment, ultra-high-definition and intelligent TV consumption will become new trends in China's TV consumption. With the expansion of China's high-income groups, the demand for high-end TV will be supported.
The color TV market, which has entered the stock market stage, will usher in the era of super large screens, and the share of TVs over 75 inches in the Chinese market is expected to exceed 50% in the next three years.