Golden Soup Buddha Tiaoqiang, Abalone Fish Maw Chicken, Old Beijing Lamb Scorpion, Hainan Coconut Chicken... On the eve of the Spring Festival, the pre-made New Year’s dishes entered the peak sales ahead of schedule.

　　Due to the increase of people returning home during the Spring Festival, the increase of people traveling, and the increase of population flow, it has brought a lot of difficulty for prepared food companies to stock up, but it has also increased the consumer demand for "going home for New Year's Eve dinner". One-person meal" and "small family meal" have been transformed into "reunion banquet" and "whole meal solution" and so on.

　　According to industry insiders, as the number of entrants increases and the intensity of competition increases, the degree of taste restoration and the quality of dishes are regarded as the key to competition in the prepared dish industry.

With the improvement of consumers' awareness and initiative of prepared dishes, the proportion of C-end prepared dishes is constantly increasing, and the market branding trend is emerging.

Sales peak starts ahead of schedule

　　"A major feature of this year's New Year's Eve pre-made vegetable market is that it starts early. Major platforms generally start setting up New Year's market in mid-December 2022. We found that many consumers plan their New Year's arrangements in advance, and the consumption of pre-made vegetables is earlier than platforms and channels. more active.” Ou Houxi, the person in charge of Dingdong Maicai’s prepared dishes, told the Beijing News reporter that in the past, the peak of New Year’s Eve dinner reservations usually occurred a week before the Spring Festival, but this year it was more than half a month earlier.

　　At the beginning of January 2023, Dingdong Maicai ushered in the first peak of pre-ordered dishes for the New Year’s Eve dinner, and the sales of related dishes increased by 500%.

It has launched a "New Year's Eve dinner pre-made dishes" reservation area on the platform. Consumers can buy the "Eight Bowls" series that focus on hometown flavors, high-end seafood pre-made dishes, and the "New Year's Eve dinner set meal" jointly launched by well-known restaurants around the world. Delivered to Home" series.

Among them, the sales volume of the "Eight Big Bowls" series has exceeded 100,000 copies in just half a month since its launch, 8,000 tables of the restaurant's joint New Year's Eve dinner were snapped up within a week, and more than 5,000 copies of Fried Breaded Crab in the Typhoon Shelter were ordered a day.

　　Wal-Mart is also grabbing the pre-made vegetable New Year's goods market.

In December 2022, Wal-Mart released the "Signature Dishes of Famous Stores in the North and South" complete table solution and launched more than 70 pre-made dishes, including classic dishes such as Buddha Tiaoqiang, pork belly chicken, squirrel mandarin fish, and local specialties such as husband and wife lung slices.

As of January 12, 2023, Wal-Mart's sales of prepared dishes have increased by 80%, and the recent growth rate has reached 110%.

　　Breeding companies, meat products companies, catering companies, and quick-freezing companies are also stepping up their deployment of pre-made vegetable markets during the Spring Festival.

　　Qianwei Central Kitchen, the “first unit in the quick-frozen supply chain” that focuses on the B-end market, is making efforts in the C-end market of prefabricated vegetables, launching three sub-brands, Cen Fuzi, Qianwei Jieyou Fried Huo Shop, and Nabaiwei.

Lixiangguo, a start-up brand of quick-frozen food, will launch gift boxes of golden soup Buddha jumping over the wall and abalone fish maw chicken at the end of November 2022.

Tangrenshen, a listed pig farming company, recently stated on the investor interaction platform that the company has developed dozens of new prefabricated dishes and established a research and development and sales team.

Longda Gourmet recently responded to investors saying that the company has more than 100 types of prefabricated dishes, and will rely on the three major R&D centers in Shandong, Shanghai, and Sichuan to move towards the goal of leading prefabricated dishes.

　　A reporter from the Beijing News noticed that supermarkets such as Beijing Huaguan, Yonghui, and Hema have set up special areas or counters for the sale of pre-made vegetables. Consumers can buy Wangshunge’s chopped pepper fish head, Jia Guolong’s Mongolian cheese cake, Chia Tai Yi Pepper Pork Belly Chicken from Chef, Stir-Fried Yellow Beef from Fucheng Co., Ltd., Spicy Crab Claw from Guolian Aquatic Products, Hainan Coconut Chicken from Tanniu, Buddha Tiaoqiang from Xinglonggang, Abalone Chicken from Laoguang Food, Heju Fu's old Beijing sheep and scorpions and other large portions of Poon Choi gift boxes.

The price of pre-made vegetables in small packages ranges from 15 yuan to 40 yuan, while the price of gift boxes is as low as 59.9 yuan and as high as nearly 300 yuan.

From "eating for one person" to "reunion banquet"

　　Ou Houxi told the Beijing News reporter that the Spring Festival is an important consumption scene for prefabricated dishes, and the New Year’s Eve dinner with prefabricated dishes is also the main category promoted by each brand before the festival.

Different from the daily sales of prepared dishes, most of the prepared dishes for the New Year’s Eve dinner are produced in quantitative quantities, and the price band will also be adjusted according to the quality and type of dishes.

This year, the flow of people during the Chinese New Year has increased, the supply chain is sometimes unstable, and the difficulty of stocking has increased.

　　The Beijing News reporter noticed that with the "Class B and B management" measures and the increase in the number of people returning home, the theme setting of prefabricated dishes of major brands during the Spring Festival of the Rabbit has changed from the previous two years of "Chinese New Year in situ" and "one-person food". "Small family package" has been transformed into "reunion banquet" and "full table solution", etc., and this is taken as an innovative point to break through the homogeneity of dishes.

In addition, improving product quality and co-branding with well-known catering companies IP are also the main focus of prefabricated vegetable companies.

　　"Eating reunion dinners during the Chinese New Year is a traditional Chinese custom. Pre-made dishes allow people to eat all over the world quickly and easily without leaving home." Lixiangguo said that the research and development of pre-made dishes for the New Year pays more attention to sharing attributes and some customs of the New Year , the packaging design will be mostly festive red, and the positioning is "the finale that the family can easily handle."

　　Zhu Jun, Senior Vice President of Wal-Mart China and Chief Procurement Officer of Hypermarkets, said that the reason why Wal-Mart proposed the "full-seat solution" is that the brands in the prepared vegetable industry are currently of varying magnitudes, and the selection ideas are also different. Some brands only provide One or two dishes, some count ham, sausage, lo mei, etc. as pre-made dishes.

For customers, there are too many choices and no focus. The whole table solution is a relatively innovative approach in today's prefabricated vegetable market.

　　Regarding the well-known catering IP co-branded by a prefabricated vegetable company, an unnamed person in charge of a prefabricated vegetable company believes, "This kind of cooperation is more to use the influence of time-honored catering brands to drive the sales of prefabricated dishes, but this year many platforms have another idea, which is Use pre-made dishes to increase the market share of catering brands. Many restaurant owners worry that the high degree of reduction of pre-made dishes will take away offline customers, and even ask to reduce the quality and taste of pre-made dishes. Vegetable sales are actually better."

　　Judging from the current feedback from enterprises, quality has become the key point of competition in the prepared vegetable industry.

Li Xiangguo believes that there are many brands of prepared dishes nowadays, and it has become a difficult problem to get rid of product homogeneity.

As more and more entrants enter the market, industry standards will also become higher and higher. If companies want to stand out, they must increase investment in products and brands, and make more delicious, higher-quality, and more distinctive products. product.

　　Ou Houxi also believes, "Competition is always there, and the size of the competition has nothing to do with the size of the track. Only by doing well can companies have room for improvement and more possibilities. In the past few years, people have not had a strong feeling for the branding of prefabricated dishes, but this With the development of consumption habits in the past few years, branding has begun to appear, and companies must improve the quality and taste."

The proportion of C-end prefabricated dishes has increased

　　According to the research report of Guohai Securities, the ratio of the Japanese prefabricated vegetable market to the B side and to the C side is 6:4, but in China, the ratio is about 8:2, and Chinese food companies are still the most important sales channel for domestic prefabricated vegetables.

However, according to some prefabricated vegetable factories, the proportion of C-end prefabricated dishes is constantly increasing, and the sales ratio of some brands in B-end and C-end has reached the same level.

　　According to the "2022 Annual Consumption Report of Prefabricated Vegetables" recently released by JD Supermarket and Blue Shark Research Institute, the scale of my country's prefabricated vegetables market will be 419.6 billion yuan in 2022, a year-on-year increase of 21.3%, and it is expected to reach trillions in 2026.

The number of registered enterprises related to prepared vegetables in my country has maintained an increase for 10 consecutive years. By the end of 2022, there will be a total of 64,000 related enterprises.

In JD Supermarket, more than 400 prepared dishes brands will sell more than 2,000 kinds of prepared dishes in 2022, and the turnover growth rate will reach 160%.

　　Among all kinds of pre-made dishes, "signature dishes" have contributed more revenue to JD Supermarket in the past year. Among them, the sales of Buddha Tiaoqiang, pork belly chicken, and beef bones have increased by more than 190% year-on-year.

For dishes with larger specifications, more expensive ingredients, and more complicated craftsmanship, consumers are more willing to bear the price range of 50 yuan to 60 yuan.

In terms of consumers, 62% of consumers of prepared dishes will come from first- and second-tier cities in 2022; married people account for 74%, of which women account for 55%; the 31-41 age group accounts for the highest proportion, reaching 46.1%.

　　According to a Hema survey, "eating New Year's Eve dinner at home" is still the mainstream during the Spring Festival, and more than 50% of users will use pre-made dishes.

In 2022, the sales of Hema Workshop's prefabricated dishes will increase by 50% year-on-year.

More and more young people are becoming the leaders of the New Year's Eve dinner, and pre-made dishes have become the better choice.

According to the data, 32% of the respondents "make their own + buy some pre-made dishes", enjoy the fun of cooking ingredients and eat hard dishes; 21% of consumers will directly choose set meal gift boxes, mostly as gifts or Minimize cooking burden and risk of failure.