Don't take ice cream you "don't know" because you probably "can't afford it


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　　"Two 32 yuan, I didn't expect it to be so expensive!"

　　A few days ago, Mr. Zhang and his friends in Beijing bought two ice creams when they passed by a small supermarket near the community.

　　Mr. Zhang said that he really wanted to put the ice cream back in the freezer, but because he didn't want to lose face in front of his friends, he finally settled the bill.

　　Some netizens eloquently concluded that these high-priced ice creams "lurked in the freezers of convenience stores, ready to give a head-on attack to those who would go to the checkout as soon as they took them."

　　Why are ice cream in convenience stores more expensive?

Is your ice cream freedom still there?

　　【event】

　　The latest rules for buying ice cream

　　Don't take it if you don't know it

　　"If it was me at the time, I would have put the ice cream back. It was too expensive. I thought the most expensive was only ten yuan, but I had already typed '1' when I scanned the QR code to pay. Silently changed it to '3'. And I don't think such an expensive ice cream is so delicious, maybe I only care about money when I eat it!" In Mr. Zhang's memory, there has never been an ice cream like this. Expensive.

　　"The small puddings and old popsicles that I often ate when I was a child were only 5 cents and 1 yuan. Later, there were more and more kinds of ice creams in the supermarket, and they became more and more expensive. Many of them cost four or five yuan. This time The 16-dollar ice cream caught me off guard," said Mr. Zhang.

　　The reporter noticed that on social platforms, there were also many netizens who reported that ice cream was selling more and more expensive, and they dared not take ice cream that they had never seen before. Some netizens joked, "Expensive ice cream is good, but my heart is cold before I eat it."

　　There are also some netizens who shared a similar experience with Mr. Zhang, saying that "the ice cream is not marked with a price, and it is the money of the thin-skinned people."

　　The topic of #contemporary ice cream is so outrageous# has also caused a heated discussion among netizens on Weibo, and some people even shared the rules of buying ice cream: don't take it if you don't know it.

　　"When I was a child, I thought that the chocolate is the most expensive, but now the chocolate is just my last decent. In the convenience store, a random ice cream starts at 10 yuan, and the higher price is almost catching up with Haagen-Dazs. "Ms. Yu, born in the 1990s, said that she would wholesale ice cream to go home in the summer, but most of them were traditional low-priced ice cream. The more expensive Internet celebrity ice cream occasionally bought and tasted, but the frequency was very low. "Really It's too expensive."

　　However, traditional ice cream is also rising in price.

Netizens in many places said, "The green tongue of 5 cents has risen to 3 yuan" and "Qiao Lezi has risen to 5 yuan".

　　It was for fire

　　Three days after eating

　　Recently, the reporter visited many convenience stores in Beijing and found that ice cream above 5 yuan has become the main product, and some boxed ice cream prices are as high as tens of yuan.

Among them, most of the ice creams of brands like Menglong, Heluxue, and Zhongxuegao are priced at more than 10 yuan, and some are more than 20 yuan; low-priced ice creams such as old popsicles, big puddings, and small puddings are almost very expensive. Hard to find.

　　The reporter saw in a convenience store that the cheapest ice cream products here are 85 grams of Madiel original ice lolly and 65 grams of Yili Weiqu very panda Maixiang cocoa milk ice cream, each priced at 5 yuan; the most expensive It is 78 grams of Northeast Daban Heiqiao Thick Milk Collision Ice Cream, which costs 19.9 yuan per piece.

　　Since most of the ice cream in large supermarkets are sold in boxes, the price of a single stick is relatively cheap, but many of them are more than 5 yuan.

Taking the cuteness of a certain flavor as an example, 6 pieces cost 31.2 yuan, and one piece is 5.2 yuan.

　　On the e-commerce platform, some Internet celebrity ice creams are priced at 30 yuan per piece, and some are even higher.

　　"The ice cream is indeed more expensive now than before, and the store also sells ice cream for less than two yuan, which is less than before, and we will earn more from selling expensive ice cream." A staff member of a community supermarket in Beijing Speaking to Sino-Singapore Jingwei.

As for how much more money can be earned, the staff member said it was inconvenient to disclose.

　　For example, Roger (pseudonym), a practitioner in the ice cream industry, for a certain brand of ice cream priced at 18 yuan, the purchase price of a supermarket or convenience store is generally around 12 yuan, that is to say, every ice cream sold can earn about 6 yuan.

Roger said that the cheaper the ice cream, the lower the profit margin. "For example, if you sell ice cream for 5 cents a piece, the store will never make more than 5 cents."

　　As for why high-priced ice cream is more willing to enter convenience stores, the above-mentioned practitioners said that convenience stores are mostly located near office buildings and high-end communities. Consumers here generally have high spending power and are more willing to pay for high-end ice cream.

"Some small stores are more willing to sell expensive ice cream while ensuring sales."

　　A netizen summed it up well in one sentence: It was originally to reduce the fire, but after eating it, the fire became bigger for three days.

　　The more expensive the higher the profit

　　How long can Internet celebrity ice cream last?

　　Behind the increasingly expensive ice cream, the rising cost of raw materials may be one of the important reasons.

According to statistics, from 2008 to 2020, the cost of raw materials such as milk and whipped cream required for ice cream production has risen by about 80%.

　　Youwei Mengniu, Yili, and other ice cream brand agency manufacturers have pointed out to the media that the production process of ice cream has improved in recent years, and the prices of raw materials have also risen a lot. It is normal for ice cream to sell more expensive than before.

　　On the other hand, brands are scrambling to deploy high-end products. High-quality and healthy concepts such as zero sucrose, pure milk, "no added water" and "raw materials imported from abroad" have also pushed up the price of ice cream.

For example, the Heiqiao thick milk-flavored ice cream jointly launched by the Northeast Daban Daily Heiqiao, which claims to add 98% alcoholic black chocolate, Belgian fermented butter, and California pistachios, etc., set the product at 19.9 yuan, and entered the high-end ranks in one fell swoop .

　　However, Roger revealed that Internet celebrity ice creams of tens of yuan per piece are actually similar to ordinary ice creams in terms of the use of raw materials and the cost.

The person in charge of the aforementioned ice cream brand agency manufacturer also mentioned that the cost of producing a high-quality milk ice cream, including the cold chain, is only about 7-8 yuan.

This means that these ice creams either really have a super high gross profit margin, or there are other costs.

　　"Some innovation costs, research and development costs in terms of taste, style, and appearance of ice cream, including marketing costs and channel costs for high-end ice cream promotion, will be reflected in the pricing of the product." Financial commentator Zhang Xuefeng told reporters.

　　Chinese food industry analyst Zhu Danpeng also mentioned that generally speaking, the production cost of ice cream and ice cream is not very high. .

"The new generation of consumer groups are not sensitive to price, but they are more concerned about emotions and the tonality of the brand. Therefore, this group of people has promoted the transformation of ice cream attributes and brought huge room for growth to the market." Zhu Danpeng said.

　　According to the data of the Prospective Industry Research Institute, China's ice cream/ice cream market maintains a growth trend, reaching 147 billion yuan in 2020 and exceeding 160 billion yuan in 2021.

　　Zhu Danpeng pointed out that at present, the Chinese ice cream market has entered a node of precise segmentation and multi-level consumption.

Driven by the continuous superposition of new-generation demographic dividends and consumption upgrades, China's ice cream market has split into six different consumption levels, namely ultra-high-end, high-end, mid-to-high-end, mid-range, mid-low-end, and low-end.

"Different levels of consumption and different consumption capabilities determine the needs of the consumer side. From low-priced products of one or two yuan to high-end products of tens of yuan, there will be market demand."

　　However, Zhu Danpeng believes that in the long run, there will be a question mark on how long these ice creams will be popular, "Consumers' preferences and needs are constantly changing, if there is no quality and experience It is difficult to support the sustainable development of the brand only by gimmicks.”

　　【Related】

　　Three stages of ice cream price increase

　　The first stage--

　　From 2007 to 2013, the main reason was the increase in the prices of raw materials for making ice cream: milk, sugar, and chocolate.

During this period, the 5-hair pudding that was popular in the streets was replaced by a large pudding of 1-1.5 yuan, the green mood rose to 1.5 yuan, and the chocolate rose to 2-2.5 yuan.

Ice cream officially bid farewell to the "era of less than one yuan". Instead of directly raising product prices, ice cream manufacturers have introduced more expensive mid-to-high-end new products to replace some of the original low-profit products.

　　second stage--

　　Since 2016, during this period, ice cream has entered the 3-8 yuan level, and many cold drink brands have begun to launch "high-end routes", and there are many ice creams with a single retail price of over 10 yuan on the market.

　　At the same time, the brand conveys that ice cream is no longer a substitute for iced beverages, but a consumption concept of enjoyment food that can bring happiness and happiness. It also makes ice cream in the Chinese market gradually change from a seasonal heat-relieving consumer product to a four-season leisure product. Food is transforming.

　　The third phase--

　　Internet celebrity ice cream "C" debut, the most representative is the domestic ice cream brand Zhong Xuegao.

　　In the promotion of Tmall Double 11 in 2018, the brand Zhong Xuegao, which had only been online for 5 months, offered a discount and launched the limited-edition "Ecuadorian Pink Diamond" of 66 yuan on the day, which sold out 20,000 in just 15 hours. branch.

And "double egg yolk ice cream", "stinky tofu ice cream"... have also become "net red" with the help of various exotic flavors through Internet marketing.

Although there are mixed reviews, there is one common feature: the price is not cheap!

　　Comprehensive reports from China News Agency, CCTV Finance, and Daily Economic News