Children's Clothing Big Battle Is In Full Swing, Who Can Grasp The Baby's Economy "Blue Ocean"?

? The arrival of the "61" children's day has made the whole society perceive the hot degree of the "baby economy". The development and competition of the children's clothing enterprises and children's wear market have once again become the focus of the industry.

Authoritative data show that in 2017, the size of children's wear market in China has exceeded 150 billion yuan. Roland Begg, the global information consultancy, predicts that by 2020, the size of the domestic children's clothing market will exceed 280 billion yuan, and the domestic children's wear market will usher in a more explosive period.

In recent years, with Semir, ANN, Lining, Anta, Pacific bird, Metersbonwe and other enterprises in the children's wear market constantly layout, product diversification, brand diversification and market segmentation development pattern is also clearly presented.

　　 "Faucet" stirs up the market pattern of children's clothing.

At present, the overall competitive advantage of leading enterprises in children's wear market is more obvious. The phenomenon of "big fish eating small fish" appears frequently, and the number of "small fish" is less and less. But no matter what kind of enterprises, how to improve the profitability of enterprises, how to further expand the market share, the next step is the issue of common concern.

Semir, ANN, Pacific bird, Metersbonwe 4 listed companies in 2017 children's clothing performance handed over a different answer. A year ago, the company's operating income reached 1 billion 30 million yuan, an increase of 12% over the same period, and its net profit was 68 million 870 thousand yuan, down 12.95% from the same period last year. Among them, the company's online revenue reached 302 million yuan, an increase of 35.49% over the same period, and the operating income of the direct channel under the line was 576 million yuan, an increase of 6.68% compared with the same period last year. The revenue from the franchising channel was 149 million yuan, down 3.30% from the same period last year. The growth of business revenue is mainly due to the rapid growth of children's clothing category and e-commerce business.

Taiping bird's children's clothing brand Mini Peace2017 achieved operating income of 709 million yuan, an increase of 37.48% over the same period last year. Metersbonwe's children's clothing brand Moomoo and ME&CITYKIDS, store sales revenue increased by 32% over the same period. The two brands did not disclose the profit data of children's clothing.

It is noteworthy that Semir, the brand of Barbara's children's clothing, has occupied the absolute advantage of the children's wear market for several years, maintaining the first market share in the domestic market for 5 years. In 2017, Barbara realized operating income of 6 billion 321 million yuan, an increase of 26.4% over the same period, gross margin of 41.57%, down 1.3% from the same period last year. Barbara accounted for 52.56% of Semir's total revenue, an increase of 5.68 percentage points over the 46.88% of the previous year. It can be found that children's wear has become the main business of Semir, and its contribution to its revenues and profits has been increasing.

Since this year, in order to achieve the ultimate goal of building the children's clothing industry chain, Semir has continued to pay heavily in the children's clothing market, and has accelerated the expansion of children's clothing business through brand cooperation and overseas mergers and acquisitions. In May 28th, Semir announced that the company invested 22 million 950 thousand yuan in its own capital with Wenzhou gaino Garments Co., Ltd. to jointly set up Zhejiang sunny Clothing Co., Ltd. After the establishment of the joint venture, Semir will invest 14 million 990 thousand and 100 yuan to purchase the registered trademark and some equipment of COCOTREE brand in Wenzhou.

This is Semir's third capital acquisition this year in the field of children's wear. In May 2nd, through the wholly owned subsidiary Semir INT'L GROUP (Hongkong) Limited, Semir acquired 100% stake in Sofiza SAS group of European high-end children's clothing enterprises at 110 million euros (at that time exchange rate of about 844 million yuan), and finally acquired the purpose of acquiring all the assets of Kidiliz group, the largest children's wear enterprise in France. In March of this year, Semir also reached long-term strategic cooperation with The Children 's Place, the most professional children's clothing retailer in North America, to carry out the brand business in China and develop products independently.

By the end of 2017, Semir's children's wear shop has developed to nearly 4000. However, for Semir, next may be faced with some tests. Insiders pointed out that the completion of the acquisition of overseas brands is only the first step of Semir's gorgeous upgrades in children's wear, and how to manage these brands is undoubtedly the core issue of its future development.

Differentiation and good quality are still the key to success.

The children's wear market in China has always been an attractive cake. The industry said that although the concentration of children's clothing industry is not high, it is still in a relatively decentralized pattern, but the share of the high-end market still has much room for improvement.

As a local sports brand that entered the children's clothing market earlier, Anta's ANTA KIDS and FILA KIDS performance has been strong, and has become an important driving force for the company's revenue growth. As of June 2017, Anta's independent children's wear shop has increased from 228 in 2009 to more than 2100, an expansion of nearly 10 times.

In early 2017, Anta children, with its slogan of "stubborn growth", created a dynamic, energy, interesting and inspiring brand image. In addition to running, soccer, basketball, outdoor, comprehensive training and life series, in 2017, Anta children also launched the popular Mini corps, Hello Kitty, and the movie and TV series of cross border products such as God's father, and so on, which was well received by consumers.

In fact, not only Anta, domestic sports brands such as Lining, 361 degree children's clothing performance has achieved varying degrees of growth, and began to carry out further strategic layout.

In 2017, sales of children's clothing at 361 degrees increased by 9.2% to 710 million yuan, accounting for 13.8% of the group's total turnover. By the end of 2017, there were 1797 outlets selling children's clothing products at 361 degrees. In 2017, Li Ning Co also rebuilt the original "Lining KIDS" brand and upgraded it to "Lining YOUNG". Li Ning Co targeted 3 year old ~14 year old youth as the target consumer group, aiming at different age groups, set up two product lines: 3 year old ~6 years old curious child and 7 year old ~14 years old dynamic youth, shoes products include training, basketball and sports fashion and other categories. As of the end of 2017, "Lining YOUNG" has opened 173 outlets in 26 provinces across the country. When most enterprises are thrived, a small number of enterprises are in hot water. XTEP also reorganized the children's department in 2017 to find new profit growth points, but the effect is still not obvious.

Unlike Semir and Anta, which entered the children's wear market in 2006 and 2008, it has been more than 20 years since its establishment in 1996, and its income structure is relatively simple, with only Annil brand.

With balbala and Anta relying on overseas acquisitions and expanding the development of the brand matrix, since the birth of the product, the product has been positioned in the middle and high-end, focusing on the pursuit of high-quality fabrics and comfortable experience to create core products. In June 1st last year, since the official landing of the Shenzhen stock exchange by A shares, the number of brands nationwide has exceeded 1420. In 2017, the company's business revenue for the first time in the 1 billion yuan club.

Nowadays, more and more post-80s and 90s parents are joining the ranks of children's wear. Their personalized demand for children's clothing products is becoming more diversified and high-end. For children's wear brands, offline brand influence and store resources are still core competitive advantages. With differentiated brand positioning and excellent product quality, they still firmly grasp the competitive initiative of children's clothing market.

　 Online and offline competition is fierce.

In the past, brand dealers mainly sold by agents and had no direct dialogue with consumers. Nowadays, with the continuous penetration of e-commerce mode, brands and consumers have established platforms and channels that can directly communicate with consumers.

Current children's clothing business market The online platform is in full swing. In this regard, some people in the industry are not optimistic about the online development of children's clothing: besides the online competitive bidding strategy, it is difficult to achieve the healthy development of the baby brand, and the consumer attributes of children's clothing itself, consumers will pay more attention to product experience when they buy products.

Although many enterprises, channel providers and so on have seen the development space of children's clothing, they have been "killing" in the field of children's clothing business, but in fact, compared to adult clothing, children's wear is more professional in many aspects. From the quality and design of children's clothing to the interpretation of children's wear brands, enterprises and brands are required to have certain experience in all aspects.

"Many brands choose online development, mainly considering that online operating costs are much lower than those under the line." The head of an industry consulting company said, "but with regard to the current operation of children's clothing, the cost of online and offline channels has become increasingly convergent. Enterprises also need to talk with the platform about the "deduction point" when they enter the electronic business platform.

In fact, with the increase of "on-line" enterprises, the cost of online platform entry is also increasing. At the same time, the operation cost of promoting brand online is also getting higher and higher. Therefore, if children's clothing brand has to do something online, it must enhance the comprehensive strength of the brand.

From the price point of view, the price of online children's clothing brands is mostly concentrated between 100 yuan ~200 yuan, and many small brands are priced at less than 100 yuan. In contrast, the price of children's clothing under the line is basically over 200 yuan. The rising cost and relatively low premium rate result in a lower profit margin of online children's clothing brands than traditional brands.

Customers who like to buy children's clothing online are focused on product quality and shopping experience. Nowadays, consumers who like to shop online are mostly the new generation of parents like "80 generation" and "90 generation". When shopping, they are more concerned about the style and cost performance of products. Moreover, from the current trend of online shopping consumption, consumers are becoming more rational in online shopping. It is not hard to find that nowadays, consumers are concerned about product quality and brand reputation. The simple low price strategy can not fully meet the future trend of online children's wear. Therefore, the competition of online children's wear brands will be the comprehensive ability of the enterprises, including brand influence, product quality, operation and promotion ability, supply chain resources and financial strength.

But at the present stage, with the increase of "touch net" enterprises, the competition of online platforms is becoming increasingly fierce. Therefore, price war is still the main means of competition among online brands. In some large online platform businesses, they also coerced enterprises into price wars through regular and irregular promotional measures. Online shopping channels partially show "no low price, only lower" situation. But in fact, this too much emphasis on low price online competition is not good for businesses. industry Healthy development. Many enterprises in order to reduce costs, so that the quality of products has been shrinking, for children's clothing brand, the impact of quality problems is "fatal."

Quality becomes the weakness of e-commerce

The worry about the quality of online children's clothing is definitely not groundless.

On the eve of "3. 15" this year, AQSIQ issued the "sampling inspection report on children's clothing products for e-commerce" in the first quarter of this year. Among the 80 batches of children's clothing products sampled, 27 batches failed, and the overall failure rate was 1/3. But in the unqualified products, there is no shortage of big brand products. Previously, the Guangdong Provincial Quality Supervision Bureau released the online shopping children's clothing sampling test results showed that the 17 sampling products failed rate of up to 57.5%.

In fact, Children's wear Unlike adult clothing, the requirements for rope, accessories, chemicals and so on are very strict. However, consumers can only understand the products through pictures and words when purchasing online, and the actual situation needs to be known only after receiving the goods. Moreover, because network transactions are open and trans regional, safeguarding rights is rather difficult.

Cheng Weixiong, general manager of the footwear and clothing industry independent analyst and Shanghai Liang Qi Brand Management Co., Ltd., said that the business mode of the electricity supplier led to a low threshold, prone to mixed traffic, the uneven quality of the electronic business of children's clothing, and the comparison between the electricity supplier itself and the whole network, leading to the inability to make the brand. If the clothing enterprises do not strictly check the incoming fabric, in the process of Jerry building and shoddy, it is possible that the pH value, formaldehyde content, color fastness and heavy metal content of children's clothing will exceed the standard. It is worth noting that although bright patterns on children's clothing are good looking, they also hide the risk of excessive exposure to phthalate two, and long-term exposure can seriously affect children's health.

In recent years, the relevant departments have issued mandatory and recommended standards such as "children's clothing, student clothes", "basic safety technical specifications for national textile products" and "knitted student clothes". Among them, there are clear technical standards for the pH value of children's clothing and the tensile strength of accessories.

In view of the potential hazards of children's accessories, in the "infant clothing standard", children's clothing items such as buttons, decorative buttons, zippers and metal accessories are all stipulated accordingly. The safety standards for children's tops and the safety requirements for children's ropes and belts have been put into practice in succession, and also put forward very specific indicators and requirements for the production of enterprises.

In fact, in order to pursue high profits, some children's clothing manufacturers have begun to cut corners and shoddy products in the production of children's clothing, using unqualified raw materials, while children's clothing enterprises often earn 10 times profits. It is understood that the formaldehyde content, pH value exceeding the standard, containing prohibited, carcinogenic aromatic amine dyes prohibited by the state, poor color fastness and fiber content labeling and the actual discrepancy, has become a serious problem for children's clothing business problems. Among them, formaldehyde exceeding the standard may harm children's skin and respiratory tract; pH value is too high or too low, easily lead to allergic dermatitis and other diseases; and poor color fastness, may damage the child's skin.

There is no denying that there are many problems in the quality of e-business products, and the corresponding regulation is also very complicated. The quality supervision department can only trace back along the route through the discovery of the Internet, and whether it can catch up with the extent to which it is difficult to operate technically.

In many children's clothing industry, in the field of children's wear sales, many times, it is even harder to sell online than to sell well. This is mainly due to the particularity of children's clothing consumption. When many parents buy children's clothing for children, the most important thing is the safety and quality of their products. It is easy to assess the quality of products when purchased in a physical store. But for online sales, it is hard to achieve.

According to the insiders, the online platform for children's wear is the trend of the times, but online channels can not replace offline sales. Offline sales can not compete with online sales trends. The most ideal sales status should be a positive interaction mode between online and offline sales.