Setting up a scenario may just be the key first step in future beer marketing.
Beer and barbecue seem to have become a “official pairing”. While Baijiu enterprises increase the catering track, it seems to be one of the mainstream ways for enterprises to develop offline scenes.
Recently, Wusu Beer’s first barbecue experience store, Wusu Barbecue (also known as “Wusu Barbecue”), officially opened on the top floor of the North Street District of Jing’an Joy City in Shanghai. According to Wusu Beer, the main purpose of the barbecue restaurant is to create an offline experience scene for Wusu Beer and consumers.
In fact, the “wine+meal” model has mushroomed in the past two years, and its underlying logic is nothing more than offline scenes or front-end gold mining. However, market feedback is not satisfactory. Most of the restaurants expanded by Baijiu enterprises are only as additional businesses, with insufficient investment and serious homogenization.
Focusing on the action of opening a barbecue shop with Wusu Beer, will there be a new trend for the beer industry to enter the catering industry? What is the next step in beer marketing?
1、 Can BBQ become the second growth curve of Wusu?
Recently, Japan’s Kirin Holdings Co., Ltd. released a report on global beer consumption in 2021. In 2021, global beer consumption was 185.6 million kiloliters, up 4% year-on-year. China has been ranked first for 19 consecutive years.
It is worth noting that the report shows that China has become the largest beer consumption country in that year, with a total consumption of 38.1 million kiloliters, accounting for 20.5% of the global market share. There is no doubt that the vast beer market is the reason why every beer company is involved.
So, can barbecue shops become the second growth curve of Wusu Beer? What effect does Wusu Beer want to achieve through barbecue?
From the name of this barbecue restaurant, the three “big” characters overlap with t à i, meaning “big.”.
Wusu roast
Wusu roast
Image source: Weibo @ Wusu Beer
According to the person in charge, the origin of the store name matches the characteristics of the store, with “big” as the selling point.
First of all, the products are presented in “large” portions, such as a one meter long lamb skewer priced at 138 yuan/string, a large roast lamb chops of four or five kilograms, three pieces of roast lamb chops or four kilograms, and “roast three kings” such as roast beef chops, roast pigeons, and roast fish heads with vegetables. Baked skewers are packaged in barrels, highlighting the “big” characteristics.
Secondly, in addition to the “big brand” barbecue skewers mentioned above, Wusu barbecue skewers are also different from other barbecue restaurants. There are many special snacks and drinks in northwest Xinjiang, including roasted Nang, soup, belly soup, as well as special apricot peel water, sweet embryo milk tea, etc.
Finally, judging from the location of the first restaurant, the location of the first Wusu Barbecue restaurant is in the center of Shanghai. As China’s financial center, beer consumption in Shanghai cannot be underestimated. According to more data, Shanghai has become one of the cities with the highest annual per capita beer consumption in China. It can be seen that Shanghai, as a highly inclusive city, opened its first restaurant here not only to maximize brand exposure, but also to timely adjust the business model of Wusu Barbecue through market feedback.
In addition, according to the headline report of Yunjiu, Wusu Barbecue also introduced a variety of special beer flavors that are not available in other stores, such as cactus flavor, Wusu black beer, Wusu white beer, and so on.
It is reported that Wusu Bakery has only one store in Shanghai, and the company has plans to open a chain store in the future.
In summary, it is not difficult to see that the Wowo Barbecue Shop has made great efforts in “differentiation”. In the immersive consumption scenario of a barbecue shop, it not only cultivates consumers’ consumption habits and atmosphere, but also promotes the sales of high-end products of Wusu Beer, increasing the exposure of high-end products.
According to the public review app, the store has now become the third best selling barbecue string in Jing’an District. After tasting, many consumers said that the quality and taste are both good, suitable for about three or five friends to have a drink after work.
As a new store that has been open for less than a month, it is not easy to achieve such achievements. From market feedback, it seems that barbecue shops have become the second growth curve of Wusu Beer, but the specific situation needs long-term observation.
2、 Can Baijiu enterprises’ catering become bigger and stronger?
The barbecue shop of Wusu Beer, of course, uses “wine with barbecue”.
The official responsible person said that this store is to enhance customers’ experience of Wusu Beer, but it is not difficult to find that this store is actually an exploration of Wusu Beer’s front-end catering store business.
Undeniably, Wusu beer is both a feature and an advantage. In this restaurant, you can taste different flavors of Wusu, which is a very good thing for fans who like Wusu, and can also bring customers to the barbecue shop. However, it also has its own disadvantages, as this barbecue shop only sells Wusu beer, and customers have a narrow range of choices.
This is also one of the reasons why many Baijiu enterprises have increased the catering track and finally “had no choice but to retreat”.
Yunjiu Toutiao noticed that in addition to Wusu Beer, many Baijiu enterprises have also entered the sub track of offline experience stores in the past two years, including beer enterprises such as Snow Beer and Yanjing Beer, as well as Baijiu enterprises such as Yanghe and Luzhou. Laojiao and Jiangxiaobai. They create new consumption scenarios and link young consumer groups through the layout of small restaurants.
“High channel operating costs, squeezing competition and competing for young consumers are the key factors for beer and Baijiu enterprises to sink into the tavern track.” According to industry insiders, various forms of offline experience stores have the value of scene sales, brand communication and community promotion, which is a major trend of channel integration.
But in fact, the “wine+meal” model has not yet become a leading brand, nor has it stirred too much water in the market. The main reasons are:
First, the overall decline in the catering industry in the past two years has not yet fully restored the offline consumption scenario;
The second is that Baijiu enterprises plan to “taste new” in catering. While “balancing wine and food,” they neither highlight the characteristics of their own drinking, nor achieve a high level of cuisine.
According to industry insiders, the cost of creating offline consumption scenarios is not low, but the profits of FMCG products themselves are not high. If the overhead of offline experience scenarios and marketing costs is too high, the gains outweigh the losses. Therefore, FMCG enterprises must pay attention to the balance of revenue and expenditure under the mode of “borrowing meat to sell wine”.
If Baijiu enterprises want to become bigger and stronger in catering, they need to further develop the catering industry.
3、 The next step in beer marketing?
Previously, affected by the epidemic, many beer brands accelerated the development of online channels. Now, with the adjustment of epidemic prevention policies in various regions, enterprises are beginning to “bet” on the development of offline scenarios. So, what is the next step in beer marketing?
It is not difficult to find that beer companies are constantly adjusting their strategies from channels to marketing, seeking more diversified development paths. As channel terminals, taverns and catering practitioners are also exploring new performance growth points through more diversified marketing methods and sales channels.
From the perspective of online channels, taking Budweiser as an example, its digital transformation has become the main reason for its sales growth, focusing on the BEES business to business (B2B) platform; Yanjing Beer sells its products through multiple e-commerce platforms and is highly targeted. For example, on the short video platform, Yanjing Beer focuses on different products and combines different themes to create small theatres suitable for short video transmission, such as “U8 Theater” and “You Theater”.
From the perspective of offline channels, the Pearl River Beer has opened more than 20 the Pearl River Beer chain experience stores in the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area; Since 2021, Huiquan Beer has gradually entered high-end restaurants and nightclubs, achieving brand improvement and sales growth.
It can be seen that the competition between beer enterprises, both online and offline, is very fierce. Currently, the relatively unified direction is for leading beer companies to make efforts to create online and offline integration links. By forming a closed loop of online and offline channels, we can promote product sales while deeply linking consumers. Among them, setting may only be the key first step in beer marketing.
In addition, in the exploration of diversified channels for beer enterprises, sports and social entertainment have also become important areas of attention for beer marketing.
Throughout the entire beer industry, both giants and rising stars are embracing the diversified layout of the new era while stabilizing key markets.
