In May 221, Wei Long officially launched its listing plan in Hong Kong. Prior to this, the company carried out the only financing of RMB 3.56 billion in history, which was favored by institutions such as Gaochun, Sequoia, Tencent and Yunfeng Fund. The post-investment valuation reached 7 billion yuan, exceeding the sum of the market value of qiaqia Food (26.8 billion yuan)+Three Squirrels (19.89 billion yuan)+Good Shop (19.986 billion yuan) (as of May 14th).
briefly, Wei Long food is an old snack food brand in China, which has been established for 22 years. Mainly engaged in spicy strips, dried beancurd, seafood vegetarian dishes, braised meat, puffed fast food and other series of snack foods. Its signature gluten spicy strip can be called a national "leisure snack" item.
according to Jost Sullivan's data, in terms of retail sales in 22, Wei Long is the largest spicy snack food enterprise in China, with a market share of 5.7%, which is 3.8 times that of the second place, exceeding the sum of 2-5 places. At the same time, it ranks first in the market share of seasoning noodle products and spicy leisure vegetable products.
in the late 197s, Liu Weiping (the founder of Wei Long) was born in a poor family in Pingjiang county, Yueyang. This small county in Hunan Province is located on the bank of Miluo River and has a long history of making dried soy products. In 1998, the local area suffered a flood disaster, and the price of soybean as raw material soared from 7 cents a catty to 1.5 yuan, which hindered the production of dried sauce. Old masters can only "find another way", try to replace soybeans with wheat flour, and make gluten snacks with similar taste and low price, which is the embryonic form of spicy strips.
Most dried sauce workshops turned to the production of spicy strips, and Liu Weiping, who came back from Guangdong, also joined in. However, Pingjiang is not the main wheat producing area, and the local wheat flour is not enough. In order to find more development opportunities, he and his younger brother Liu Fuping opened a small workshop in Luohe, Henan Province, which is rich in wheat, with raw materials and production technology of artificial soybean skin, seasonings and other spicy strips.
due to the extremely low production threshold, a large number of latecomers flocked to the market. In the Millennium, there were more than 4, spicy strip enterprises in Henan, and the industry was in a state of barbaric growth. Unlike most manufacturers of spicy strips, Liu Weiping had a "brand awareness" at that time. In 23, the trademark of "Weilong Weilong" was registered, and Wei Long spicy strips were officially born. Subsequently, it invested millions of yuan to purchase production lines from abroad.
In order to improve brand awareness, Liu Weiping changed the packaging of spicy strips from transparent plastic packaging to aluminum foil and aluminum film packaging. In order to cater to the consumer group of students, the packaging is also adjusted from large bags to small bags for easy carrying. In addition, Wei Long began to push and put up posters under the line crazily, so as to quickly open the Luohe market.
However, when the business was booming, many spicy strips workshops were exposed due to health problems, and spicy strips became the representative of "junk food" for a time. The whole industry entered the reshuffle period, and Wei Long was also affected. Therefore, on the one hand, Liu Weiping introduced standard aseptic production lines, established a quality control system, and set up a special quality management organization to solve the product safety problem from the source.
On the other hand, it is necessary to build a hygienic and safe brand image through marketing. A video of the company's assembly line and production workshop spread on social media, which greatly improved consumers' impression of Wei Long and opened the curtain of brand online marketing.
first, they invited Michael Jack, online celebrity, to the production workshop for live broadcast. In just 18 hours, the reading volume exceeded one million. Then "touch porcelain" iPhone 7, the store style is designed as apple style, imitating Xiaomi slogan (born for spicy snack enthusiasts). Once a "dirt-soaked" spicy strip enterprise, it became online celebrity for a time, and it spread overseas, competing with Laoganma.
last year, Wei Long achieved an operating income of 4.12 billion yuan. In contrast, the revenues of Three Squirrels, qiaqia Food and Liangpin Shop were 9.79 billion yuan, 5.29 billion yuan and 7.89 billion yuan respectively. The net profit is 819 million yuan, which is more than three squirrels (31 million yuan)+good shop (344 million yuan). The net profit rate is 19.19%, which is much higher than the industry average net profit rate of about 1%.
Wei Long is not without worries. Overreliance on a single product is the number one problem. Although we actively expanded the categories of egg products, vegetable products (kelp), beans and others, we failed to create new explosions. On the other hand, enterprises such as Baicaowei, Three Squirrels, Good Shop, Yanjin Shop and Golden Monkey have laid out their layouts one after another, and the competitive pressure has increased sharply. Some research reports predict that the market size of spicy strips will reach 94.9 billion yuan in 226. Wei Long's share is only 5%, and it is not known whether there will be a new leader in the industry.