“Houses in Lujiazui, Pudong are very expensive, tens of thousands of yuan per square meter, but they are not yet the ‘king of buildings’ in Shanghai. The real ‘king of buildings’ are the old houses along Huashan Road. After renovation, a 150-square-meter house a few years ago could easily be sold for a super high price of 10 million yuan."

This is Wang Zhuo, deputy general manager of Shanghai Jahwa United Co., Ltd., for the Maxam brand. The revival of the Communist Party of China has long been formulated with a set of rhetoric. His example was in response to the controversy in the industry about reviving old brands and creating new ones. He told the CBN reporter that Shanghai Jahwa has made many efforts to improve Maxam, such as repeatedly refining the market positioning of Maxam. Founded in 1962, Maxam is the first styling mousse and the first in the Chinese cosmetics market. Sunscreen, the first styling hand cream and countless other glorious national brands. In 1990, Mejia Net entered its peak period and became the undisputed number one brand in the industry with a market share of more than ten percent, with an annual growth rate as high as double digits. The market share of Mejia Pure Shampoo is also close to 20%, with sales revenue of more than 300 million yuan.

During the "out-marriage trend" that emerged in the 1990s, Meganet entered into a joint venture with SC Johnson in 1990, and the trademark has since been shelved.

In the first year after being acquired, Meganet’s performance plummeted to 6 million yuan. By the time Shanghai Jahwa reluctantly bought back Maxam in 1994, the brand was no longer in glory. In Shanghai Jahwa's waiting and hesitation, it went through a period of hesitation of nearly 10 years.

But this is not the only problem that Shanghai Jahwa faces. There are hidden dangers in the use of one brand by four different companies: Shanghai White Cat Co., Ltd., which produces washing powder products, and Shanghai Toothpaste Factory Co., Ltd. The company produces toothpaste products, Shanghai Soap Co., Ltd. produces soap products, and Shanghai Jahwa is responsible for the production of Maxam cosmetics. Each company can only produce specific American and Canadian net products and cannot operate across categories.

Although there are many disadvantages, Shanghai Jahwa is determined to change what it can, maintain the existing brand well, and change the unfavorable situation of "one leg is long (Liu Shen) and the other is short (Maxam)" .

According to the explanation given by insiders of the group to CBN reporters, from a business perspective, the "revival" of Maxam appears to be the most pragmatic at the moment. Apart from hand cream, which has an overwhelming share, Maxam is most suitable for facial creams. The mass market in the field has promising prospects.

Looking for market "blind spots"

The "Survey on Shanghai Brands" report previously released by the Shanghai Business Information Center shows that for many Shanghai old local brands, Shanghainese of different generations have different opinions. Different preferences, and there are stage differences. For example, people born in the 1940s most remember the Guangming brand; for interviewees born in the 1950s and 1960s, Shanghai brand watches are often mentioned; and for those born in the 1980s, Forever brand bicycles and Megatron are still mentioned. Most favored.

Among the Shanghai brands that are still "alive", about 60% of the respondents said they still use brands such as Zhonghua Toothpaste, Guangming, Maxam, and Sangun.

Assuming the acupuncture points are found accurately, Wang Zhuo believes that there are still opportunities in the market.

"Maximum now includes two main segments: hand cream and facial cream. Among them, the sales of hand cream have achieved nationwide strategic deployment, while the sales of facial cream have been sold in some areas of the country, especially in third- and fourth-tier cities. The development trend is good, which shows that it has obvious advantages in 'sinking'," an insider told reporters.

“I am responsible for the mistakes that have been made in shaping the Maxam brand for more than ten years.” Ge Wenyao, chairman of Shanghai Jahwa, has said it in public more than once.

Ge Wenyao has very deep feelings for Meijiajing, who once "married outside", and his team has also paid a lot for it.

Judging from Shanghai Jahwa’s strategy for reviving Maxam, in addition to allocating resources and increasing confidence in the internal and external environment that Maxam will be revitalized, Shanghai Jahwa’s leadership has always warned itself about its lack of confidence in the past few years. We learned a painful lesson from the idle experience of Maxamin. Wang Zhuo has spent many years exploring the development path of Maxam.

Wang Zhuo once lamented that the Maxam brand was weak in terms of value proposition—because multinational companies such as Procter & Gamble were too strong in functional demands.

So now it seems that Meganet should pursue differentiated development and emphasize returning to the roots. At the core, confidence is the primary factor, followed by a clear value proposition.

“An old brand does not mean an aging brand.” Wang Zhuo is full of confidence in the revival of Maxam, an old Shanghai brand.

In Shanghai Jahwa, the brand managers of Maxam have changed 6 times in 8 years.

The previous brand manager was still promoting the "Youth and Wrinkle-Free" series of products, hoping to emphasize the concept of "skin care" and "professionalism"; the next brand manager immediately turned to the energetic Maxam "CQ Condensation" "Water Revitalizing Skin" series emphasizes vitality and high technology. This is the consequences of a “brand manager system” that is not suitable for brand development. In the past 12 years, the brand manager of Maxam mainly did product development and coordination work, rushing between the consumer, scientific research, purchasing, production, and sales departments to do business coordination and document preparation. He had no energy to invest in On "strategy". In fact, the "brand planning" aspects of consumer demand, competition and marketing strategies are what brand managers should really do.

“Brand elements have changed, and the personalities of the six brand managers are clearly reflected in product strategies.” Wang Zhuo concluded. Every brand manager will "dig a well" when he takes office. 6 brand managers dug 6 wells, but none of them was deep. Not only could the brand elements not be grasped, each brand manager had to find a new advertising agency and reselect models with different styles.

In the end, the brand positioning of Megamax became increasingly blurred, resulting in the brand being extremely unserious. "We give up things that we shouldn't give up too easily and make innovations that are not innovations."

Although Ge Wenyao has always believed that Shanghai Jahwa has caused great harm to the "Maximum" brand, but Megamax is still viable. The sales volume of Meijiajing's products still recovered from tens of millions of yuan in 1996 to 300 million in 1990. At that time, it was the peak of net sales in the United States and Canada. However, these historical assets have not been carried forward in Shanghai Jahwa. This is why Ge Wenyao feels guilty when he mentions "Maxamin". "Modern marketing is a 'war of cognition', not a 'war of products'. If we don't start paying attention to the intangible assets of enterprises now, we will miss the opportunity for development again."

November 2004 On the 17th, the eve of the CCTV bidding. Ge Wenyao, who was a guest on Shanghai TV's "Brainstorm" program, faced the camera and conducted self-examination unceremoniously. Ge Wenyao is the chairman of Shanghai Jahwa United Co., Ltd. He has "repented" in public more than once for the failure of the "Maximum" operation.

The next day, Shanghai Jahwa appeared at the CCTV bidding site for the first time and bid for two CCTV advertisements with more than 47 million yuan. This move is very prominent among local enterprises in Shanghai. Prior to this, Maxam’s “CQ Revitalizing Series” had already begun an advertising campaign on CCTV.

Shanghai Jahwa's internal employees commented: "This is what the 'boss' (Ge Wenyao) repays Maxam."

Everyone in the industry knows that Maxam has become a lingering piece of Ge Wenyao's possession. In order to get rid of his worries, Ge Wenyao asked Shanghai Jahwa to carry out a series of tailor-made efforts for Maxamin from the aspects of advertising, marketing, system and other aspects, striving to transform Maxamin from a "Cinderella" to a "princess". Ge Wenyao, chairman of Shanghai Jahwa United Co., Ltd., mentioned "the pain of Maxamin" on more than one occasion. For him, Megamax was very passive when it was acquired by SC Johnson in 1990, which is different from the subjective will of the "little nurse". By the time Maxam "returned" to Shanghai Jahwa in 1994, its share of 10 in the country in 1990 had become less than 6. The brand of Maxam was for a time regarded as a case of failure in cosmetics brand building.

"Maxamin" has become a concern for Ge Wenyao. In 2004, he began to demand that Shanghai Jahwa "return to Japanese chemicals". Shanghai Jahwa has made a decision to sell several of its pharmaceutical companies.

This approach is mainly to concentrate resources and strengthen the daily chemical brand. At the same time, a considerable part of the profits of hotels owned by Shanghai Jahwa are converted into marketing expenses for daily chemical brands.

“We are determined to build a daily chemical brand.” Wang Zhuo described it. After the "revival" plan was made, Shanghai Jahwa began to "pick and pull in its own basket" for a while, and finally came to the conclusion that "Qing Fei" is aimed at an older consumer group and cannot be widely promoted; " "Herborist" is a non-popular brand, and the path of personalized development may be more suitable for this brand; in addition, the "Friendship" brand is too old and difficult to "activate". It is difficult for these brands to carry the basic conditions for Shanghai Jahwa to build a national brand.

In the end, "Maximum" was carefully selected as the "brand with the most appreciation potential" in Shanghai Jahwa's three-year plan. If Olay is the brand with the highest market share of similar products, then Maxam can be ranked sixth or seventh. Three years later, Shanghai Jahwa hopes to build Maxam into the top three, which is to achieve Dabao's market position.

Opportunities for net resurgence in the United States and Canada exist because Chinese consumers have not yet developed to the level of rational consumption. According to analysis, the status of domestic daily cosmetics brands has not yet been fully established, and skin care brands may still face reshuffles at any time - this is the development opportunity faced by Maxam: At that time, Olay had not yet entered anyone's field of vision, and at that time, even more Similar to a college student brand. No one would have thought that Olay could already support the sales of products worth more than 100 yuan; no one would have thought that Pond's would decline. Without Unilever's strategic adjustments that year, Olay would not have had the opportunity to launch an offensive and quickly occupy the "white-collar" market. The consumption level of these brands is similar to that of Maxam.

At the same time, a market factor that cannot be ignored is that there are more than 300 cities in China with a population of more than 1 million; there are more than 60 cities with a population of more than 500,000. Mejia Net only directly covers more than 100 cities in China with a population of more than 1 million. From this perspective, there is still a lot of market space for the expansion of Mejia Net in new regions.

In the development process of China's local brands, the advantage of the hair care brand "Shu Lei" lies in the terminal sales channel; the advantage of "Oni" shampoo lies in the advertising bombing; and the advantage of Naaisi lies in its low price Advertising strategy. But now it seems that these once brilliant brands have fallen from the peak of the market due to the failure to control "risk control". Shanghai Jahwa believes that its “risk control” that has not been relaxed is mainly focused on “funds”, “costs” and “mechanisms”. Shanghai Jahwa believes that its funds are very standardized, and all funds cannot be used for "edge ball" practices such as futures speculation; due to strict monitoring of international raw materials, the cost will be controlled and will not risk 0.10 yuan or 0.20 yuan. The low-profit risk of RMB 10,000 is to hit the market; the sales policy does not advocate the dealer contracting system, but strict price control. This is also to prevent dealers from "getting rich quickly" by contracting the sales of Meganet, which is very likely to occur. "All fires off" situation occurs. In Wang Zhuo's view, as long as these advantages are maintained and breakthroughs in brand marketing are achieved, the prospect of "reviving" Maxam is very optimistic.