Jay Chou endorses it! Why does Moutai want to create a cocktail?

This article starts with Moutai's new products and discusses the inspiration that Moutai's continuous innovation brings to the sustainable development of other brands. It is recommended for students in need to read.

Moutai has launched a new product!

On November 20, at the third Moutai Youmi Festival, Moutai Ecological Agriculture Company and the emerging cocktail brand MOJT jointly released a new cocktail, with Jay Chou as the spokesperson. According to official introduction, this "Taste of Guizhou" series of cocktails is inspired by the world's classic cocktail formulas - Bloody Mary, Whiskey Sour, Singapore Sling. Through technological innovation by both parties, it combines the classic Guizhou flavors such as Danzhai blueberry juice from Qiandongnan, special red sour soup, and Guizhou Moutai Liquor to develop a cocktail product with unique oriental flavors. Following the "three brothers and sisters of Moutai" - ice cream, coffee, and chocolate with liquor, the new cocktail may become another collaboration of Moutai.

The media has been interpreting Moutai's new initiatives in recent years. Some people think that this is marketing for young people, while others believe that Moutai wants to do IP business like Disney and can collaborate with various industries in the future. However, Shentong Business believes that Moutai's focus seems to have never been IP or marketing.

1. From ice cream to cocktails, what exactly does Moutai want to do?

Many people, including Mr. Liu Run, believe that Moutai is pursuing rejuvenation and diversification. “Diversification means becoming Disney, not only doing product business, but also brand business.” Being younger is good, but Moutai does not want to be Disney, nor does it need general diversification. What Moutai really wants to do is to create a long-term second growth curve in the food and beverage field in addition to the “Moutai” product.

As I mentioned in the interpretation video of "Moutai's Three Brothers and Sisters, Beating New Consumption", if we carefully sort out Moutai's important cooperation in recent years, we will find that its partners are all food and beverage giants:

Ice cream - in cooperation with Mengniu, launched in 202205

Jiangxiang Latte——Jointly launched with Luckin Coffee on 202309

Liquor-filled chocolate - co-branded with Dove, launched on 202309. The cooperation with Mochito this time focuses on the "liquor" itself. This is enough to show that Moutai never wants to do a simple IP business. Moutai has a strong moat, but at the same time these barriers also have industry boundaries.

If we want to analyze Moutai's true strategic intentions, perhaps we should pay attention to a term previously proposed by Moutai Group Chairman Ding Xiongjun: 3T, which refers to expanding Moutai's industrial ecology in the 3T industries (Technology, Bio-technology, Food-technology) around core resources: wine and core microbial technologies.

Its goal should not only be to plant the seeds of "Moutai" in the minds of young people through marketing; what Moutai wants to explore more are real new growth points at the business level.

Take Moutai ice cream as an example. It sold 10 million cups in one year and opened dozens of flagship stores. It explored both product and direct sales channels. We all know that Moutai sauce wine is very competitive. However, with the overall changes in the wine market, it is obviously not enough to just let sauce wine conquer more young people's minds.

According to iResearch's "Six Trends in China's Wine Industry in 2023", the domestic wine market has entered an era of stock competition, with liquor production declining year by year, and the output in 2022 will be 49% of that in 2016. As market concentration gradually increases, Moutai's competitiveness in the liquor field is certainly increasing, but the overall trend of the industry becoming more and more "involutionary" will inevitably make Moutai focus on a broader market beyond "sauce wine".

Song Shuyu, chairman of the China Alcoholic Drinks Association, also pointed out that at present, category innovation of alcoholic drinks has become an important direction to lead the development of the industry. In the view of Shentong Business, with the popularity of cocktails among young people , the development of new products may become a key step for Moutai to explore the field of "alcoholic drinks" in recent years, and this "leading" layout will also bring some new inspiration to the alcoholic drink industry.

2. Collaborative R&D, a new model for wine companies to reach out to young people?

Upon closer inspection, the cocktails launched by Moutai this time are somewhat different from the previous "Moutai Three Brothers and Sisters" - this seems to be the first time in recent years that Moutai has cooperated with a wine company to develop new products. And this model is likely to be imitated by many wine companies in the future. To be fair, the leading wine companies other than Moutai have also done a lot of new cross-border cooperation in recent years, but frankly speaking, the overall effect is relatively average. In the final analysis, it is not that easy to "please" young people. Regardless of the strong aroma or light aroma, the one that young people like is the "real aroma".

The cooperation model of Moutai's new products may bring two inspirations to wine companies:

First: New and old wine brands need to boldly explore value complementarity.

Whether it is across industries or in the same industry, "differentiation" is often an important factor for successful cooperation (except when the values ​​of user groups vary greatly).

Take the Maotai-flavor coffee and the "Taste of Guizhou" cocktail as examples: Maotai is known as the "national liquor" and is undoubtedly the undisputed king of Maotai liquor brands; Luckin Coffee, which was once the most popular, and Mochito, endorsed by Jay Chou, are both cutting-edge brands that have emerged in recent years.

On the one hand, classic brands can leverage their influence on the young market; on the other hand, emerging brands can greatly improve their reputation and tone after receiving support from classic brands.

Second: The exploration of innovative flavors cannot rely solely on a single wine company "making wine behind closed doors". The flavors of liquor have always been about "authenticity" and "century-old heritage". For experienced wine lovers, the value of "authenticity" is naturally irreplaceable.

However, if we expand our horizons to the broader beverage and fast-moving consumer goods markets, constant exploration of new products is the key to capturing the appetite of a wider audience, as is the case with Nongfu Spring and Wahaha. The so-called trend of “coffee becoming more like milk tea, and milk tea becoming more like porridge” has only occurred in the last 10 years.

The new product of Moutai is a valuable demonstration of the so-called "Guizhou flavor, interpretation of world classics". It allows users to understand that Guizhou's blueberries and many other agricultural products are high-quality and distinctive winemaking ingredients; combined with the world's classic formulas that the cocktail brand is good at, it is hoped that innovative products with unique flavors can be created.

In this regard, I believe that there will be more wine companies in the future that will bring more interesting explorations, and Moutai has taken the first step.

In addition, the cooperation process of Moutai's new products may also provide a correct approach for "wine companies to go overseas".

Going overseas has always been a major pain point for Chinese wine companies, especially white wine companies. Although the "eight major flavors" are well-known in China, it is not easy for Chinese wine companies to break through in overseas markets with completely different cultural atmospheres and drinking habits.

Looking back, perhaps we don’t need to force the export of the “eight major flavors” at all, but can create categories such as cocktails that are naturally popular overseas. “Each flavor has its own flavor, each has its own beauty” is a better solution. Moreover, fully incorporating Chinese flavors into classic recipes will not only naturally have a unique charm, but one of them may even become a globally popular innovative product in the future. Just like those Chinese online articles, video short plays, and original music that make foreign users feel fresh, it has become a cultural label with great communication power.

Of course, this is just a beautiful fantasy. But no matter what, this cooperation with Moutai is indeed a very innovative layout in the wine market. At a time when the entire wine industry has entered a new round of structural adjustment and the liquor market has undergone profound changes, this will become a typical case of a new model of cooperation among wine companies. As for Moutai's "new growth curve", how will it grow in the future? Perhaps the good answer, like good wine, still needs time to settle.

Author: Chu Qingzhou

Source public account: Deep-FOCUS Business (ID: DEEP-FOCUS), decipher where your time and money go every day.