In 2018, the furniture industry has changed dramatically, and the five key words are not so bitter.

The furniture industry experienced the tide of listing last year, and it has been affected by the capital market. The consumption upgrade, the new retail concept, and the application of intelligent manufacturing and AI artificial intelligence are very hot. Many companies are looking forward to the market turnaround this year.

In fact, this year is also very lively. The furniture industry has been experiencing overseas acquisitions at the beginning of the year. The environmental protection continues to be strictly investigated. The whole equipment has begun to exert its strength. The real estate hardcover houses are directly involved in the furniture market. The furniture market continues to be sluggish. Custom furniture and finished furniture enterprises There are different levels of income decline, companies face new dilemmas, and so on. In particular, capital coffee and cross-border big coffee promote industry changes, various costs have risen, and the living space of small and medium-sized furniture companies has been squeezed.

Taking stock of the key words of this year's furniture companies is bound to be the main line of confusion and survival, and rarely talk about development, as well as such things as rising costs, sales, falling profits, environmental protection, and the transfer of enterprises brought about by Sino-US trade wars. Layoffs and diversification, and so on.

Confusion and survival

In addition to a small number of listed giant companies continue to carry out the national and global market layout, for most furniture companies, the main topics discussed this year are how to survive, compress spending to ensure cash flow, rather than development. Especially for many traditional finished furniture enterprises, the channels for developing new products-exhibition-investment-opening franchise stores have become narrower and narrower, sales have fallen sharply, and it is difficult to open stores.

New products that often cost a lot of manpower and resources to develop and produce are not recognized by the market. I don’t know what products the market needs. In fact, I don’t know what products my company should do. Even if there are individual companies’ new products, the investment situation is better. What to do in the future is to express confusion. And custom furniture companies are also facing a double decline in sales and profits, despite the efforts to develop and reduce costs, companies still feel the crisis.

The unclear understanding of the direction of the furniture market is the confusion faced by most furniture companies. The fashion trend of the furniture market seems to be very clear, such as light luxury style, new Chinese style, modern Italian minimalism, etc., but companies can not grasp the market trends of the market, but also the industry's awareness is not enough, whether the market-oriented style products companies can do There is no clear understanding. What kind of products should be developed by enterprises, what products should be produced at a price, and the positioning is not accurate.

On the other hand, it is an unknown confusion about market changes. This is a question that enterprises have been thinking about at the end of the year. How will the market change next year? What should companies do, they are very confused. The furniture market has been in the doldrums for many years. The furniture industry has been steadily retiring from well-known companies in the industry. The market segmentation of customized, hard-installed houses and e-commerce has made many companies feel the crisis but it is helpless. In the state of confusion, the management tends to be conservative. The biggest hope of the company is to be able to stabilize or decline as small as possible to ensure that it can survive in the era of great changes in the industry.

Rising and falling

Various cost increases are very obvious, environmental protection costs, raw and auxiliary materials costs, logistics costs, labor costs, research and development costs, marketing costs, and so on. At the same time, because of the pressure of rising costs, the price of products exported by enterprises has also risen. It is very obvious that the price of furniture products on the market is more indicative of “consumption upgrade”. Of course, most companies like to develop so-called high-end new products. In general, both manufacturing and operating costs, as well as product prices, are rising. For furniture companies, to resolve cost pressures, it is necessary to consider and work hard from multiple dimensions and perspectives. It is not feasible to raise prices through product upgrades. It must be achieved through product enhancement, service value-added, and brand premium. The increase in profits.

In fact, as opposed to cost and price increases, it is a double decline in sales and profits. The confusion of enterprises is also that the company's continuous efforts to exchange is still the decline in sales, and the profit of the same sales is also very obvious. There are many channels in the furniture market, such as franchise stores, community stores, independent brand stores, hardcover house projects, decoration customization, e-commerce, etc., and the competition is fierce. At the same time, there are more international furniture brands entering the domestic market. As a result, sales have fallen sharply, especially in the real estate market, where consumption is sluggish. In order to increase sales, companies have increased their investment, and small profits but quick turnover has only narrowed the decline.

Layoffs and transfers

The market is sluggish, sales are falling, profits are falling, and companies are in the midst of confusion in order to survive and protect themselves, reduce costs, and streamline personnel. It is understood that many well-known large-scale brand enterprises in this year have different levels of layoffs, including workshop workers, operation management and marketing planners. Of course, there are also some companies in the industry's first echelon group that the external statement is that enterprise manufacturing upgrades, smart manufacturing can save a lot of labor, layoffs is not a decline in corporate performance.

There are several aspects to the transfer, the most obvious being the shift of market direction and the transfer of manufacturing bases. The direction of market transfer includes export to domestic sales, finished products to customization. The main reason is that the international market orders and profits are not as good as before, especially the Sino-US trade war has a greater impact. Some export furniture companies exporting to the United States are directly closed, and some put more energy on the domestic market; Second, the customized consumption in the domestic market is more and more obvious. Whether the finished products are really customized or not, they will make customized advertisements to meet the market demand.

The transfer of the manufacturing base includes internal transfer and external transfer, and the internal transfer is mostly the transfer of the coastal areas or the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region to the inland provinces and cities. The shift is to set up production bases abroad, to the United States, Europe and Southeast Asia, Africa, mainly Southeast Asia. The reason is the implementation of domestic environmental protection policies and the impact of two factors of Sino-US trade war. Of course, reducing manufacturing costs is also a factor, especially for companies that have moved to places like Africa.

Diversification

Diversification is mainly about product diversification and channel diversification.

Product diversification is mainly reflected in style and customization. In the face of domestic professional furniture exhibitions, industry experts, business owners, designers, etc. are only concerned about the new Chinese style, modern simplicity, luxury, American style and so on. A somewhat powerful furniture company is pursuing a diversified product portfolio, which is related to the popular new Chinese style, modern minimalism, light luxury, American style products, or all of them.

The public statement is to meet the individual needs of consumers, and to provide more and better products for dealers to open stores and sales. In fact, it is indeed a search for a breakthrough in the existing market. The company is in a comprehensive development, and all the products produced by the company are put into a brand franchise store, so that the dealer can open a brand franchise store to run all the styles of the enterprise. The products, whether it is an independent brand store or a store in a professional store. Instead of a single series with a single style as before.

Channel diversification is also a measure for companies to cope with increasingly fierce market competition. In the past, furniture companies mainly used finished products, and the channels were relatively single. However, the current market is multi-participating, the capital market does not say, decoration companies, vertical furniture e-commerce platforms, furniture e-commerce companies, real estate companies, soft-packing institutions and furniture stores themselves, etc., are rushing to grab the furniture market share, furniture companies The franchise chain brand business model has been challenged in many ways, so furniture companies also try to diversify their channels, mainly to participate in these channels. Many companies set up engineering departments to specifically dock real estate hardcover housing projects.

E-commerce, customization, and the like like this are already common. From the perspective of effectiveness, most enterprises are not ideal in participating in these channels. The reason is that the strength of the enterprise is not enough, the channels are not exhaustive, the participation is not deep, and the profession is not professional. On the other hand, the understanding is not enough, the investment is not enough, and there is not a large amount. Professional team management, can not keep up with resources, negotiations and services. Of course, the diversification of channels of many enterprises is to break the previous business bottom line, supply the distributors across the country, abandon the specialty stores everywhere for bulk goods, and also provide the same products of the specialty stores to the e-commerce companies, which is obviously a kind of Respond to the market's helpless choice.

Terminal services and training

In the past, the furniture company's service target was the dealer. At the same time as the enterprise service dealers this year, the more talked about the service terminal, the thinking is how to shorten the distance between the enterprise and the terminal. The service terminal is generally a dealer's job, but the market sales decline, companies have to pay attention to terminal sales.

It is very obvious that the "armed" of the terminal shopping guide, on the one hand, training, training for store management and shopping guide sales skills, enterprises are no longer the symbolic training in the past, but more pragmatic and pragmatic; It is a sales aid tool, which is shared by the company and the dealer. Whenever possible, use various kinds of drainage and help sales tools that help the terminal sales; and help the dealers to do the model house and do the baggage check-in project.

In fact, enterprises must train the services of the terminal, new business ideas, ways of thinking should be trained, sales tools should be used for training, and new channels and models must be promoted through continuous training. The more big brands and large enterprises are trained. The more sound, but actually the better.