Daming 1805

Chapter 304 Product Classification
When the large-scale anti-smuggling operation was in progress, Dashi Clothing Company organized a large batch of goods.

A whole ship of specialties from Meng County was sent to Taixi through the Xihai Canal, and then scattered to Dashi clothing firms in major cities of various countries.

A comprehensive New Year's promotion was launched immediately.

When Rothschild returned to Tessie, it was just at the end of the year, just in time to hit the climax of this broken promotion.

Therefore, this extremely difficult smuggling operation was not only a complete waste of work, but may even directly lose money.

Zhu Jingyuan and the two staff members did not know Rothschild's existence, so of course it was impossible to specifically target him.

But Zhu Jingyuan knew that smugglers existed, so he could target all smugglers as a whole and directly cover Rothschild.

According to the plan discussed by Zhu Jingyuan and his staff, the discount activities of Dashi Clothing Company's official channels and the large-scale anti-smuggling operations of the two Dudufu were originally carried out in coordination.

Whether the anti-smuggling operation can directly catch all the smugglers is not the most important thing.

The key is to see how many smugglers will go bankrupt and how many people will leave the business with this overall coordinated suppression.

There is no way to directly count this, but to slowly observe the after effects.

Half a month after the anti-smuggling campaign started, Lin Zexu and Niu Jian came to report to Zhu Jingyuan again.

Lin Zexu said with great regret:
"Your Highness, the two governor's mansions have been busy for half a month. Although a large number of smugglers, big and small, have been caught, the main smugglers of the Great Food Kingdom have not been caught yet."

Zhu Jingyuan was not too disappointed about this, he was already mentally prepared for this kind of result:
"It's okay, although no smugglers were caught, the effect of cracking down on smuggling has already been achieved, and it seems to be pretty good so far.

"It's almost New Year's Eve now, so let's notify the two governor's houses that they can start taking turns and gradually reduce the intensity of investigations.

"However, the bottom line of the investigation is still higher than before the large-scale investigation.

"Anyway, a large number of old-fashioned cruisers and destroyers are about to be decommissioned, let's use the residual heat at last."

Lin Zexu nodded in agreement, and wrote down Zhu Jingyuan's request.

Zhu Jingyuan continued:
"After the Chinese New Year, I will leave Meng County and the Great Food Country.

"About the subsequent development direction of Dashi Kingdom and Meng County after I leave...

"Let's discuss and confirm one last time now..."

Niu Jian responded immediately:
"Shaomu and I have basically completed the construction plan of Meng County, and I have shown it to you, and you have given instructions."

Zhu Jingyuan smiled and waved his hands and said:

"Of course I remember this, what I want to say now is some direction and some details.

"First of all, it is about our Meng County... and even the special products of Dashi Country, its future sales plan.

"The sales of conventional products related to rayon and elastic yarn are basically no problem, just let the output and market expand naturally.

"The biggest problem is pantyhose, which cannot be marketed in the way it is currently."

Lin Zexu and Niu Jian looked at each other and nodded subconsciously.

Then Lin Zexu summed up his point of view:

"The current situation is that pantyhose, as a product category, is generally a luxury product as defined by His Royal Highness.

"But it is not a gem with a very limited objective output, but a simple industrial product.

"Purely industrial products do not even involve agricultural production at all, so they are not affected by climate and disaster years.

"We can see now that if the scale of the petrochemical industry continues to expand, the output of this kind of finished product will explode very quickly.

"At the same time, as knitted products with great elasticity, they are relatively easy to damage by their nature, and transparent thin socks are even more consumables.

"The huge predictable output and the relatively easy-to-break nature make them unable to be used as a luxury product forever, and must be gradually transformed into a mass commodity."

Niu Jian kept nodding his head listening to Lin Zexu's previous words, but at the end he suddenly had a different opinion:

"It doesn't have to be transformed into a mass commodity, the public does not have a rigid demand for this kind of clothes.

"If Dawang wants to, we can completely control the output, so as to maintain its market price."

Lin Zexu immediately asked back:

"Of course we can control the output, but we can't control the Royal Oil Refining Company and the refining companies in Western countries.

"If they invent similar products, if they are promoted and sold as mass products, we can't stop them!"

Zhu Jingyuan raised his hand, signaling the two staff members not to argue:

"If the big food country is small and the population is small, and there is no way to engage in large-scale production, then of course we must control the output as much as possible and keep the market sales price as high as possible.

"But the Great Food Kingdom cannot be a small country with few people forever, and Ming Dynasty, including the Great Food Country, is not a society with a small country and few people.

"Moreover, luxury goods can make money, but the most profitable things are not luxury goods, they are still popular commodities.

"At the same time, after turning ordinary rayon stockings into a mass commodity, it does not mean that luxury rayon stockings cannot be sold at the same time.

"In the future, we only need to create a luxury stockings brand."

The two staff members immediately came to their senses and quickly understood Zhu Jingyuan's meaning.

Niu Jian said suddenly:
"Your Highness is right, and this brand is even ready-made.

"The clothing sold by Dashi Clothing Firm is originally a luxury item among ordinary clothing.

"The seal script and Mingzi logo selected by shopkeeper Chu has now formed a very powerful influence.

"With this label on ordinary clothes, the price can at least triple."

Lin Zexu also remembered the individual requirements put forward by the designer Chu Yuqiang in production:
"On the pantyhose of two types of artificial stretch silk, there are hot stamps of seal characters, but there is no such thing as stretch cotton pantyhose.

"We can refer to this design and add several different types of hot stamping, such as official script, italic script, and Song style.

"Use hot stamping to plan several product lines of different grades, including product lines that ordinary people can afford.

"Seal script marks are still sold as luxury goods, and rich people really have money to spend, so they can continue to buy them.

"If ordinary people just want such a piece of clothing, they can just buy ordinary low-end products.

"Making common products available everywhere should fundamentally reduce the incentive to smuggle."

Zhu Jingyuan nodded slowly, and then explained his thinking:
"The actual consumption goals corresponding to luxury goods, one is consumption experience, and the other is status symbol.

"Real consumer experience can only be obtained through formal channels, so it should not affect the demand for smuggling much.

"Now the entire product type of artificial elastic silk pantyhose is a luxury product, and wearing it can play a role of status symbol.

"This makes there is no obvious gap between smuggled products and licensed products, so the smuggling activities are so bad that they are difficult to control.

"We want to make ordinary products at the same time, so that ordinary people can buy similar luxury products without spending a lot of money.

"Then when buyers wear it directly, it will have no status symbol effect, and the demand for smuggling will inevitably drop."

Lin Zexu and Niu Jian nodded again.

Then Niu Jian asked another good question:
“So, how do you maintain the status symbol of the luxury product line after selling generic merchandise on a mass scale, thus eliminating the status symbol of the category itself?

"If it can't be maintained, its attractiveness as a luxury item will inevitably decrease...

Zhu Jingyuan smiled and said:
"That's why Chu Yuqiang publicized from the very beginning that the pantyhose was designed by me, the Prince of Ming Dynasty, His Royal Highness the Prince of Dashi.

"It is the key part of the new Ming-style formal dress I designed, and it is the perfect combination of the splendid culture of Ming Dynasty and the tradition of Tai and Western.

"The rayon and elastic yarn used in pantyhose are also invented by me, and they are the crystallization of the latest human technology.

"From the collection and production of all materials to the final weaving and packaging, all are done by Daming people.

"We also produced a very high-grade solid wood box packaging, and designed a unified serial number on the box and the product.

"There are also some badges, pendants, and what level of service terms to enjoy and so on.

"That's what Chu Yuqiang does on other luxury clothes. He knows the way."

After hearing this, Niu Jian was obviously taken aback, and then laughed together with Lin Zexu:
"Shopkeeper Chu is really a genius in business..."

Zhu Jingyuan couldn't help but nodded together, this Chu Yuqiang really let him pick up the treasure:
"There is basically no obvious difference in the quality of the actual product itself between luxury goods and high-end products for the mass market.

“The difference is mostly in the extrinsic added value of packaging, labels, badges, benefits and service levels.

"Our ordinary products can be stripped of these external added values ​​and only be ordinary commodities themselves.

"There are also materials whose marginal income is not very obvious. Ordinary goods can be accepted as soon as they are good, and luxury goods can be sold hard.

"For example, if the ratio of elastic yarn is [-]% to [-]%, the effect is very good, and if it is increased to [-]%, there will be no huge difference.

"We can increase the elastic silk of luxury stockings to [-]%, and control it to [-]-[-]% for ordinary products.

"Doing ordinary goods like this does not affect us to make luxury goods at the same time, just separate these places.

"Even, among luxury goods, different grades can still be classified according to these added values."

When Zhu Jingyuan said this, he paused for a moment to ponder, and recalled the luxury goods industry in later generations.

That is to say, the classification of luxury goods should be top luxury, high luxury, light luxury or something.

Under the guidance of himself and Chu Yuqiang, his own Dashi Clothing Firm has produced substantial luxury goods.

However, the current business philosophy and methods still have the typical confusion of the initial period, and there is no mature standard.

He actually does different levels of luxury goods now, which makes the positioning of various products a bit blurred.

Now I should give him a look at the luxury pricing standards.

Next, Zhu Jingyuan led two staff members to slowly discuss and sort out a product classification plan based on Chu Yuqiang's existing marketing plan.

Including three levels of luxury goods, as well as high-end and mid-end products in regular clothing.

There must be Chinese hot stamping marks on luxury goods, and only luxury goods will use them.

The hot stamping of three different fonts of Xiaozhuan, Lishu and Kaiti directly distinguishes the three luxury grades.

They are the titles of "seal standard", "li standard" and "kai standard".

The first level, top luxury goods, seal label.

Adopt the highest material selection and quality inspection standards, keep the hot stamping label in seal script and clear characters, and keep the wooden packaging box.

Use and register the globally unique code and owner's name, and adopt a regular limited invitation sales strategy.

For example, a set of 20 silver bills for a new Ming-style formal dress is equivalent to a set of [-] yuan for a modern formal dress.

As a symbolic product with the highest positioning, the target customers are top nobles and wealthy businessmen.

That's not really the topmost customer, though.

Dashi Clothing Firm has only one top customer in Taixi, and that is the French Crown Prince, Prince Charles.

The goods given to him are directly unique and are not sold directly.

He will replenish new ones when they are worn out, and the new ones are still the only ones.

After all, he is Zhu Jingyuan's "best friend", and he helped Dashi Clothing Company from the very beginning, bringing goods to the entire French aristocratic circle.

Prince Shire is equivalent to the spokesperson and partner of Dashi Clothing Company.

So Prince Charles is out of specification and not included in the normal customer registration management system.

The second level, high-end luxury goods, affiliated to the standard.

The quality standard is the same as that of the top grade, the hot stamping of the Ming characters is changed to official script, and the light alloy packaging box is used instead.

The synchronous codes on the box and the body are retained, but no special registration is made, and limited public sales are made.

For example, a set of 10 silver bills for a new Ming-style formal dress is equivalent to a set of [-] yuan for a modern formal dress.

There is no difference between the quality of the product itself and the seal label of the two thousand silver bills, only the label, packaging and service.

Therefore, as a "cost-effective" high-end luxury product, it is aimed at senior nobles and wealthy businessmen.

The third level, lightweight luxury goods, regular script.

Using advanced material selection and quality inspection standards, the hot stamping of clear characters is changed to italics, and it is packaged in a hard carton with hot stamping.

For example, a set of 3 yuan silver bills for a new Ming-style formal dress is equivalent to a set of modern [-] yuan formal dress.

The actual quality is very similar to the first two products, but the material selection and inspection standards are slightly lower.

But official prices make them affordable for the middle class.

As the main force of luxury goods, it is aimed at ordinary aristocrats, businessmen, and senior middle class such as shopkeepers and managers.

Further down the product is no longer a luxury.

The fourth level, non-luxury high-end custom clothing and ready-to-wear.

There is no hot stamping on the clothes, but the manufacturer and seller are marked on the label, and they are packed in high-end cartons.

For example, a set of 1-yuan silver bills in the new Ming-style formal dress is equivalent to a modern [-]-yuan formal dress.

It is supplied to higher-end personnel with hard needs, including small businessmen, middle-level managers of large manufacturers, etc.

The fifth level, ordinary custom-made clothing and ready-made clothing.

The packaging and production methods are the same as the fourth level, the main difference lies in the materials used and the level of workers.

For example, a set of 30 yuan silver bills for a new formal dress is equivalent to a modern 3000 yuan set of formal dress.

The supply of ordinary personnel with rigid needs is mainly middle and low-level white-collar workers and civil servants.

These new luxury product line layout adjustments are planned for Chu Yuqiang to complete in the next one to two years.

At the same time, the most typical and urgent pantyhose product line can be adjusted with priority.

The top pantyhose produced now has a ratio of [-]% of elastic silk, and it is being sold at a [-]% discount.

Next, the hot stamping of the same new product can be changed to "affiliated standard", and the price of seventy silver notes will be kept for sale in the future.

At the same time, a new product of [-]% elastic yarn was launched, stamped with a seal label, and took over the price range of [-] silver bills.

Then, [-]% and a half stretch silk products were launched, marked with regular script, and sold at a price of [-] silver bills.

Then, the original [-]% elastic yarn product will be sold at the price of ten silver bills without the hot stamping label.

Finally, semi-finished elastic yarn products were launched, without hot stamping labels, and sold at the price of three silver bills.

It will take half a year to a year for these five products to be gradually promoted and sold publicly in the market.

Since high-end profiteering products still exist, smugglers should still exist, but it should be difficult to form a scale.

If you let Aoxue act as an official smuggler, and go to Taixi to sell "simple bags", "original factory", and "no-label" goods, you should be able to control most of the market.

(End of this chapter)