"Pet Fair" is the largest and most influential pet industry flagship exhibition in the Asia-Pacific region, gathering mainstream brands, manufacturers, dealers, etc. in the pet industry. In 2020, we discovered one of the coolest booths at the Asian Pet Exhibition - pidan, a start-up brand that quickly grew into the number one domestic cat brand in just 5 years.

pidan (Chinese name, Bidan) was founded in 2015 and is affiliated to Danke Pet Products (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. It is a brand that focuses on designing and manufacturing products for pet life, adhering to the principle of "full of goodwill, "Creative, brave and stable" purpose, determined to become the creator of "a better pet life".

The founder of empathy with objects

Ma Wenfei, founder of pidan People

pidan founder Ma Wenfei was born in 1989 and graduated from the Drama Performance Department of Nanjing Radio and Television University. In him, one can see the charm of the collision of sensibility and rationality.

On the one hand, he has very keen sensibilities and believes in the power of intuition. He said: "I have had a deep fascination with objects since I was a child. I spend all my money on objects. I am the kind of person who would buy 30,000 to 40,000 speakers (because of the instant feeling). I don't care about the purely rational parameter details. I I am the kind of person who thinks that a cup can make water taste better. I seem to be able to empathize with objects and feel the emotions emitted by them. I don’t know when I started to have this awakening, I don’t remember. ”

On the other hand, he loves philosophy very much, which allows him to show that he understands things more deeply and systematically, can see the essence through phenomena, has a unique, simple and clear way of expression, and has a maturity beyond his years.

Ma Wenfeixian is not a top academic in the traditional sense. Because I was born with a hoarse voice, I did not take the broadcasting and hosting test as originally planned, and finally chose drama performance. "Although it is a pity that I did not go to a better school, I have always had my own learning rhythm and cognitive way, and I observe and read the world in my own way."

I initially wanted to learn broadcasting The reason why he specializes in hosting is because he has been the host of various school activities from elementary school to middle school. He is very talented in language and can quickly identify the language environment and immediately reorganize the language to express. Yimingzhong's drama performance major allows him to maximize his sensitivity and expression through training. “In a limited time, you have to influence the audience and tell them the entire plot, so most of my skills so far come from the professional knowledge I learned on the drama stage, including organizing businesses, publicity, marketing products, etc. Because the brand is actually about establishing a sense of ritual, and drama is like this." After graduating from college, Ma Wenfei entered Douban's Internet advertising department and worked as an advertising salesman for a year. His work experience taught him how to choose the right customers for him. He said: "There is no difference in sales skills, but there is a difference in efficiency." After that, he worked for a traditional leading daily chemical company with a long history and worked four times. Assistant to the chairman of the month. After accumulating some experience in sales and business operations, he first traveled east to Japan to find his own entrepreneurial direction, and then went to France to prepare for starting a business.

In Japan and France, Ma Wenfei experienced the state of the two ethnic groups at their peak in the past. He experienced Japan's top food and French architecture, which had a great impact on his business. He discovered Japanese soy sauce. , is actually divided into taste arrangements of front, middle and back. I am amazed at their ability to make differences within an extremely narrow range. This "study tour" process to Japan and France gave him a keen insight into the beauty of all things that is very different from his academic background and similar to Tadao Ando and Gen Terao (the founder of Bamuda).

"Preserved Egg" is a black Bombay cat that Ma Wenfei met when he was living in Japan. From preserved eggs, Ma Wenfei experienced the happiness and satisfaction that pets bring to humans. Precisely because of this, he wanted to live a better life as a preserved cat, but when he bought more than 100 cat litter boxes with different prices, he suddenly realized: none of them satisfied him!

So he came up with the idea of ​​making a cat litter box. However, various conditions in Japan were not suitable for a Chinese to start a business, so he went to France and officially registered the "pidan" brand in August 2015 with the pinyin of "preserved egg". At the same time, he named his beloved pet "pidan". Chief Experience Officer.”

The critical first step

Ma Wenfei said: "The first step of the brand determines 70% of the matter." Before pidan was registered, Ma Wenfei had already begun to make a comprehensive deployment of the brand.

The only way for a brand to grow from 0 to 1 is differentiation, and product design is the key to creating differentiation. "People's consumption has gone from buying tools that purely solve problems to a stage where products need more value. Take the pet industry as an example. Small animals bring you emotional experience and emotional value, so you must be willing to buy some for them. Products that can bring you emotional value." At the beginning of his business, Ma Wenfei had his own definition of pidan's design. He said: "We hope to leave something with emotional value in addition to product functions. Within the boundaries, you can even challenge long-standing habits, but it must be meaningful.”

Igloo

Igloo is exactly such a design. Ma Wenfei said: "As soon as the scaled-down 3D printed model of the igloo came out, I knew it was done." The igloo was completely different from the cat litter boxes that were commonly available on the market at that time. It used a minimalist style to interpret a soft atmosphere - One-piece spherical roof with white frosted texture. Just like the feeling of a cat, round and warm.

“The biggest feature of our company is that we only ask what the bottom-level needs of the product are. When we were making the igloo, all our colleagues and friends collapsed - a 45-centimeter spherical plastic shell. The wall thickness is 4.5 mm, and the mold for the cover alone costs more than 300,000 yuan. The injection molding machine comes from a factory that makes big headlights for trucks, because it requires a very large injection molding machine,” Ma Wenfei recalled, “Everyone said at the time that this product was difficult. Sell, I said no, the spherical shape is extremely important to kittens. The experience brought by the spherical shape is completely different from that of angular things. Our beginning was actually a bit paranoid and tragic, and all 1 million of the start-up capital was invested. The company has been set up, the molds have been opened and the first batch of goods are ready.”

What shocked friends even more was that under such desperate circumstances, Ma Wenfei boldly priced the igloo at 365 yuan, which was in China at the time. Alice, a Japanese brand that has been operating in the pet market for 10 years, has the most expensive cat litter box priced at 288 yuan, while the price of an igloo in the United States is as high as 129 US dollars, which is 2.5 times the domestic price.

Ma Wenfei said at the gorgeous forum in 2019: "As a new company, when there is no channel, no money, and no energy to communicate with everyone, there is only one opportunity, which is price. We don't want to sell cheap goods. , Beauty comes at a price. For new brands, who you are at the beginning determines who you will be in the future, because building something does not happen overnight and requires continuous optimization and improvement. , then what can I rely on to make myself better in the future?”

On January 18, 2016, under zero promotion conditions, an article about the launch of the igloo was posted on pidan’s zero-fan public account. , 9,000 reads in 2 days. To date, the igloo has sold nearly 1 million pieces, and won the 2016 Red Dot Design Award.

Ma Wenfei said: "Products have energy, you must believe in the power of products."

A firm design-driven brand

“We are a very typical design-driven company in BDD cases, and we even go more extreme than some cases.” At the beginning of the interview Ma Wenfei said: "We are one of the few companies whose sales staff cannot participate in product meetings. We require that our products can be understood at a glance. It is wrong to interfere with the creative process too early or too strongly because they are pursuing a certain kind of certainty. , but creation is not. Creation itself is emotional, fragile, full of uncertainty, and even full of destruction.”

“When I set up the company, I first looked for designers and then the supply chain. The person who produces the product is the last person to find the sales person. Without a good product, no matter how good the sales are, it is meaningless.” When talking about building a founding team, Ma Wenfei said with a smile that Pidan is an entrepreneurial venture led by three professionals. company. The design partner is Pan Biwei, the designer who first collaborated with him to design the igloo in France. After graduating from the China Academy of Art, he went to Paris to study as a graduate student in the Department of Sculpture, and then went to the United States to work in the Pierre Charpin Studio of the same name as JOHN IVY for half a year. Later, he returned to China and started a business with Ma Wenfei. The supply chain partner is a senior development manager of the world's largest pet products manufacturer, while the sales partner is an e-commerce expert in the Alibaba system. The strong strength of the core team is the basis for Ma Wenfei to create his ideal brand.

Ma Wenfei is a typical philosophical thinker. He believes that no matter what way of thinking, when you truly think about the nature of business and brand, the underlying needs of the industry and people, you will naturally recognize and understand the driving force of design. the value of. In his eyes, there is no bias or restraint from experience and expertise. It is his objective observation and practice that allows him to infiltrate design into the company's system and culture without hesitation and courage.

Ma Wenfei divided pidan's existing 48 employees into two departments: the "Creation and Computing Center" and the "Communication and Dissemination Center". The former includes: industrial design, supply chain, visual design and finance, and the latter These include marketing, channels and human resources departments. By tightly bundling design and supply chain production and drawing a clear departmental "gap" between sales and sales, this unique organizational structure reflects Ma Wenfei's management sophistication.

On the one hand, he believes that design and production are inseparable, and only when the rights of the persons in charge of design and production are equal will there be a confrontation. "Only when design and production fight can a decision-making space be created. If they don't fight, there will be no spark in the product." Assessment is the core of business operations. The KPI of pidan's development and supply chain executives is to restore the design draft of the industrial designer, and even The color cannot be changed.

On the other hand, Ma Wenfei emphasized that design and sales cannot affect each other. Generally, companies pay too much attention to sales, but in his opinion, this is exactly a pitfall. He believed what Borges said: The crowd is an illusion, I am talking to you alone. "Although we want to build a brand for all consumers, we need to make everyone feel as if you are designing for him. So we are talking to a group of people, and sales can only tell you the needs of one person, but one person There is a huge illusion between the needs of a group of people.”

So, before pidan’s products are produced, designers only need to write a free product design concept document, and the supply chain is ready. The materials and process documents are given to the marketing department. If they don’t understand the design concept, they can digest and recreate it on their own without interfering with each other.

Although this will take some time, Ma Wenfei believes: "No one knows the result of a product before it is actually sold. But the logic and values ​​of creating a product determine that you may have a greater probability of creating a good product." Products. Not excessive pursuit of certainty is the first principle of our creation.”

The appropriate choice comes from an in-depth analysis of brand values ​​and company capabilities. Ma Wenfei believes that Pidan's core ability lies in its emphasis on efficiency on a rational level, knowing the boundaries of its capabilities and then achieving them thoroughly; on an emotional level, it has a clearer view of the world, and the team is also consistent with this, and the company has strong cohesion. He summarized the company culture into eight concise words - product, efficiency, love and empathy, which appear on employees' DingTalk software pages every day.

pidan company's DingTalk page

Products come first. Products with energy are the basis for pidan's survival. High-level efficiency allows products to express time More calmness, love and empathy are a high-level summary of the brand's values ​​and expectations for all employees.

In pidan, only 6 people decide on the most critical products - 4 industrial designers, 1 supply chain manager and Ma Wenfei himself, who calls himself a "product manager". Ma Wenfei believes that the product manager of a startup company must be the boss himself, because only the boss can see all the resources clearly, understand the limits of the company's capabilities and the flexibility to take risks, and only then can he dare to take risks and create innovative and good products.

“This is set up based on the three stages of product formation. I am the person who envisions the product, the designer is responsible for expressing it, the developer makes the sample, and the supply chain solves the cost efficiency problem. I hope Even if the business is worth 20 billion in the future, these 7 people will decide the company’s products.” Ma Wenfei emphasized, “No one in our company can hold a meeting for more than 30 minutes. Meetings that last too long show that they have not used their brains before.”

The decision-making weight of design is so high, which also makes Ma Wenfei more cautious about recruiting designers. He believes, “If the creative work is not good, it basically means nothing. Although the product may not be 100 points, the next one will definitely be better, but you have to sprint towards 100 points with ambition and be infinitely close to the best state. ”

The high demand for designers also made Ma Wenfei lament: “It is so difficult to find designers. Since starting my business, I have read at least 1,000 resumes.”

In. In Ma Wenfei's view, "Qualified designers must have empathy for objects and be able to improve business efficiency. I am very disgusted with sharpening a sword for ten years. That is what a master does. Our design rhythm is to produce 2 pictures a week We must use quantity to explore the design draft and then make trade-offs. If the quantity is not enough, you will not be qualified for me and the design director to judge your work.”

High requirements also come with high returns, Ma Wenfei. Said: "We should be the only company in China where industrial designers can get commissions from product sales. Designers can get sales commissions of 0.5 to 1% of the retail price. There is no upper limit on how much commissions they can get based on the sales."

Design is an information worldview

Finding ways to provide more creative space for products seems to have become the direction of pidan's concerted efforts. This is not only due to Ma Wenfei’s trust in products and designers, but also his deep understanding of design.

Through the study of philosophy, Ma Wenfei developed a rare ability to appreciate aesthetics. He believes: "Third-rate designers focus on shape and color, second-rate designers focus on materials, and first-rate designers focus on the relationship between products and space. Good design must have some kind of relationship with space."< /p>

The most representative one is the design of the igloo mentioned above. Its rounded and solid color appearance complements the home living space. The internal design uses an extra-long winding corridor to reduce the possibility of cat litter being taken out, and to block the odor from escaping. Through clever use of space, the function and appearance are perfectly matched.

The internal structure of the snow house

The snow house is the first product of pidan company, and it was also designed by Ma Wenfei. "The first version of the design was more feminine, I changed it to more neutral "Desexualization is a more important thing in design." After that, the company's products have also been adjusted to varying degrees by 10%-50%.

Although Ma Wenfei is a "non-industrial design professional", in his view, drama and design research have the same problem, which is to show the spiritual core of the story to the audience in a limited space. For drama, the language and scenery on the stage are extremely important. The scenery can allow the audience to immediately understand the historical background tone of the plot. "So I have always emphasized to my industrial designers that the things we design must have a stage feel."

The design with a stage feel can, on the one hand, allow pidan's products to catch the user's eyeballs. It stands out among the dazzling competing products. On the other hand, it can fully convey pidan's brand philosophy and tell the brand story well. From a higher perspective, Ma Wenfei believes that design is not a style choice, but an information worldview that interprets the essence of the brand.

In addition, he also has a very clear idea of ​​how to use design. He believes that first of all, the value that the brand wants to convey must be clear, and only then can he understand how to use design, instead of just following the colors and shapes of a certain popular style. .

Ma Wenfei appreciates UNIQLO's philosophy - truly high-quality clothing comes from high-quality "materials", so the materials are innovated every year, the design is simple and bright, and most of the clothing styles are basic styles, which are displayed in stacks The store shelves allow consumers to see key information such as style, size, price and materials at a glance.

pidan, on the other hand, “puts cats first” - in the pet industry, buyers and users are not the same people. People who pay the bills do not directly experience these products, and the information gap in the middle is often deliberately created by merchants. Some false marketing gimmicks, but what pidan has to do is to convey correct and true information, from materials, design to experience, to ensure the safety and comfort of cats, so that they can live a better life.

pidan poster

So, not only is Ma Wenfei himself a research-oriented "cat slave", but all the designers at pidan are also cat slaves. They have three cats in the office for convenience. Employees observe them at all times. pidan has planned to establish a "pet life science research laboratory" to conduct long-term and more systematic basic research.

Secondly, people’s perception experience is better. A brand is an experience, so in addition to product functions and quality being user-friendly, pidan also considers whether consumers’ purchasing experience is pleasant, so it switched product express delivery to SF Express, which allows every consumer to enjoy the increased cost despite the increased cost. Everyone feels the convenience of door-to-door delivery.

Brands are complex and three-dimensional. Advertisements or slogans alone cannot convince the public. Only by repeatedly doing the right things can consumers form a positive perception of the brand. When designers understand that "design is information value", the use of design becomes more comfortable. Through simple and sincere designs, pidan conveys its care for cats' lives and makes "cat lovers" simpler and happier.

Water Austrian Pet Bowl

For example, the Water Austrian pet bowl that won the if award is a pet bowl that can keep both cold and hot. It can be filled with ice water and hot water on demand. Water to ensure that the food the pet eats is at the right temperature.

Valley Cat Scratching Board

Although the Valley Cat Scratching Board is a very simple product, it uses high-quality corrugated paper and has an evenly sunken design in the middle to fit the cat. The curvature of the body allows cats to sleep more comfortably, and it is environmentally friendly and thick. It is more durable than ordinary cat scratching posts. Cat owners do not need to replace the scratching posts every few weeks.

Pet tumbler

The pet tumbler that won the G-MARK award takes into account the amount of water and the angle of drinking water for pets. What is more "humane" is that it also increases activity Carbon filtration ensures clean water quality.

Although design is not a stylistic choice, the same values ​​can still be expressed in different ways. Ma Wenfei said thoughtfully: "pidan is a company whose aesthetics are guided by philosophical ideas. Just like Steve Jobs's aesthetic concept was influenced by the Zen Buddhism in India and is full of the Zen meaning of blank space, my philosophical view comes from Nietzsche, and I have realized a very important thing. The important concept is that 'only tragedy can empathize'. From this point of view, many brand companies are wrong to make extremely colorful and happy materials, as long as they are products, their industrial design should be a little sad. The atmosphere or color is in it, otherwise you can't empathize. We can only relieve our pain when others are more painful than ourselves."

pidan brand atmosphere

"Tragedy" is. It is a very abstract word, and everyone has different understandings, but it is this abstract concept that allows designers to not deviate from pidan's brand concept and have more creative space, so we are tasting pidan's products. When you see it, you will feel a harmonious but not boring design image. Some of pidan's products

pidan pet bag video

pidan pet food storage bucket video

You can see the perfect color matching in pidan's products, videos and posters Clean and bright, the products mostly use a combination of simple geometric shapes, and the posters use a white background to highlight the beauty and functionality of the product itself. Compared with the cute and concrete elements used by many pet brands, pidan prefers to use abstract elements and rounded lines to make the space full of changes and create a soft feeling in the home environment.

pidan’s product details pages and communication techniques also boldly abandon fancy descriptions and designs, and directly and efficiently convey real information to consumers. The homepage of Taobao's official website is divided into interesting and emotional categories such as "Welcome New Members", "Happiness of Foodies", "Deep Sleep" and so on according to different scene needs, making the shopping selection process simpler and easier.

Animal Backline Offline Store

In terms of brand communication, Ma Wenfei believes that the gross profit of the industry is not enough to support his own brand advertising. Brand communication is sales. He firmly believes in the power of products, " I believe that communication is most efficient the moment every consumer opens the box.”

In short, when you carefully observe pidan’s design, from logo to font selection, shopping page, categories, and products. From design and packaging to the "Animal Back" offline store, the consistency of expression will multiply the energy of the product. When you observe its design choices and proportions, especially its thinking and understanding of product functions, you will be moved by Pidan's respect for pets and its decent design.

Benign symbiotic relationship with suppliers

When it comes to business models, Ma Wenfei believes: "Changing the world is a problem that products should solve, and business models are a very classic thing. So, Our business model is the most unpretentious thing in the entire company. We have to figure out the supply chain, learn to operate the brand, and sell our own goods in our own factory. However, a strong supply chain is the prerequisite for brand development. ”

So Ma Wenfei spent four years sorting out his suppliers step by step and sorting out his own supply chain system. He divided the suppliers into five materials based on materials: cloth, large plastics, small plastics (which are further divided into electronic and non-electronic), cat litter, paper products, and wood, with a total of 4 production plants.

“In the first four years, I spent the most time with suppliers. Three of the factories were created by poaching leaders from other companies when our company was first established and letting them start their own businesses. The other one was originally The business of a large factory is very complicated. We asked them to cut off the redundant business and focus more on pidan business. These suppliers have a close relationship with us. As long as I have enough space, they can complete the project within 2 months. All the people and equipment were moved here, and they are willing to be controlled by us at any time."

Ma Wenfei also achieved "outside management". The workers in these four factories and the company's supply chain personnel are all in Pidan. in the internal information system.

pidan has created a symbiotic relationship with its suppliers. There is no need to pay the mold fee for plastic products below RMB 300,000, they can be integrated into the product. Each SKU can be made in 1,200 pieces, velvet products can be made in 500 pieces, and ceramic products can be customized in 300 pieces. Therefore, the back-end efficiency is extremely high. 6.5 million inventory can achieve 42 million sales. All turnover is in the hands of suppliers. They prepare goods for pidan for free for a certain period of time because they believe they can sell it.

“I told the suppliers about the current situation of manufacturing in China very truthfully – large factories with more than 300 employees have scale but low gross profit, but factories with less than 30 employees that have flexibility and efficiency may gain Higher gross profit. And we have the ability to give them enough orders and gross profit. We usually give them 15 points of gross profit. When it is good, it can be 18 points, and if it is not, it can be 12 points. After one year, they have sufficient funds. . ”

“So we are a company that uses design to achieve 200 million sales in 4 years with an efficiency that is unmatched by traditional companies in the pet industry. My peers need 300 people to achieve 200 million. In 12 years, we only have 48 people. And we design and develop molds ourselves, with mold assets of close to 10 million yuan." pidan has now achieved a 30-day production cycle covering 75% of its products, and in the future Ma Wenfei will I hope to achieve a very short inventory turnover rate like Uniqlo. Only when the turnover rate increases can we have the conditions to "enrich" products. The pressure on a single product will be reduced, allowing designers to express their products more boldly.

Do a good job in the cat business

Regarding the prospects of the pet industry, Ma Wenfei is confident: "The total scale of the US pet industry is now 110 billion US dollars, and the total scale of China's pet industry will definitely exceed this number. . At present, China’s cat market accounts for about 45 billion, with cat food accounting for 45%, cat litter accounting for 20%, supplies accounting for 25%, and the pet market accounting for 15%. There is no brand giant yet.” In his opinion, there will definitely be a strong brand like IKEA or Uniqlo in the pet market, and he is deeply rooted in the belief that “I would rather be a chicken head than a phoenix tail.” Pet market.

“We are a company with a very deep insight into people. But we have suffered losses before. More than 1 million of our 6.5 million inventory are brought by dog ​​products. In fact, we are a company A company that can achieve sales of 24 million with more than 4 million in inventory. This mistake stems from the fact that we blindly amplified the energy of the product at first. When the product leaves a certain accurately positioned group of people, there is no energy left. The gap between cat owners and dog owners is completely different.”

They found that dogs mainly consume dog food, and can eat 500 grams per meal, so 70% of the dog product category mix is. The staple food, and the rest are tools and products such as leashes and dog chews. The living environment and living conditions of Asians are not suitable for raising dogs. On the one hand, raising dogs requires a large living space, and the high-rise apartments that most urban people live in are relatively small. On the other hand, raising dogs requires too much energy. I have to go out to walk my dog ​​every day. In addition, there are constant negative news about large dogs hurting people.

“Human nature is complex and changeable. If you spend a lot of energy on a dog, you will want to spend less money; but cats are different. They only eat 50 grams of cat food per meal. The feeling of a cat is more like raising a daughter. You need to buy a bow tie to dress it up and coax it occasionally. That’s why we have the opportunity to achieve the scale we have today.”

Ma Wenfei understands the nature of the pet business and captured it accurately. The structure and trends of China's pet market, starting with cat products, using design thinking to differentiate cat products from other competing products, not only improve the probability of entrepreneurial survival, but also create brand differentiation and locate precise user groups.

“Just-in-demand products such as cat food and cat litter are big standard products. The quality and sales volume are determined by the place of origin and variety. The homogeneity phenomenon is serious and is not suitable for the development of start-up companies. And those who are willing to spend money for Consumers who buy some good supplies for small animals are the high-quality users that pidan strives to win. By selling cat litter and cat food, the frequency of purchases can be guaranteed," explained Ma Wenfei.

“The snow house allowed us to achieve a monthly revenue of 0-1 million yuan. Later, we added some supplies and toys to achieve a monthly revenue of 1-3 million yuan. In the third stage, we added cat litter cats Liang achieved a monthly revenue of 3 to 10 million yuan, which continued to grow until June 21, reaching monthly sales of 45 million yuan. Pidan’s cat litter now ranks first in the category, with sales of 15 million bags a year, and the price is still higher than the previous year. The second most expensive one is 40%, and it is also the first in terms of