On the evening of September 8, the BDDLive live broadcast room invited Mr. Ma Wenfei, the founder of pidan, and Li Yongshan, a researcher at BDDWATCH and the manager of the BxxmPet pet brand, to discuss the brand story about cats, love and products.

What I’m going to talk about today The theme is actually a pragmatic brand of philosophical self-destructive tendencies. When everyone sees this sentence, it is very easy to mistakenly think that this thing has a sequence or priority, but in fact it does not. The sentence on this topic: "Philosophical self-destruction tendency pragmatism brand", it does not have any sequence, it happens to us at the same time. It is a simultaneous instant burst.

The biggest influence of "philosophy" on me is that I doubt everything and do not believe that things are absolute. Because philosophy itself is a dialectical existence deep in my heart. When I think about a problem, doubt and verification always coexist, so I am often in a state of great doubt.

When we manage a company, it is important to be dialectical about things. There is no absolute authority in things. Although on some occasions and in some institutional education courses, people will exaggerate a kind of authority, shortcuts and methods, making people think that they can make better judgments than others in the general environment and achieve their goals faster, I think These are all fake.

Because no matter what decisions you are making, the environment is constantly changing. So in addition to making judgments decisively, bravely, and resolutely, you must also doubt this choice. Therefore, when we chose to use cat litter as our main brand business, we were also thinking about whether this was correct and whether we needed to make pet supplies or food? From this point of view, it reflects the underlying logic of our philosophical brand - make decisions decisively, have confidence in your own judgment and always be full of doubts about your own judgment, instead of getting entangled in things that have not happened yet.

pidan Valley Cat Scratching Board

We never care about any business methods, business processes, or awards and honors we have established in the past. pidan will not become more stable and cautious in its operations because of past achievements. We only care about this moment, that is, from the past to this moment, what is the most important node in the objective resources and subjective judgments we have? This is my understanding of self-destructive tendencies.

pidanThe "baggage" of the past will make us more cautious in making any decisions. The self-destructive tendency drives us to choose unconventional and risky decisions among many options, that is, the decision with the greatest value, the most power, or the sharpest edge. We are like people setting off fireworks, except that these "fireworks" are not as short-lived as everyone understands. Any company will eventually collapse, and everything will eventually fade away in the face of time. We are doing this gentle yet firm career in the storm with a relaxed and joyful attitude that outsiders cannot understand.

Enterprises do not succeed by relying on one decision, but the accumulation of countless decisions and countless nodes in the past has made it what it is today. Whether you are a company or a designer, you must remember not to fall into a very narrow and sophisticated cause and effect cycle. We should always take risks with a clear mind.

pidan igloo cat litter box

"Philosophical" and "self-destruction" are two relatively empty and illusory words that are unlikely to be directly used in the real world. If an enterprise only has the first two words, it will lack a "ruler" to measure when making decisions. So the final focus falls on pragmatism.

As a business, if we do not generate actual value, what qualifications do we have to collect consumers' money? Therefore, the most basic pragmatism is to be as green as possible and to take responsibility for the environment, even if it is just to save 0.01 milligrams of plastic. There is an old Chinese saying that "no good deed should be considered small", so the brand's focus on environmental protection itself is pragmatism, and it is to minimize the damage to the world.

pidan’s brand image at different stages represents different strategies:

The first stage: serving cats

At first, my friend took care of my little cat. A logo is drawn on the profile photo of the cat. For graphic design, this was a very rudimentary and unmistakable approach. The most original idea we wanted to express at that time was: We are a company that serves cats.

The second stage: atmosphere creation

After that, we realized that a product should not only have functions, nor should it only solve problems. The reason is simple – products can’t solve all problems. Kittens around the world are doing just fine without our products. So we must always stay awake and realize our own ordinaryness. Just like Nietzsche said, "Life has an end." We have to struggle a little to make life meaningful. Therefore, we need to create an atmosphere, hoping that the brand can bring an emotional influence, allowing users to be calmer or more gorgeous for a while.

The third stage: social responsibility

So far, pidan has served more than 3 million families, with annual sales of about 400 million. So we should assume some responsibilities and obligations to this world. For example, among the 16 million pieces of cat food we sell a year, what will be the consequences if one ten thousandth of the cat litter contains formaldehyde or exceeds the bacterial limit? In industrial production, defective rates of 3% and 5% are normal and completely acceptable. But if 16 million pieces of cat food have a 2% defective rate, it will have adverse effects on 320,000 kittens. Therefore, pidan must also have its own bottom line, responsibilities and obligations.