Lining Dilemma: The Pace Of Internationalization Is Blocked; &Nbsp; Product Positioning Is Vague.

Different people look at Lining and have different interpretations.

Some people say it is slow, some say it is atmospheric, some say it is changeable, others say it is reserved.

And it was presented in front of the public, once a classic tale of "everything is possible" to overtake Adidas. But recently, it has been caught up in the chase by the backers, struggling to cope with it and being washed up by capital.

The biggest sport in China

Thanks to the Olympic Dongfeng, Lining once surpassed Adidas in 2009 and became the top Chinese sportswear brand after Nike.

However, the position has not yet been consolidated. Looking back, Adidas is catching up. The biggest competitor in the local brand Anta is also catching up.

The 2010 annual report shows that although Li Ning Co's turnover of HK $9 billion 479 million was ahead of HK $7 billion 408 million of Anta sports [9.19 6.86%], Anta's HK $1 billion 551 million was far more than that of Lining's 1 billion 108 million HK dollars in terms of group profits, while Anta's 23.4% was also higher than that of Lining's 16.3% in terms of operating profit margin; in terms of measuring operational efficiency indicators, the average value of the average was 16.3%.

Ten years ago, when Lining had become the most famous brand in the country, Anta was only a representative of Fujian's grassroots clothing.

Worse news comes from the market. In the same period of the overall market growth of nearly 20% of the environment, Lining set the domestic sports brand in the second quarter of 2011, the worst record of orders, the total value of orders fell by about 6% year-on-year according to the wholesale shipment, the order growth in the domestic sports brand listed companies in the last place, and market organizations also do not optimistic about the two quarter growth prospects.

In 2011, Lining expects to increase the number of stores to 8500, while Anta plans to achieve the scale of "10000 stores".

The capital market seems to be losing confidence in the future performance of Li Ning Co.

In December 20, 2010, Li Ning Co's share price plummeted due to a sharp reduction in its trading volume, falling 23% in one day and evaporating nearly 4 billion 500 million Hong Kong dollars in market value.

This is the darkest day that Li Ning Co has experienced in the capital market since its listing in 2004.

Among them, J.P. Morgan bought 12 million 883 thousand shares at a price of HK $18.24 per share, while Li Ning Co's target share price dropped by 23%.

On March 17, 2011, at Li Ning Co's 2010 performance briefing, CEO Zhang Zhiyong predicted that the average cost of Li Ning Co will rise by 20% in 2011, and the price of products will increase by two digits.

Lining's stock price fell for another 3 days, or nearly 15%.

As of May 18, 2011, Li Ning Co's stock price was 14.96 yuan, and less than a year ago, Lining's stock price had approached HK $30.

What's wrong with Lining?

Despite the fact that many dealers, former executives and people in the industry were interviewed, they almost agreed that Lining was an excellent company. Its brand accumulation, strategic planning, system operation and even strict standards of the company were more suited to the Chinese people's appetite than rival Nike and Adidas in the same period, and also more obvious than the "Fujian Gang" of the later pursuers.

But on the other hand, the interviewees all agree that the messy pace, the swaying of the brand, and the incongenitally inadequate marketing are all giving people a sigh of regret and anger.

Lining himself is also contradictory. On the one hand, it was born and grew up in the mainland, and was deeply rooted in national sentiment by the Chinese people. On the other hand, it has been trying to get rid of the constraints of this regional brand and is committed to creating an international sports brand image, which is an endless glory for the dream of internation oriented Chinese enterprises.

However, when it frequently adjusts the way of take-off and tries to leap the internationalized Longmen, we find that this enterprise always seems to be difficult to sustain. The great strategy is often suspended in the air.

For two months, this reporter interviewed many Li Ning Co distributors, former executives, sports brand peers, and tried to restore a real and still Lining on the road from different angles.

"I hope the people of the Li Ning Co can give me a statement whether to do or not?" in May 15, 2011, Xu Tailin, general manager of Guangdong Hongda sports company, Lining distributor, told reporters that Xu Tailin was still resentful.

Xu Tailin's resentment began at the end of 2010 by Lining.

In 2010, before the second quarter of 2011, the Li Ning Co once revealed to the media that the company decided to shut down 500~600 stores with poor performance because of the company's decision to implement a strategic adjustment to "value consumption".

However, this information was quickly interpreted as "the Li Ning Co is not well managed and is forced to close its stores".

There is no doubt that Li Ningzheng, one of the leading companies in China's local sports brand market, has been faced with the biggest challenge since its establishment.

The pressure on the distributor to Xu Tailin is more of a suffering.

This pressure is manifold: in June 2010, Lining launched the bid change, which was not a success for him because the sales of Lining's products decreased by about 30% from 2011.

Xu Tailin belongs to the distributor of Li Ning Co integration.

Since 2001, Lining has been selling to Maoming. In the past 10 years, the sales volume of Hongda sports has exceeded 16 million yuan, which is almost second to none in the city of Hong Kong.

Lining products account for about 1/4 of the company's total sales.

Xu Tailin's affection for Lining has been around for a long time.

In those days, he only opened a small shop with an area of less than 70 square meters, which could sell 300 thousand yuan to 400 thousand yuan a year, which helped him complete the original accumulation.

So far, he has 6 stores in Maoming, and each shop has an area of more than 100 square meters.

He missed the state at that time.

The goods are issued by Lining headquarters. Every other stage, headquarters will have information about the special products, and the people who are responsible for the market docking will look very young, but very friendly.

One of Xu Tailin's impressive things was that he bought more than 10000 yuan a year, and he tentatively sought help from Lining headquarters.

Later, when the goods arrive, the money will be in debt.

He felt that Li Ning Co was very kind and wanted to set up Lining with him all his life.

But in the next few years, he didn't feel well.

As a company that established the market position very early, Lining adopted the exclusive distribution of products, that is, distributors will not set up "Lining" brand specialized shops, and can sell other brand products at the same time.

After years of deep ploughing, Lining has more than 129 distributors and over 2000 distributors throughout the country, and has more than more than 7000 outlets nationwide.

In 2006, Li Ning Co was determined to carry out channel reform.

This year, Li Ning Co set up several large areas in the country.

Soon, Southern China district distributor Guangzhou speeding company ran to Maoming to open a store, and Xu Tailin protested.

Lining, manager of Southern China District, came to convene the two sides to coordinate. The final result was that the speeding company promised not to open shop in Maoming. However, the cost of pre opening shop preparation was 110 thousand yuan, which was borne by Xu Tailin.

Xu thought, but still paid, "keeping the market is more important than anything else".

The next 4 years were safe.

But Xu Tailin thought it was not easy to run Lining's products.

As a distributor, he can only pick up the goods on the hand of the dealer at the upper level.

Dealers are very strong. They usually increase their prices by about 8% to 10%.

Selling products, distributors usually sell in their stores, and many times, he can not get goods, can only watch the dealer make money.

Because of the high price, Xu Tailin did not dare to sell at all. He usually sold only about 70% of the price at a price, while the remaining 30% was his own profit.

But often the goods were not sold out, and Lining's new models came on stream.

After that, they will be asked to clear the warehouse quickly.

Dealers will soon reduce their prices. As the next distributor, Xu Tailin will be caught in a dilemma. No price cuts will be violated by the rules that Li Ning Co must deal with secondhand goods. If the distributors fail to meet the requirements, the distributors will be cut down.

Even so, information is also asymmetrical.

Almost all of his products and information came from dealers.

The products are sold well and not sold well, and they are stuck in the dealers.

Almost everything he wants to sell or not is decided by the distributor.

In September 2010, the dealer Guangzhou speeding company once again came to Maoming to open a shop.

Xu Tailin found Lining Southern China District Office, hoping to get a fair answer. The answer is that dealers have the right to open shop.

Xu refused to take it. He found someone blocking the door.

On the day of the opening of a store, dozens of policemen ran into a confrontation.

In November, Xu Tailin arrived in Beijing, hoping to go to Lining headquarters to ask for a view. However, for a long time at the Li Ning Co gate, he didn't let him in. He felt a bit sad. "After 10 years of Lining, in the end, he found that there was no emotion."

The pattern now is that just one street in his Lining shop has opened 3 Lining stores, and the other two are dealers.

In the past 3 months, the sales volume of his Hongda Company has dropped by 30%.

The clerk of the other side often says, "Hongda's goods are taken from us."

This made Xu Tailin very excited.

Xu Tailin did not want to offend the Li Ning Co. He had a very complex feeling about the brand he had always accompanied with him.

On the other hand, Li Ning Co's "connivance" to dealers is hard to understand. "We can not talk with Li Ning Co at all. Do not know if people at headquarters know the following situation?"

Xu Tailin's idea now is to get rid of the hundreds of thousands of Yuan stock Lining products before the exchange.

"We are also a member of Lining, but we have been ignored."

He felt that he could not find anyone who was responsible for himself.

In the past, there was a lot of strange things in the upper levels. In 2000, Lining launched a frenzied wave of internationalization. The positioning of the former "sportswear national team" in Lining was another slightly critical voice.

Lining, the first marketing manager of the international market, has chosen to leave.

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"In fact, whether Lining is an international brand or a localized brand has been very vague."

Receiving a reporter's call, Zhang Qing expressed his puzzled euphemism, "an excellent brand should be clearly conveyed to consumers and the public with some impression, but Lining has changed and is no longer the original appearance."

Zhang Qing missed the days when he first started his business, when he was Lining's first marketing manager.

He entered the company in 1996 and worked until 2001.

After leaving, Zhang Qing opened a management consulting company. He often used Lining as a case to talk about the development path and brand appeal of Li Ning Co. Of course, he also referred to the later internationalization road.

Recalling the then opening meeting of Li Ning Co, Zhang Qing felt that everyone was very devoted. Lining would attend every time. His annual speech at the conference would be the guiding ideology and goal of the company in the following year.

"At that time, the image of Li Ning Co was the national team of sportswear, sponsoring many national teams such as gymnastics, diving, shooting, table tennis and so on. In fact, this positioning is very precise, because at that stage the national sentiment was unprecedentedly high, and Lining's personal voice was still there."

Zhang Qing also felt very passionate at that time.

In 1997 and 1998, Li Ning Co's sales volume was close to 1 billion yuan.

At this point, such giants as Adidas and Nike are still quietly laying a foundation in the Chinese market and finding their feelings.

The brand of the Fujian sports brand that rises later is just the grass root product that is not too high in the streets and lanes.

Zhang Qing felt that Lining's pride was that he saw too many people put a national sentiment on Lining, and Lining represented virtually the image of a country.

But these achievements are not satisfactory inside Lining.

"Obviously, at this time, Lining needs to find a bigger goal for himself to stimulate the inertia and unwillingness to go too smoothly."

During that time, Zhang often went to the market to investigate and ponder the direction of the next step of Lining's brand.

After that, he produced a brand planning plan of "beauty of sports and world sharing". "You know, beauty is the language of the world, and the beauty of sports will arouse widespread sympathy in the whole society. I am doing market research, and I know what the brand should express."

But in the end, in 2000, Chen Yihong, the then managing director of Li Ning Co, put forward the goal of "internationalization". In his view, Lining's wandering for many years was precisely due to the lack of brand appeal, and more, "need to go out and play a bigger role".

Soon, Lining launched a frenzied wave of internationalization, including the sponsorship of the French gymnastics team and other major handwriting, and even in the vicinity of Le Louvre Museum, also opened Lining's first overseas store.

At this time, Lining's commercials on television turned into a little girl standing on the streets of Paris, dancing with beautiful red ribbons.

Zhang Qing said he had reservations about such abrupt changes.

But the formulation of the previous "national sportswear team" is now another slightly critical voice within Lining.

"People believe that the four national teams that Lining sponsored by shooting team, diving team, table tennis team and gymnastics team is very difficult to achieve real results, because at that time, athletes would not play in Lining's clothing when they were playing."

In 2001, Lining and Chen Yihong broke up. The latter decided to run another sports brand KAPPA by themselves. The general manager of Li Ning Co was promoted by Zhang Zhiyong, who was promoted by Chen.

After taking over, the first thing Zhang Zhiyong did was to invite Gallup to make a comprehensive market survey for Lining brand.

The survey results show that Li Ning Co has at least three major problems: firstly, the target consumers are not clear; secondly, the brand is facing the danger of being forgotten; thirdly, the brand personality is not distinct.

Zhang Zhiyong decided to carry out "brand remolding" to Lining and strengthen the image of Lining sports brand internationalization.

The first step is to reclaim old employees who are old fashioned and are not suited to the company's development.

Secondly, introduce some talents with more international perspective.

Zhang Qing, who held reservations, gradually discovered that he was slowly marginalized, and he was told to take charge of "brand PR and brand asset management". After feeling that his actual power was weakened, Zhang Qing chose to leave.

Although he left Lining, Zhang has always been concerned about the development of the company. He feels that Lining still has many improvements. For example, Lining's R & D capability, the speed of pushing new products, and the judgement of grasping the trend have been greatly improved and more and more internationalized.

But some things can not be solved by internationalization.

Some of the most fundamental problems in Zhang Qing seem to have not been well resolved from beginning to end.

For example, in the system coordination.

Lining uses Nike's light asset operation mode to set up its creative design headquarters in Beijing, Hongkong and the west coast of the United States, so as to enhance the company's overall creative design and product research and development capabilities.

However, good products are often not reflected in the market.

When Lining had a strong brand appeal, dealers were skeptical about the product, so that many of Lining's outstanding products were usually caught up in inadequate distribution.

This problem has not been solved very well.

On the other hand, he also has some criticisms about the performance of "professional" star athletes signed by the company.

From Li Tie, O'neal, Evan Turner to Isinbayeva, they are either too angry or lacking in influence. The mode of enhancing brand image through star appeal is always difficult to achieve.

Why can PEAK's second tier brands sign NBA, and Lining's signing is always a failure?

Zhang Qing felt more distressed by changes in the style of management of the company's managers.

The agent of a star who was signed by Li Ning Co once told him that on the signing of the contract, the outlaws and evasions among the various departments within the company made him feel "incredible".

"I really want to ask Lining's leaders. Do they have Lining from their hearts as a brand that they can remember at their bosom? Do they regard Lining as their career?" Zhang Qingye was puzzled.

He felt that Lining did not lack lofty positioning and vision. What he lacked was a persistent spirit and perseverance.

On the other hand, from his tone, he clearly felt full of feelings about Li Ning Co.

The resignation paratroopers want to be more professional (once Le Shuyu, a controversial Li Ning Co, said she had been walking professionally and fashionably on her legs while she was in Lining. "Only fashionable things are more likely to be noticed, and a few people are deliberately biased and opposed because they do not know the facts."

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Lining has always wanted to be more professional in sports brand, just like Nike's performance in basketball and Adidas in football.

In 2007, Le Shuyu, a 43 year old Taiwanese, landed Lining as the general manager of the brand.

How to integrate two elements of fashion and fashion becomes a problem Le Shuyu urgently needs to solve.

Before that, Le is deputy general manager of Guangzhou Zhongwei daily necessities Co. Ltd., and has rich experience in running fashion brands.

In the past year, old Lining, Chen Yihong and KAPPA swept the whole sports brand market. Under the impact of fashion, avant-garde and bold fashion, Li Ning Co realized that changes must be made.

Li Ning Co conducted a market survey of consumers. The report shows that the actual consumption of Lining brand has a certain deviation compared with the target consumer group, the overall age is larger, and the crowd aged 35~40 is over 50%.

Zhang Zhiyong, who is regarded as the main target group of new generation creators and 13~26 years old, often finds Lining not "cool".

After the airborne, Le Shuyu immediately started a brainwashing campaign of the fashion concept inside Lining, and began to integrate Lining's overall design.

More designers resigned and their design was denounced as "too rubbish", and the vacant jobs were filled by designers from multinational companies, the new chief designer came from Nike.

Le Shuyu became the most controversial figure in the Li Ning Co.

A popular piece is that at a brainstorming session, Le Shuyu ordered his employees to shout "we will succeed" one after another.

The most shouting girl got 1000 yuan reward on the spot.

"The scenes are very like brainwashing sessions of pyramid selling!" these are required to perform in a highly performable way, which in fact makes it difficult for employees to accept.

It is also required that every day, when the time comes, all the people in the company must stop their work and do rhythmic gymnastics with the rhythm.

This approach is said to come from Nike, in order to promote the spirit of sports.

But a year later, the controversial Le Shuyu went away.

Some people think that this is the inevitable result of two cultural conflicts between fashion and profession.

Le Shuyu is considered to be the maker of all these problems because she is too loud and too radical.

In 2010, 4 years after leaving Lining, Le Shuyu responded. "In fact, I am not a fashion proponents. On the contrary, I was a proponents of Lining brand sports.

When I first arrived at Li Ning Co, I found that many products were not professional enough, professional products had no professional function appeal, fashion products had no sense of fashion.

Le Shuyu said that the demand for breaking through professional and fashion was very urgent. She had been walking professionally and fashionably on two legs. "But fashion is easier to be concerned about. A few people are deliberately biased and opposed because they do not know the truth."

After leaving Lining, Le Shuyu and her friend founded a management consulting organization, who has been a professional manager for many years. She said, "I just want to look at the world from a different angle and reexamine the clothing industry."

After Le Shuyu left, the Li Ning Co did not give up its previous fashion.

On the contrary, it enhanced the promotion of fashion elements and gained more market share in the attempt.

Practice has proved that fashion and professional line are not antagonistic.

Le Shuyu felt that he was "misunderstood" and "misread".

Lining's brand focus shifted quickly.

In June 30, 2010, after three years of grinding a sword, Li Ning Co launched an improved new LOGO. The new LOGO is inspired by the intersection of Lining pommel horse.

Lining's attitude was clearly demonstrated in the bid change conference. "Lining needs to win more support after 90 years". The slogan of "ten years is possible" has also changed to Make the change.

After changing the bid, Lining brand claimed to focus on the first tier cities, and opened 70 sixth generation flagship stores in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, and began to compete with Nike and other international brands.

All these seem to have not been recognized by more people.

"The sportswear national team will be internationalized for a while. It will be fashionable for a while. After a while, it will not understand what Lining really wants to do," an industry insider pointed out sharply.

Lining's high expectations of young consumers are more unique. "That sign is not as good as before, like a cottage brand."

An evaluation after 90.

In fact, Lining never lacks the spirit of innovation and initiative, but in any direction, it never seems to have lasted for more than two years.

In the eyes of the public, this change and swing are somewhat unstable and disturbing.

The Chinese old man? The long world five? (the long distance of growth, let Lining at any time may fall into the domestic dilemma, the international unsuccessful dilemma. "

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Despite the replacement of partners and managers, Lining's international path has not stopped.

The standard of Zhang Zhiyong's internationalization for Lining is that the overseas part's income is over 20%, and the internationalization of Lining can be called success. At present, Lining's overseas contribution rate is less than 5%.

And some industry experts pointed out that the long growth distance left Lining at any time in the dilemma of domestic failure and internationalization.

But Zhang Zhiyong said that in the next 20 years, Li Ning Co should not only be the leader of the Chinese market, but also the top five of the world sporting goods market.

Another unconfirmed claim is that Zhang Zhiyong himself had planned to retire, but he did not find the right replacement.

In fact, in recent years, the competition of sports brand has long been hot.

The "Fujian Gang" headed by Anta, XTEP and PEAK suddenly rose. They quickly completed the coverage of the important two or three line market of Lining in the way of franchised stores with the spirit of grass roots swept by the autumn wind (micro-blog).

Anta and other stores operate flexibly and take footwear as an example. Their prices are usually below 250 yuan, and most stores are directly managed by headquarters. They can react quickly to the market. Lining's shoes cost about 35% more than that of ANN.

In the first tier cities, under the strong pressure of Nike and Adidas, Lining can not avoid a positive battle.

Lining's price is usually about 10% lower than that of Adidas and Nike. In the first tier cities, Lining's brand influence and the price difference of 10% are usually an awkward limit.

But international brands should be much faster than people expected.

Shortly after Li Ningxin's brand strategy was released, Nike took the international brand as an example and began to sink to the two or three tier city.

In August 2010, Nike launched 300 yuan low price shoes, which is 25% lower than the current price.

The survey shows that China's two or three tier cities, the most acceptable price of footwear in the market is between 170~250 yuan. As an international brand, Nike is priced at 300 yuan, and it will still attract the 90's generation to pursue the brand, which happens to be Lining's target consumer group.

Xu Tailin received the news that the company is brewing the next round of price increases.

And the message conveyed is that the young Li Ning Co's determination to advance towards high-end professional sports brand seems to stick to the new internationalization strategy.

A Hebei distributor who did not want to reveal his name and said he was under the same pressure said: "we all think Lining is the leader of the local brand, so we choose to believe it.

It is only because we do not know why, it has repeatedly pursued innovation and change, and has also paid a lot of cost and effort, but it has never been able to achieve the desired effect.