Liu Xiaolu Founded NEIWAI Underwear Brand, And The Annual Sales Volume Increased By 6 Times With Uniqlo Model

How would you choose sexy underwear and comfortable underwear? A few years ago, the former would have won an overwhelming victory in the hearts of female consumers, but now this Libra has begun to swing.

"The awakening of women's self-consciousness makes them start to pay attention to the comfort and health of underwear". Based on the judgment of this trend, Liu Xiaolu founded "NEIWAI" in 2012 domestic and foreign ”(hereinafter referred to as "inside and outside") The brand, starting from the market segment, focuses on wearing a comfortable, zero body feel, no steel ring bra, which is somewhat out of place with the market environment that emphasized gathering together and shaping the curve of women's breasts with thick pads at that time.

Over the past four years, with the classic product of "wearing it, you can't take it off", more than 100000 female consumers with medium and high-end consumption level have accumulated inside and outside, and they have basically formed the habit of re purchasing every three months. In the past six months, the brand repurchase rate has exceeded 40%. In 2016, with the gradual popularity of steel ring free and sports underwear, the brand also ushered in a comprehensive outbreak. The annual sales at home and abroad exceeded 30 million yuan, a six fold increase over last year. On the day of Double 11, the amount of additional purchase exceeded 12 million yuan, up nearly 9 times year-on-year.

At the end of 2016, after obtaining the round of financing of Pre-A, both internal and external companies obtained the round A financing of tens of millions of yuan led by Illuma Capital and followed by Zhenge Fund. With the promotion of capital, the first store was officially opened in Shanghai in December, in addition to the investment in the gym. In Liu Xiaolu's plan, the offline strategy will be comprehensively launched in 2017.

The first physical store inside and outside NEIWAI

Gather shaping OUT?

Previously, the underwear manufacturer Vinnie released the 2016 semi annual report, which showed that the company's profit fell by nearly 90%. This was once backed by Victoria's Secret (Victoria's Secret) has become a star stock for capital pursuit. Now, the "orders of American customers are less than expected" has also become the main reason for the decline in net profit.

Bee waist, buttocks and long legs, plus a proud career line, Victoria's Secret used underwear to define the sexiness of American women, and it was almost difficult to meet rivals in the underwear market in the United States. Now, the giant of the underwear market, which emphasizes gathering and thick pads shaping the curve of women's breasts, is suffering from recession.

American The underwear brand Aerie under Eagle saw a 26% increase in sales in the first quarter of 2016. "Aerie is not seeking perfect female body with Victoria's Secret advocates sex appeal and confrontation, so the market strategy is successful ". Liu Xiaolu, who came from an underwear family, has a sensitive perception of the market. She analyzed the market at home and abroad, and found that underwear has always used restraint to shape women's career line, but this traditional thinking mode has more opportunities for innovation.

Liu Xiaolu, founder of NEIWAI's internal and external brands

After graduating from Olin Business School of Washington University with a master's degree in finance, Liu Xiaolu worked in a consulting company for five years. During this period, she was responsible for women's consumer goods and luxury brand planning, which also gave her a deeper understanding of women's brands. With the awakening of women's self-consciousness, their perception of sexiness is becoming more diversified. Women began to pay less attention to other people's eyes and more attention to their own feelings.

In 2012, although the concept of comfortable underwear was in the ascendant abroad, the trend did not spread in China. Liu Xiaolu had the intention of "becoming an underwear that women cannot take off". This crazy idea almost stood on the opposite side of most peers, including Victoria's who advocated that women should use "perfect body" to show sexiness at that time Secret。

"Xiaolu is a person who can do products with great confidence. When she started her business, she was alone for more than a year. She completed the first classic design inside and outside.". Chang Xin, a senior investment manager in Qibin's capital consumption industry, said that the classic product is the main product of Liu Xiaolu's domestic and foreign brands: the bra without steel ring.

Previously, Liu Xiaolu set the price of the steel ring free bra, which is the main product of both inside and outside, at 249 yuan, and the audience was mostly young women aged 28 to 35. In order to further expand the customer base, the price has been adjusted at home and abroad this year, and a zero sensitivity introductory series of 169 yuan has been launched to capture young women. "On the e-commerce level, the average customer order of more than 4000 underwear stores of Tmall is 105 yuan, compared with our original customer order of 400 yuan, which makes young people flinch." After testing at different price segments, Liu Xiaolu found that underwear below 120 yuan is generally defined as a low-end brand in the eyes of consumers, and between 140 yuan and 200 yuan is a relatively vacant stage in the market, This is also the price that consumers who buy quality products can afford.

As a result, the new series with more leaping colors and more cost-effective launched inside and outside last year have received a good response from young female consumers, and the sales volume of each model has exceeded 10000 pieces. Among them, the sales volume of zero sensitive and exquisite products leaped to the third place among Tmall's products at the same price, only second to Uniqlo and Mannifen. At present, the proportion of customers aged 20-25 years old in and out of China has increased significantly, reaching 30%.

　　 "Uniqlo" mode: each model is made into a classic model

In terms of products, the internal and external products are made in a classic style, which is somewhat similar to Uniqlo.

Compared with the traditional underwear brands that often have thousands of products, there are only 70 products inside and outside the four year old brand. "In fact, there are very few Uniqlo styles, only 400 in total. Every year, designers adjust the color, size, and parts based on the basic models to support the global sales of more than one trillion yen, which makes the number of orders for each style very deep". Liu Xiaolu believes that this is the way to create classic models. Uniqlo can build low-cost and high-quality product advantages on the supply side, and the same is true for internal and external building ideas.

At home and abroad, there is a cruel product elimination system. When a product cannot reach the basic sales line, it will not enter the next production, and the popular product will slowly evolve into a classic model, maintaining long-term vitality. Among the 70 products inside and outside the company, 30 styles without steel ring accounted for 70% of the sales volume, and the monthly sales of classic models generally reached 5000~6000 pieces. We used 23 products to participate in the Double 11, and reached the 35th place in the bra sales list that day. It is based on the deep sales of products that brings a virtuous circle to the internal and external supply chain.

Different from the traditional underwear, the number of components and parts of the underwear without steel ring is less, which gives the internal and external advantages in the stocking depth of raw materials, and speeds up the production cycle of the product to a certain extent. In addition, the bayonet of product style is strictly controlled, and the depth of sales is enhanced. At the supply chain end, lower production prices can often be obtained both inside and outside, thus creating a cost-effective product.

"We don't take the way of rapid iteration of traditional underwear styles, but let every new product launch have a reason for existence". According to Liu Xiaolu, every product inside and outside the market will go through the process of customer trial, opinion collection, product update and optimization before it is officially launched, which will take 2-3 months.

For women's different chest shapes, the zero sensitivity no steel ring series was launched in March last year. It consists of facing A/B The exquisite model of Cup women, with the imitated steel ring design, has a certain bearing capacity. It mainly focuses on the plump model of large breasted women, the triangular model that ensures women to wear not empty cups, and the bra model that can be worn with sleeveless outerwear that is hot this summer.

In this series, two innovative points of "imitated steel ring design" and "half yard system" are adopted inside and outside. The former has greatly improved the supporting plastic effect under the concept of internal and external zero body feeling. The latter refers to the size of S+, M+, L+and other sizes launched for large women who could not find the right size in the market of the bra without steel ring, and they dabble in the blank market of the bra without steel ring.

Then in August, both inside and outside the company focused on the vigorous leisure sports market in the past two years, and launched a full range of sports products NEIWAI ACTIVE。 Different from the traditional sports brand sports underwear with firm lines and male design, the internal and external sports series adopt the Chinese hand-painted ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink ink.

　　 Who can tell the story better in the next stage

"It used to be a time when sales led the production of products, but now it is still in the stage of cost performance. The arrival of consumption upgrading is followed by the stage of brand story telling. Now consumers have received good aesthetic education, and they are willing to pay for design". Chang Xin believes that the biggest competitiveness at home and abroad lies in that it is a company with design as its core. Its design team is composed of Chinese designers from the world's top design schools RCA, FIT and Esmod, and it is trying to "tell stories" to consumers, which is quite different from the traditional underwear brand that determines the product design and production of the new year by sales.

As the internal and external people who cut into the market with the idea of niche in the past, they adopted the "story telling" method of publicity, which is also the embryonic form of content marketing today. "There is no promotion at the product level inside and outside, but in the form of holding women's public welfare forum to establish recognition in this group". Liu Xiaolu's early "She Says" forum held at home and abroad was an example. The brand invited different young artists to tell their own stories, so as to tear off the original labels on women and awaken women's awareness of living for themselves. "Generally, these women are more well-known in the industry, and they are more likely to influence the women around them". This top-down opinion leader style of play has made the brand's popularity spread rapidly, and has also obtained the first batch of seed users from the financial, advertising and art circles for both inside and outside.

However, the explosive growth of brands is more benefited from the acquisition of new customers. In addition to the adjustment of price and product line, the social media content operation has become the main channel to gain new customers both inside and outside. By sending products to fashion bloggers to wear, both inside and outside, we have established cooperation with professional fashion giants, and exported fashion content to increase brand exposure. This kind of content output allows customers to know effective information, bringing a large number of new passenger flows to the brand.

Both inside and outside the country with a good growth trend have also gained the favor of capital in the past two years. After the Pre-A round of financing in 2015, we obtained a round A financing of tens of millions of yuan led by Illuma Capital and followed by Zhenge Fund in 2016 and abroad. With the promotion of capital, the company not only invested in the gym, but also opened the first store of the brand in December last year.

In front of many people's view that the real economy is shrinking, Liu Xiaolu has positioned 2017 as a year to comprehensively launch the offline strategy. She thinks that new retail has been mentioned frequently this year, "Uniqlo is a good case, in fact, offline entities have been recovering Underwear brand In terms of online experience, there is still a lack of good experience, such as measuring customers. The integration of online and offline is the trend of the future ". In her plan, domestic and foreign On the basis of building a "comfortable life", it will continue to enhance the brand value and grow into an international lifestyle aesthetic brand.

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