CBME China Interview

Alicia Chen, Overseas Sales & Marketing Director of CBME has answered our questions for our new “Sectoral Interviews” section as our first guest.

1-How did this difficult period affected the baby and child products sector market especially in your country?

We split the baby product market in China into 2 main sales channels – Online & Offline. An Obviously offline market consisting of baby retail stores, department stores, super & hyper markets are badly affected due to the pandemic. However, certain product categories did extremely well during China’s lockdown period back in February such as nutritional baby food, healthy snacks, baby health supplements, toys & children’s furniture such as study desks and bedding. When parents get to spend more time with their kids, they tend to buy more than usual.

On the other hand, we also have clothing products faced with huge challenges, consider that everyone is staying at home, sales for children’s clothing shrunk drastically from February till early April. Also, consider that many diaper factories face the expropriation of their assets from the government to produce a face mask. Once the production is converted to produce a face mask, this production line will not be able to revert or change to producing other types of products. Similar to diapers & clothing, strollers and car seat makers also suffer from the impact. 

2-Do you think any changes or revisions will be made in marketing and sales strategies after this period?

At the moment everyone is going online. Before the pandemic, the baby product market in China split between 70% offline and 30% online. Right now, I believe is about 60% online and 40% offline. Back in 2003 during the SARS outbreak, it boosted Alibaba’s sales and people start to realize the need for Online/ Digitization. Same for a pandemic, this changes consumer purchasing behavior, we, therefore, will need to adapt accordingly. 

3-Do you think that this period will change the baby and child products sector in terms of consumer expectations? Can you share your expectations about these changes?         

From the consumer perspective, Safety, Quality, and Design are still the top 3 most important elements when a consumer makes their purchase for the little ones. This has not changed, and we believe this will continue for some time here in China.

4-What will be the changes in the trends of the sector in the coming period?

Brands tend to focus on B2C sales channels for the moment, trying to sell off their goods as much as possible, consider the fact that “Cash is King”, especially in- bad times like this. However, we believe the offline sales channel will slowly reestablish in early Q1 2021, for now, the majority of the focus will be online at least until the end of 2020.

5- What messages would you like to give to TURKEY as CBME China?

 Be Positive and Stay Safe, after a storm comes a calm, things will get better and better.

6-What’s new could be expected at CBME China 2020 this year?

“CBME Online Business Matching Platform” will be launched to all trade buyers and our exhibitors from the child, baby, and maternity industry for free, which aims to connect the exhibitors and buyers with intelligent business matching services from online to offline regardless of physical restriction and time limit.

Get more information about CBME China and their new digital initiatives via www.cbmexpo.com

Published Date: 23 Jule 2020