[On the spot, I am thinking]

Original title: "Small and beautiful" also has unlimited power and possibility

Luo Xiaoxiao

How many novel patterns can you make when making an umbrella? Recently, Lei Penglin, the boss of an unknown umbrella factory, became popular on the Internet because of the design and manufacture of many "brain opening" umbrellas. In the video he uploaded to the social networking platform, there are "reflective umbrellas" that can be seen from a distance in the dark, "lovers' umbrellas" that can be used by two people, umbrellas with their own fans, and even "umbrellas that can rain" that can generate spray... These umbrellas are sold to the outside world, and some of them have sold tens of thousands of pieces.

Lei Penglin has been dealing with "Umbrella" for more than 20 years. Due to the fierce competition brought about by homogenization, the factory she opened was in trouble in 2019. Under the crisis, he tried to make his umbrella more personalized while broadening his sales channels through e-commerce and social networking platforms.

In 2022, an umbrella with flashlight designed and produced by Lei Penglin attracted some netizens' attention, and many people also left messages describing the style and function of the umbrella they wanted. Since then, the comment area has become the inspiration source of Lei Penglin's team and the "wishing pool" of netizens. Umbrellas "only for sale" have been launched one after another. Consumers have bought the products they like, and the nearly closed factory has also come back to life.

Lei Penglin and the Umbrella Factory first benefited from their ability to sincerely listen to the voices of netizens and put them into practice. To use the current popular word, it is "listening". Some netizens commented that it was not safe to walk with umbrellas at night, and they wanted to have a reflective umbrella. This idea received a lot of praise, so Lei Penglin made a "reflective umbrella" and soon sold 70000 umbrellas. Cherish and seriously treat every netizen's comment, and then realize their wishes. This awareness and practice of accurately matching consumer demand is crucial for both business giants and small businessmen.

This kind of "persuasion" is also reflected in Lei Penglin's silence in many videos, showing the unique function, firmness, size and other characteristics of the umbrella with the most intuitive actions, and introducing the relevant knowledge of the umbrella. This "no nonsense" approach has made many netizens applaud.

In the final analysis, the essence of this "persuasion" is actually innovation.

Innovation is the breakthrough of high-end industry, and the transformation of an umbrella is also innovation. Innovation has nothing to do with size. It is meaningful as long as it is guided by user needs and problem solving. Lei Penglin has made a lot of fancy umbrellas, but some of them may sell less, which does not mean that the efforts from design to production are wasted. Because, while bringing flow and profits, innovation has also accumulated experience and created the quality of unremitting improvement, which can enable an enterprise to avoid self repetition and inertia operation to a large extent, so as to win more development opportunities.

Because they always introduce creative umbrellas seriously in videos, netizens call Lei Penglin, 38, "umbrella uncle". Despite the sharp increase in popularity, "Uncle Umbrella" is not in a hurry to "make the factory bigger and stronger". He is very clear that such an umbrella follows the niche market route.

In September last year, there were washing brands and many old brands of domestic products that turned red together, and the live broadcast room once had more than 100000 people online at the same time. As the heat fades, the number has now dropped to about 10000. However, this does not prevent the production factory of the brand from optimizing products and launching new products every once in a while, and some best-selling products are also in the state of "being sold out when they are on the shelves" for a long time. In the view of its management team, the brand can continue to develop healthily as long as it has a certain number of fixed consumer groups, even if it cannot compete with the number of international famous customers.

In Japan and Germany, there are many small enterprises with a history of more than 100 years. They may not be so famous, but they have always been firmly rooted in the market segments by virtue of high-quality products and become solid cornerstones in the national economic system.

In fact, before this success, "Uncle Umbrella" had found a development model suitable for his factory by relying on the niche market. There must be many such "umbrella uncles" in industries and fields that people still cannot see, and we hope that more people will be willing to become "umbrella uncles". Make products with heart and serve one or two small groups with heart. "Small and beautiful" also has infinite power and possibility.