Over the past 20 years, the Vacuum Cleaner market has been lackluster, with low retention rates. In the past two years, the market has ushered in a turning point, and vacuum cleaners have become a dark horse in cleaning appliances. GfK data shows that since the second half of 2016, the offline market of vacuum cleaners has stopped falling. In the first half of 2017, the offline market of vacuum cleaners began to recover, and for the first time there was a positive year-on-year growth in retail sales, with a growth rate of 7%; in the second half of 2017, the year-on-year growth rate of retail sales of vacuum cleaners exceeded 16%; from January to May 2018, the vacuum cleaner line The growth rate of the lower market continued, and the retail volume increased by 18% year-on-year. In the first half of 2018, the growth rate of retail sales in the offline market of vacuum cleaners is expected to exceed 20%. The gradually released market space has also attracted the attention and entry of more enterprises, not only professional brands such as Dyson, Lake, Electrolux, Puppy, and Prosane, but also Panasonic, LG, Midea, Philips, and Haier. Other comprehensive home appliance companies, and even Roidmi, a Xiaomi ecological chain company, want to come in and get a share of the pie. In July 2018, the kitchen appliance company Joyoung acquired a 51% stake in Shangconingjia (China) Technology Co., Ltd. held by Shark, and officially entered the vacuum cleaner industry.
In the face of the increasingly hot market, Liu Xin, product marketing manager of Electrolux, said that the current vacuum cleaner market size has reached 15 billion yuan, with more and more brands, and the market competition is becoming increasingly fierce. With the improvement of consumer awareness and product differentiation It is believed that there will be further integration of brands in the industry.
Although the current market size of vacuum cleaners is not large, there are many categories. "Electrical Appliances" reporter learned that the mainstream products on the market currently include horizontal vacuum cleaners, vertical vacuum cleaners, wireless Handheld Vacuum cleaners, bucket vacuum cleaners and sweeping robots. Among them, the fastest growing market is wireless handheld vacuum cleaners. CMM monitoring data shows that in 2017, a total of 15.668 million wireless vacuum cleaners were sold in the domestic online market, a year-on-year increase of 30.2%. Among them, the sales volume of handheld push rod products grew the fastest year-on-year. Its offline market share increased by 11 percentage points compared to 2016. Ren Huaiqiang, the chief R&D engineer of TEK, has been in the vacuum cleaner industry for 15 years. He told the "Electrical Appliance" reporter from the perspective of product pattern changes that the sales of wireless handheld vacuum cleaners and sweeping robots are both growing rapidly, leading the consumption upgrade of domestic vacuum cleaners. The market share of upright vacuum cleaners has been growing steadily, the market share of mite removal instruments has slowed down, the market share of wired vacuum cleaners has declined rapidly, and horizontal vacuum cleaners have almost no market position.
Talking about the reasons, Qin Jianzhou, product manager of Pusanike, believes that, first of all, the popularity of domestic vacuum cleaners is low, and there is a lot of room for growth. Secondly, domestic users are in the stage of consumption upgrading, and the demand for new home appliances is constantly increasing. Finally, the wireless Handheld Vacuum Cleaner has a good user experience, the product is easy to clean and store, and it has the characteristics of labor-saving, fast and thorough cleaning, so the user reputation and reputation are conducive to the benign spread of the product.
Through interviews with mainstream companies, the reporter of "Electrical Appliances" learned that wireless handheld vacuum cleaners have outstanding advantages compared with traditional household vacuum cleaners. First of all, products with small size and wireless design are more convenient and flexible to use. Children in many families will leave some debris on the floor after eating snacks, which is convenient to clean with a wireless handheld vacuum cleaner; secondly, handheld products are generally equipped with rich The brush head can be used to expand the scope of use, and the furniture gaps, ceilings, and sliding door slots can also be thoroughly cleaned; finally, handheld products also have more advantages in storage. Pursue. "The biggest feature of wireless handheld vacuum cleaners is 'wireless', which is not only more convenient to use, but also has a slim body, which is convenient for storage and does not take up space. Liu Xin believes that wireless handheld vacuum cleaners are one of the products that are most likely to impress Chinese consumers."
The reason, Ren Huaiqiang believes that technology is the main reason for the explosion of the wireless handheld vacuum cleaner market. Among them, the technical development of brushless motors and the improvement of battery life are the main ones. He said that traditional manufacturers such as TEK and Lake have achieved independent research and development of brushless motors, as their core technology for future layout.
The improved battery life also brings great convenience to users. The battery life depends on the type of battery. The batteries on the market are roughly divided into nickel-cadmium batteries, nickel-metal hydride batteries, and lithium batteries. The service life of different battery types is also different. Most brands on the market are powered by lithium batteries. In order to solve this problem, TEK adopts a detachable dual-battery configuration, and the battery life exceeds 1 hour.
Talking about the reasons for the excellent experience, Liu Xin said that the hottest wireless handheld vacuum cleaner on the market is very convenient to use and has no limitation on the use radius. Traditional horizontal vacuum cleaner. The wireless handheld vacuum cleaner breaks through the limitation of frequent plugging and unplugging of the power cord, which is very suitable for the needs of use and release. Today, "post-80s" and "post-90s" have become the main consumers, and integrating household appliances into daily life is also a way of life to improve the quality of life. These have achieved the fact that the sales of wireless handheld vacuum cleaners have skyrocketed.
In the same category of vacuum cleaners, the reason why wireless handheld vacuum cleaners have become the focus of users' purchase is that on the surface, it is a convenient and fast experience, but it is inseparable from the support of technology. Taking the current popular sweeping robots and wireless handheld vacuum cleaners as examples, Qin Jianzhou told the "Electrical Appliance" reporter that most vacuum cleaners currently use the principle of vacuum cleaning, and improving suction is an important technical problem that both categories of products are overcoming.
In addition, the improvement of the vacuum cleaner floor brushing technology also brings an intimate experience to users, especially for families with pets. Chen Huaxia said: "Like Mojie M95 is equipped with a new anti-entanglement technology for the floor brush. Through the unique comb structure, the hair is automatically combed and collected into the dust box, and the roller brush rolls on the ground. It's a hassle to clean up."
Innovate around pain points for a better life
In order to better create products suitable for the usage habits of Chinese users, mainstream companies not only innovate around noise, suction and motors, but also industrial design and technological aesthetics have become the breakthrough points for entrants. The relevant person in charge of Puppy Electric told the "Electrical Appliance" reporter that battery life is a key factor restricting consumer experience. In the face of complex living environments, vacuum cleaners should have longer battery life. The puppy vacuum cleaner adopts an intelligent BMS battery management system, which can monitor the health status of each battery in real time. Through multi-system cooperation, it can run for about 15 minutes in strong mode and about 30 minutes in normal mode. Such endurance can meet the cleaning needs of consumers. In addition, the motor is the core component of the vacuum cleaner and the guarantee of cleaning efficiency. On the motor, the puppy vacuum cleaner has reached a strategic cooperation agreement with Japan's NIDEC motor. The puppy vacuum cleaner is equipped with a new generation of brushless permanent magnet precision motor, which has the characteristics of high power, low power consumption and long life. On the suction issue that users are most concerned about, Puppy Electric actively develops new technologies, and has mastered the world's leading multi-stage and multi-cone, motor control technology, air flow channel noise reduction technology, and innovative air channel technology. These technologies not only ensure that the suction power of the vacuum cleaner is not damaged, but also keep the noise to a minimum.
Talking about the development trend of the wireless handheld vacuum cleaner market in the future, the interviewed companies are generally optimistic, especially under the wave of consumption upgrades and after meeting the rigid needs of major appliances, small household appliances that improve the quality of life are becoming a new growth point. Wireless hand-held vacuum cleaners with selling points such as convenience and cleanliness undoubtedly meet consumers' ever-changing household needs and improve their quality of life. However, the respondents also generally believed that the suction power, battery life and user experience still need to be improved and improved.
