In the context of China's rapid economic development, a number of leading enterprises have emerged in all walks of life.

In the field of home appliances, especially the air conditioning market, has always been a battlefield of fierce competition, in the past, Gree and Haier two giants each accounted for one side, after many years, the home appliance market has already undergone earth-shaking changes.

Now, Gree's 24-year sales champion status is not guaranteed, and it is the largest air conditioning group in China that beats it, the new leader, with extremely outstanding performance, defeating Gree and Haier, with an annual income of 120 billion, and an average daily income of 700 million.

So, who is the big man in this industry?

The legendary entrepreneurial history of Midea electrical appliances

Since the reform and opening up, the development of the mainland has attracted the attention of the world in just a few decades, but in the eighties and nineties of the last century, the household appliance industry was not as hot as it is now.

At that time, marriage did not require a car or a house, but the standard "three turns and one ring", which referred to bicycles, watches, and sewing machines, and "one ring" referred to the radio.

Whoever has these four things, who is a quasi-10,000 yuan household, but in a few years, the manufacturing industry is becoming more and more developed, and these four major objects have become worthless, but refrigerators, color TVs, air conditioners, washing machines and other things have become people's new favorites.

Among them, air conditioning can be said to be the most luxurious thing in the year, because refrigerators and color TVs are necessary for people's lives, and they usually choose to buy them first, but air conditioning is dispensable, not to mention that many people have electric fans as a substitute at home.

With the price of household appliances lowered, air conditioning can be regarded as entering thousands of households, and there was a slogan back then: "If you want to improve the quality of life, you must buy air conditioning for your family." ”

The reason why air conditioning can enter thousands of households, in addition to economic and income growth, is also inseparable from the efforts of brands, especially domestic brands, at first, our technology is not as advanced as others, and the market is occupied by foreign brands.

Japan's Panasonic, Toshiba, Daikin and other brands have high sales in China, especially those bigwigs in the business world, and the products have been labeled as high-end and high-grade since their birth.

But in terms of price, or domestic brands are closer to the people, Gree Group is one of them, in the 90s of the last century, Dong Mingzhu led the team to fight the country, with cheaper prices, better service, and gradually let domestic electrical appliances rise.

Due to the problem of tariffs, those overseas brands have never been able to suppress prices, and their market competitiveness has declined seriously, and Gree air conditioning has become the mainstream brand chosen by every household.

Almost at the same time, Midea electrical appliances also squeezed into the market, the brand of Midea, I believe everyone is familiar with it, even the 70s, 80s have heard of their stories.

Many people don't know that Midea has been founded since 1968, and it did not set foot in the home appliance industry at first, but was just a small workshop that produced plastic accessories.

The founder of Midea is Mr. He Xiangjian, who has gone from a farmer to an entrepreneur, from a small plastic factory to an inverter air conditioner, and finally became one of the world's top 500 figures, his life is full of legends.

He Xiangjian was born in a peasant family in Shunde, Guangdong, and after finishing primary school, he went home to farm, and then his family had financial difficulties, so he had to go out to work and work as an apprentice in the factory.

Unexpectedly, He Xiangjian learned quickly, and only a year later, he organized the villagers to set up a plastic production base, and borrowed 5,000 yuan of start-up capital by relying on his connections, which was already a huge amount of money in that era.

In order to fully compete in the market, He Xiangjian also registered the brand name of his own products, which is today's Midea, at first Midea's production workshop was very small, and the most expensive equipment was an injection molding machine, which could only produce plastic bottles.

Under the leadership of He Xiangjian, Midea Company operated very smoothly and made a lot of money, and the partners in the village became rich, so in 1973, he expanded his business and began to produce hardware products.

In 1975, Midea's own funds have exceeded 100,000 yuan, more than 60 workers, into the 80s, people's income increased, all kinds of electrical appliances into the country, Midea saw the business opportunities, so into the home appliance industry.

Midea is not like other brands, which invest a lot of time and energy in advertising, they believe that a good product should use word-of-mouth to impress the people, and a good word-of-mouth is better than any advertisement on the market, so Midea is very low-key.

However, Midea has not done electrical appliances, and the team does not understand this aspect at all, especially when it comes to the design of some components, and it is difficult to find professional talents in China.

But this did not stump He Xiangjian, during that time, he transferred his business to his subordinate departments, thus freeing up time to poach people in large enterprises.

At that time, the old engineer who understood electrical appliances was a very sought-after talent in China, a small factory that produced hardware and plastic accessories, almost no competitiveness, so Midea adopted the most stupid method in the industry, which was to take money and smash it.

At the initial stage of the project, He Xiangjian was able to offer the highest standard salary in the industry, and the company's welfare was very good, which attracted a group of talents to join Midea, and in the next few years, Midea produced the first Pearl brand fan.

The fan is cheap and easy to use, which instantly gave Midea a firm foothold in the electrical appliance industry, and at this time they have begun to consider making air conditioners, including washing machines, refrigerators and other household appliances.

In 1990, Midea Industrial Park planned a new air-conditioning manufacturing plant, with a planned annual capacity of 200,000 units, only two years later, the market economy brought about the shareholding reform, and "Midea Electric" took advantage of this spring breeze to be listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange.

For a time, a large amount of capital poured in, and Midea was finally able to show its strength, successively acquired many air-conditioning factories, and planned to build factories in other provinces to produce electrical appliances for sales.

In 2016, Midea entered the top 500 enterprises, and Midea air conditioning almost became a household name, and even CCTV interviewed this company several times.

According to statistics, in the first half of 2020, Midea Gree accounted for 37.99% and 25.05% of the market share respectively, and Gree has dominated the market for the past 24 years, and now it is surpassed by Midea.

In the same year, the financial report released by Midea showed that the turnover in the first half of the year was 139.067 billion yuan, that is, 700 million yuan per day.

Nowadays, the domestic market has rarely seen foreign brands of electrical appliances, I hope that Gree and Midea can continue to compete peacefully, which is a good thing for the majority of consumers.

Text: Uncle Luo Ying

Edited by Uncle Luo Ying

Resources:

The surging news reported on the ""air conditioning brother" dispute: the gap between the two giants of Midea and Gree is widening丨 company".

Flush Finance reported on "Gree VS Midea Who can become the boss of China's future air conditioning industry".