The "new three things" of young people: Tesla, BYD, Xiaopeng?

Last month, one of my post-95 colleagues, Xiao Zhang, ordered a Xiaopeng P7, the first car in his life.Thirty years ago, Zhang's father took the Santana as his first car.Times have changed, and two generations of young people's demand for automotive products has undergone earth-shaking changes.

In fact, during the 30 years of rapid development of China's auto industry, a number of "best-selling cars" that are highly sought after by young users have emerged in different periods. Suoba, K5 and Malibu, which were dubbed the "Three Treasures of Diaosi" during the growing period, all highlight the cost-effectiveness behind the products.Nowadays, with the popularity ofnew energy vehicles, the car products that young people are keen on can no longer be simply measured by "cost performance". New energy vehicles represented by Tesla, BYD and Xiaopeng Motors are gradually becoming the favor of young consumers. "New Three".

The new three against the "old forces"

In the past two years, with the rapid growth ofnew energyvehicles, BYD's sales and market value have soared.In the sedan market, BYD Qin PLUS DM and Han EV have been among the top ten in sales in their market segments for many consecutive months, competing with a number of joint venture fuel vehicles such as Lavida, Sylphy, and even Audi A6L and BMW 5 Series.

Model Y, image credit: Tesla

On the other hand, new car-making forces are rising rapidly. Tesla Model 3 has evolved into a "street car", and has repeatedly topped the monthly sales list of B-segment cars, while the monthly sales of Model Y has approached Haval H6.Wei Xiaoli, a new force in domestic car manufacturing, is firmly in the first camp. Among them, the Lili ONE under Lili Motors delivered nearly 100,000 vehicles last year, and the sales volume of Xiaopeng P7 also exceeded 60,000 units last year.

When more and more new energy vehicles rank among the top of the sales list in their market segments and keep pace with the best-selling fuel vehicles in the past, it means that new energy and traditional fuel vehicles have already started a head-to-head confrontation.In this contest between old and new forces, new energy vehicles have always been adhering to the attitude of attackers, constantly eroding the market share of fuel vehicles. Correspondingly, fuel vehicles have been losing in this "battle situation", and some weak models have not The power to "fight back".This situation has also made the domestic market in the past two years show that independent brands rely on a high penetration rate of new energy vehicles to develop prosperously, while joint venture brands are in chaos due to the slow progress of the new energy strategy, and their market share continues to decline.

Why do young people prefer new energy vehicles?

Behind the rapid growth of new energy vehicles is the change in young consumers' consumption concept and the result of the continuous technological iteration of major new energy vehicle companies.

Recently, the "Insight Report on New Energy and Fuel Vehicle Users' Consumption Behavior" released by the China Automobile Dealers Association and Car Emperor shows that among the new energy vehicle users, young consumers under the age of 30 account for as high as 43%, and 91% of the users are Male consumers; at the same time, in terms of consumption behavior, new energy vehicle users prefer independent brands and new forces, while fuel vehicle users prefer joint venture brands.

So why do today's young consumers prefer new energy vehicles, especially independent and new power brands?In this regard, automobile industry observers pointed out that most of this generation of young consumers are born in the 1990s. They are a generation that has grown up with the rapid rise of China's economy and the rapid development of the Internet. They are full of confidence in Chinese brands and are relatively easy to accept the new forces of car-making. If they are influenced by online shopping, they are more willing to accept the open and transparent online sales model of new car manufacturers, and they are more willing to share their own car experience.

The 100,000th production car of Xpeng P7 rolled off the production line in March this year. Image source: Xpeng Motors

The "old three" favored by young consumers in the 1990s often win with cost-effectiveness, while today's young consumers' focus on automotive products is shifting from price to technology and sales.This is also a major reason why the expensive BYD Han EV, Tesla Model Y, Xiaopeng P7, etc. are selling well.

At the same time, the heads of major new power auto companies have backgrounds in the Internet and technology fields, so they are well versed in the consumption preferences of young consumers, and they may actively communicate with users in marketing, or throw out controversial Topics harvest traffic and orders.Among them, from Li Bin's "Doesn't have much technical content in battery life" to Yu Chengdong's "Combination of fuel vehicles for the elderly", to Li Xiang's "Driving a gas car is to urinate anywhere, and driving an electric car is to go to the public toilet", you can A glimpse of the upsurge of public opinion caused by its great controversy.But the controversy is often followed by a surge in orders and a surge in stock prices.

Those who win young people win "the world"

For traditional car companies, as the auto industry transforms towards electric intelligence, it is also setting off a youth movement. Traditional auto giants such as Volkswagen, Toyota, and Ford have shouted the slogan of "electric shock new life", with a view to a hundred years later. Embrace young consumers again, and wake up the current young users to "treat them differently".

However, due to the early start of self-owned brands and new power car companies in the field of electric intelligence, they have now taken the first-mover advantage. Although the joint venture brands have been shouting very hard, they still have little profit.Taking the domestic salesof new energy vehicles in May this yearas an example, statistics from the China Passenger Car Association show that the domestic retail penetration rate of new energy vehicles in May was 26.6%, an increase of 15 percentage points year-on-year. Among them, the penetration rate of new energy vehicles among independent brands As high as 51.8%, while the penetration rate of new energy vehicles among mainstream joint venture brands is only 4.0%.

Obviously, compared with the parents of the "old three" era, today's young consumers are no longer obsessed with the halo of joint venture brands.As a senior media person in the industry said: Today's young consumers are in an era of great material abundance, with more choices, and the improvement of economic conditions makes them no longer too sensitive to prices, and they are often sensitive to product design, technology Content and brand marketing methods are more fascinated.

It is based on this, in addition to the new forces of car building, the rapid rise of traditional independent brands through the rapid rise of new energy vehicles is also collectively rising. In this transformation process, they often focus on products and marketing, in order to attract attention of young consumers.For example, at the product level, these new energy brands transformed from traditional car companies use more cutting-edge, exaggerated designs and more advanced intelligent configurations to meet the needs of young consumers for the aesthetic car ownership of "future cars"; In terms of marketing, it abandoned the 4S store model of the traditional fuel vehicle era, and began to learn the gameplay of the new car-making forces, moving closer to user-oriented enterprises.

This is an era of change. When the horn of intelligent electric is sounded, whoever embraces young consumers first will have a better chance of winning in the future competition.