"SARS" period car sales surge, crisis and opportunity in 2020 can history repeat itself?

Who would have thought that the year 2020 would start with a global pneumonia epidemic? To prevent further outbreaks, people around the world had to stay home, and many small and medium-sized enterprises were forced to shut down. The automotive industry has also been greatly affected by the original plan has been disrupted, coupled with the domestic car market is in the winter period, the epidemic on China's automotive industry is undoubtedly worse.

But on the positive side, the epidemic may bring new opportunities to China's auto industry.

"SARS" revelations

The 2020 Xin Guan epidemic, people recall the fear of 2003 by the "SARS" dominated, but the automotive market that year has shown an "atypical" side. Atypical" side.

According to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM), China's auto market maintained a double-digit growth rate every year from 2001 to 2005, and it even soared in 2003, with year-on-year sales growth reaching 70 percent. Obviously, the "SARS" did not have a negative impact on the Chinese car market in 2003, but seems to have a role in promoting.

So by 2020, will this history repeat itself?

The answer is clearly negative.

First of all, the 2003 surge in auto sales depended on China's market environment, which formally joined the WTO in 2001 and then put the nation's economy on the fast track in the following years. The automobile market at that time was a blue ocean, with only 24 million cars in the country. At the same time, the automobile market at that time was basically in a state of oversupply, and the sales volume actually depended on the amount of production. On the contrary, in 2020, the overall economic growth is slowing down, consumer demand continues to be low, and the outlook for the car market is still not optimistic, so it is obviously unlikely that you want to realize the 03 years of soaring car sales.

However, in the same way as the situation in '03, the impact of the epidemic, people's demand for buses, cabs, coaches, subways and other public **** transportation has been greatly reduced, to a certain extent, to promote the intention of consumers to buy a private car, so by the second half of the epidemic, the country's auto sales are still expected to get back on track.

Auto new retail taking shape

The 2003 SARS epidemic, the biggest opportunity can be said to be the rise of the e-commerce industry, but also indirectly led to third-party payments, modern logistics and other industries. And this epidemic, such as online shopping for vegetables, online medical consultation, buy drugs delivered to your door, online classes, online office, etc., has begun to become the daily life during the epidemic.

And for the traditional automobile franchise stores and related automobile industries that rely heavily on offline operations, the new retail model may have gradually taken shape. The new retail model in the final analysis is actually the way to buy a car online, affected by the epidemic, the offline traffic has been sharply reduced, the current major car brands have launched online marketing activities, such as online showroom, VR car, live car or even online transaction, door-to-door test drive, etc., so that you do not have to leave the door to complete the entire process of choosing a car to the delivery of the car.

Online car sales is not a new thing, there have been a number of car retailers have tried this, but by the traditional concept of car purchase and other aspects of the impact of online car sales and not much success. But the outbreak of the epidemic has had a profound impact on people's thinking and cognition, behavioral habits and consumption patterns, and online car purchases will receive more and more attention.

For the automotive industry, the transition from the offline retail channel marketing model to the new network economic model will not only expand online platforms and channels, expanding the customer base, for the online transaction as well as the online service will also have a greater space for development.

Of course, the car as a large consumer, offline transactions currently still seems to be the most conservative and secure way, but with the further development and maturity of the new retail model, the future online + offline combination of the consumer model will become mainstream, breaking through the time and geographical limitations, undoubtedly more stable consumer desire to buy a car.

Healthy demand opens new way out

Under the new crown epidemic, in addition to the shift in the retail model, China's car companies also seem to have found a new breakthrough in terms of products.

Geely recently announced an upfront investment of 370 million yuan to start research and development of an "all-around healthy car" with virus-prevention features. The car will be a consumer-grade product mainly for general consumers. In addition, Geely will develop China's first automotive air conditioning filter with "N95-type mask" as the filtration standard, and create Geely's unique G-CLEAN: Geely Intelligent Eco-Health Circle. The industry-leading IAPS Intelligent Air Purification System will be developed, and the first batch of products will be equipped on the 150 Geely Jiayi in the donated infected areas.

GAC New Energy has also invested a total of 500 million yuan in research and development of related product features, and the Aion series of products are equipped with a solar self-circulation system, an AQS air quality management system, an anion green purification system, and a green purification system. The Aion series products are equipped with a number of in-vehicle air filtration technologies such as "solar energy self-circulation system", "AQS air quality management system", "negative ionization system" and "dual-layer flow heat pump air conditioning".

The WEY brand also publicized its equipped ? "intelligent ecological forest protection air conditioning", which carries the HEPA filter on the diameter of 0.3 microns and above the particles filtering effect of up to 99.97%, comparable to N95-type masks.

In fact, in-vehicle health and ecology has always been an important topic in automotive research and development. In recent years, the air quality has seriously declined, and people are paying more attention to the need for health, and this epidemic is amplifying the importance of that level.

For domestic cars, "homogenization" is still a difficult breakthrough, and the epidemic more attention to the topic of "health", undoubtedly become a new way out of the Chinese car companies, which will be China's auto industry in the field of health and safety products. The new breakthrough in the development of health and safety products in China's automobile industry.

Under the epidemic, there is a great deal of grief, but in fact there are also crises and opportunities, for those who are actively seeking change in the car companies, the outbreak of the epidemic, just a catalyst.

This article comes from the author of the automobile home car, does not represent the views of the automobile home position.