According to the authoritative report, there has two groups in domestic sanitary napkin market at present: foreign brands represented by Whisper and other four brands occupy the high-end market, and these five brands take more than half of market shares; at the same time, the force of domestic brands can not be underestimated. Experts stated that, due to the changing surroundings of supermarkets and the rising number of shops and stores as well as the E-commerce, the purchasing behavior also change and the brand competition become more intensive, domestic and foreign brands are trying to make breakthrough on products and marketing.
1. The core raw material still rely on imports
One of the most core raw materials of sanitary napkin is the fluff pulp which has features such as excellent absorption, appropriate tightness, and good flexibility which takes a major proportion on raw material of sanitary napkins. Due to climatic and geographical limitations, and growth distribution, fluff pulp is mainly growing in the United States and Canada and other North American areas, and there has no domestic manufacturers can produce fluff pulp, therefore, internal manufacturing companies are primarily depend on imports.
2. Foreign brands occupy the high-end market
The domestic market has various brands of sanitary napkins, but the high-end market is basically occupied by foreign brands. P&G, Carefree and other international brands have already penetrated into the domestic market; some of them even set up factories in China, or do mergers and acquisitions of domestic companies. As the insider indicated that, presently, the foreign brands take up 90% of high-end market while the domestic brands takes only 10%.
International brands like P & G and Johnson & Johnson etc, take advantage of financial strength and effective promotions, firmly controlling the market of Chinese first-tier cities. On the other hand, domestic brands make use of national distribution channels hold the market shares of second and third tier cities.
3. Domestic equipment meets the international standards
Domestic sanitary napkins manufacturing began in the early 1980s. China has imported the first production line from Japan for producing straight sanitary napkins which was a breakthrough of Chinese female menstruation products. In the later time, we also imported Italian equipment, and the domestic devices also put into production. To the early 1990s, China had more than 1000 production lines, but the equipment had poor performance, low productivity and could only produce single type of sanitary napkin. From 1995 to 1998, some developed domestic enterprises introduced dozens of international production lines form Italy, Japan, Germany, the US etc, which had greatly improved the technical level and quality of products.
Subsequently, the degree of localization of manufacturing equipment has gradually increased and the accelerated peace of technological transformation and equipment renewal, all these factors contribute to the fierce competition between internal manufactures. The competition not only usher ushers rapid development of sanitary napkin, but also advance the development of production devices, and manufacturing equipment gradually complete procedures from introduction and absorption, and now has basically reached the international level.
4. Alternative products are unpopular at home
Built-in female menstrual products (tampon etc.) account for 30% of market shares in European countries. In China it takes few shares for different consumption concept and hygiene conditions, only some females in specific professional use it, such as athletes. According to some researches, at present, the penetration of tampon is relatively low in Chinese market, only about 3.3% in 2015, the majority consumers are 20 to 39 years old which takes more than 70%.
