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Dong Peng, a reporter from 21st Century Business Herald, reports from Chengdu

In just three years, the Chengdu market has quickly launched five "non-standard" commercial projects. Chengdu, which has a special position in the Chinese consumer market, is now becoming the veritable "first city for non-standard commerce."

On June 28, Chengdu’s innovative offline business, CyPARK, officially opened. In the first weekend of its opening, it attracted more than 120,000 visitors and attracted the attention of many innovative brand managers in the industry, as well as commercial and consumer investors from all over the country.

In recent years, businesses that are different from traditional commercial complexes and have certain personalization and differentiation are collectively referred to as "non-standard businesses" by the market. These new forms of commercial entities have appeared in major cities across the country, including TX Huaihai in Shanghai, Tianmuli in Hangzhou, Aranya in Qinhuangdao, and so on.

In the race for non-standard business, Chengdu unexpectedly rises.

From Regular Yuanye in 2021, to COSMO and Ancestral Hall Street in 2023, to Luhu CPI in 2024 and the CyPARK which has just officially opened, Chengdu has been far ahead in offline business innovation in recent years, and has been in a clear leading position in both quantity and quality.

It is no accident that Chengdu has become a major hub for non-standard businesses. Changes in the macro-economy and consumption trends, as well as the trend of social networking, have brought huge development space and opportunities to non-standard businesses.

Yang Rui, the operator behind CyPARK and founder of Saiyuan Business, recently said in an interview with 21st Century Business Herald that“Non-standard business has grown in size and influence. It may not be perfect, but the business logic is becoming more mature and clear. It has become an important trend and direction in the current commercial retail field.。”

Behind the popularity of "non-standard business"

“The fundamental reason for the explosion of innovative business in the past two years is that both the market and supply have undergone significant changes. Changes in the macroeconomic environment have led to a structural shift in consumer demand trends.” Yang Rui said this when talking about the popularity of non-standard businesses in recent years.

At the beginning of the interview, Yang Rui made it clear that he did not like the term "non-standard".

Over the past years, he has worked for a benchmark enterprise in China's commercial retail industry, and has been responsible for the development and operation of many iconic commercial entities across the country. Three years ago, he resigned and started his own business because of the changes in the entire commercial consumer market.

Yang Rui believes that on the one hand, the growth of high-end, symbolic luxury consumption has begun to slow down, and consumers are more concerned about cost-effective products. On the other hand, consumption in segmented vertical markets has shown significant growth, such as segmented sports such as cycling and running, niche independent designer fashion, plant pets, and aromatherapy and fragrance lifestyle categories.

The rise and fall of one company and the rise and fall of another reflect a change in the business world worth hundreds of billions of dollars. The capital market has shown some signs of improvement, with the market value of Lululemon, a yoga company, surpassing Adidas at one point.

In the outdoor lifestyle brand consumer market, Arc'teryx has become hard to find, and niche sports outdoor brands such as ON and Patagonia are also highly sought after by users.

In the past few decades, the consumer goods giants that have emerged in China have mostly pursued quality and scale, but now they have shown the characteristics of "de-symbolization" and the big brand effect has begun to weaken.

Gaining mutual recognition with customers in a certain interest group, fully expressing the brand's values, and building communities through high-frequency activities and content production are increasingly becoming ways for emerging consumer brands to attract consumers.

This trend change is not an isolated case. In the 1990s, when Japan's economic development entered a stable stage, high-cost-effective retail brands such as Uniqlo and Muji emerged, and a large number of cutting-edge fashion and lifestyle brands were born. With the maturity of the consumer market, diversification and personalization have become an inevitable trend under the premise of ensuring product quality.

As demand and supply change, the corresponding business platforms and channels will also change. After more than a decade of development, online platforms have gone through a period of rapid growth, and the cost and difficulty of acquiring customers have begun to increase significantly.

"At present, for a new brand, the cost of acquiring customers online may be several hundred yuan, while offline it is only a few dozen yuan." Yang Rui introduced, "During our research, we also found that the sales efficiency of some offline channels has shown a significant recovery."

During the period of rapid urbanization in China, offline shopping malls also achieved rapid expansion through homogeneous replication. However, China's urbanization process has entered a new stage, with growth and efficiency improvement going on at the same time, and channels and platforms will also grow into a new look.

Yang Rui believes that homogeneous supply will face growth bottlenecks in the future. Platforms and channels, especially offline, need further innovation and enrichment to match market changes.

Opportunities for social and community

"2020 is a watershed year for the offline commercial market. Before that, consumers' first demand was shopping, but after 2020, socializing became the first demand of consumers, and shopping became second," said Yang Rui, who has been responsible for positioning, product development and investment operations for a long time.

For new forms of offline commercial platforms, this also means the need to reshape their functions and scenarios.

Space changes are the first to be affected, and the first generation of non-standard commercial spaces have emerged. TX Huaihai, Tianmuli, Anaya, Cosmo, etc. have begun to show highly differentiated efforts in design and aesthetic expression, which are more open, more natural, more public, and more personalized.

They have different styles, but they are all completely different from traditional department stores and shopping malls. This is especially true for CyPARK, which is located in the core area of ​​Tianfu Fourth Street in Chengdu and has an open commercial district of 40,000 square meters.

In addition to spatial changes, the more specific and profound change in non-standard business is the re-organization and editing of business content, that is, the composition of specific brands, products and services.

Previously, whether it was online e-commerce platforms or offline department stores and shopping malls, they were basically organized and arranged based on categories. Their essence was based on the logic of commodities and goods. This was true for long-term commercial retail core shopping malls in various places.

Now, a group of business anomalies who are accustomed to the rapid growth of traditional business are starting to abandon this path.

They are beginning to like organizing emerging brands that have more connotation and content expression capabilities and are good at communicating with the new generation of consumers. This is also the real reason why the brand of the manager has been able to achieve certain development in the past few years.

But Yang Rui’s goal goes beyond this.

He introduced, "This time, CyPARK has gone a step further. It not only pursues differentiation and freshness, but also completely changes the content editing from being based on category catalogs to being based on people. CyPARK is no longer a platform based on goods and commodities, but a platform that carries different communities. We first select the communities that are suitable for existence and development in this project, and then organize goods and services around the real needs of these people."

Cycling is a relatively important theme in CyPARK's positioning. For this community, CyPARK no longer considers what bicycle brands there are and how to pack the goods like traditional businesses do, but begins to understand the real needs of the cycling community.

In addition to the usual bicycle retail, CyPARK also arranges customization, accessories, repairs, as well as the organization of cycling events, event sharing, and even supply stations.

The "audacity" of the new non-standard business leaders has changed the core system of business logic from traditional goods logic to differentiated and personalized people, as well as content related to people and goods.

Why Chengdu? Can internet celebrities remain popular for a long time?

Chengdu has launched five non-standard commercial projects in the past three years. These projects have become new popular check-in spots in Chengdu. In terms of quantity and scale, Chengdu has become the country's "No. 1 city for non-standard commerce."

Why is Chengdu's retail business performing like this? Can these new online business influencers avoid being a flash in the pan?

Yang Rui believes that this is not only because Chengdu has a huge consumer market with a population of over 20 million, but also because Chengdu is a city that ranks at the forefront in terms of fashion, life attitude and lifestyle, and consumer demand is very diverse, inclusive and open.

Compared with cities in coastal areas, Chengdu has relatively low land rent costs, and the local government has been actively encouraging the development of economic consumption, resulting in the emergence of new, interesting and vibrant emerging brands in Chengdu.

This abundance on the supply side provides "non-standard business" with a rare opportunity for growth.

“Many existing non-standard businesses have done very well in terms of spatial expression, scene and aesthetic creation, but whether they can achieve sustained growth in the future or even truly form new product models depends on who can find a reasonable path in long-term and sustainable operations."Yang Rui said.

Taking CyPARK here as an example, the project location is quite special. It is surrounded by several major cultural facilities including Chengdu Hi-Tech Library, Chengdu Hi-Tech Zhongyan Grand Theater and Chengdu Youth Palace Hi-Tech Campus, and has a strong atmosphere of cultural and artistic consumption.

After the renovation was restarted, Saiyuan designed a special pure white semi-open circular commercial belt, which encloses a huge square.

Unlike traditional commercial buildings, the entire CyPARK is completely open, without a single glass door. It is dotted with green plants and water features. Consumers can ride bicycles through the park, bring their children, and walk around with their pets.

The brand presentation also has obvious differentiation characteristics. In addition to highly professional sports and outdoor brands, and niche designer collection brands, there are also a lot of cultural and lifestyle content. There are three bookstores of different types alone.

"These are not the most important." Yang Rui said that the focus will be on continued community operations in the future, and will work with brand partners to provide no less than 400 community activities each year.

In his opinion, even if each event may only involve a dozen or dozens of people, frequent links and interactions can form long-term and continuous output and binding for the target population.

Relying solely on innovation in offline operations is not enough to fully face the future. Under the current wave of big model technology, business leaders are exploring how to push the e-commerce era from mobile Internet and o2o to AI e-commerce, although the effect is not yet obvious.

"In terms of digitalization, we have also made heavy investments. In the mini program that is about to be launched, we have integrated a series of technologies such as AR navigation, seamless points, and intelligent customer service. We hope to optimize the consumer experience and improve service efficiency through effective digital products." Yang Rui said.

The personalized trend of non-standard business provides space for the integration of more innovative technologies.

"We have been discussing with our partners about introducing AI technology into community operations in the future to further enhance the scope and efficiency of community operations," Yang Rui introduced.

The effectiveness of the many plans of non-standard business explorers is still unknown, but at least they have provided a new direction for the transformation or upgrading of domestic commerce from the perspective of product supply and operation. This is also one of the options for exploring new engines for domestic consumption growth.