news

interface news reporter | zhao xiaojuan

interface news editor | xu yue

on september 7, wahaha responded through its official weibo account to previous statements such as "requiring employees to re-sign labor contracts."

the statement released by wahaha stated that the trade union had never heard of any information about the "wahaha rights protection committee", and the trade union has not received any information about the lawsuit filed by the so-called "wahaha rights protection committee"; according to the trade union, the internal share repurchase of the employee shareholding association of hangzhou wahaha group co., ltd. was approved by the unanimous resolution of the member representative meeting, and the relevant agreement was voluntarily signed by the members of the shareholding association, which is legal and valid, and there is no situation that harms the members of the shareholding association; regarding the equity transfer of xiaoshan shunfa, according to the trade union, it is a normal shareholder change of xiaoshan shunfa, the equity transfer is legal and valid, in compliance with relevant laws and regulations, and has been reviewed and confirmed by the industrial and commercial department, and there is no special reason speculated by the outside world.

wahaha said that the management and work order of the trade union are currently normal.

according to a report by china industrial news on september 6, several former employees and internal staff of wahaha group said that because wahaha group recently asked employees to re-sign labor contracts and buy back employee stock ownership shares at a lower price, dozens of employees have recently initiated class action lawsuits to protect their rights and have entered the judicial process, waiting for the court to formally accept the case.

the direct trigger for the above-mentioned lawsuits is that since august 2024, employees of the wahaha group have been asked to terminate their contracts with the wahaha group and instead sign labor contracts with the hongsheng beverage group controlled by zong fuli. after the labor contracts were changed, the "dry stock dividends" enjoyed by employees in the wahaha group were completely cancelled. many employees are very worried that their future income cannot be guaranteed.

interface news interviewed an old employee who had left wahaha many years ago. he told interface news that he held a certain amount of equity when he was employed, and the annual dividend amount was approximately 0.6 yuan per share after tax. however, when he left the company, he signed an equity recovery agreement with wahaha and was unable to comment on the recent wahaha contract transfer controversy.

another current front-line employee told interface news that he did not have equity and as a grassroots staff member had not paid attention to "changes among management." zong fuli's management style is a typical corporate style, which pays more attention to data and motivates grassroots staff through strict systems. since the beginning of this year, the income of wahaha's front-line employees has generally increased.

the wahaha employee told jiemian news that this is one of the changes wahaha has made this year. wahaha has begun to focus on infrastructure construction in first-tier cities. for example, beijing's terminals have relatively little offline maintenance and rarely take the initiative to open up new markets. this year, sales staff are encouraged to contact as many sales terminals as possible and promote new products and refrigerators to store owners.

interface news noticed that wahaha has begun to increase its service delivery on e-commerce platforms. in march this year, wahaha organized a bidding activity for douyin and xiaohongshu delivery agents through its brand public relations department. the services included douyin influencer delivery and xiaohongshu influencer delivery.

in addition, in august this year, wahaha launched a tender for the agency operation service of wahaha creative flagship store, hoping that the store will officially announce and link up with wahaha's new products. the product goal is to create at least 3 online hit products, with an annual sales target of 45 million yuan.

data disclosed by wahaha group at the 2023 annual commendation conference on january 29 showed that wahaha's performance in 2023 was about 50 billion yuan, achieving double growth in revenue and profit. compared with wahaha's sales of 51.2 billion yuan in 2022 and 51.9 billion yuan in 2021, this result did not increase but slightly declined. nongfu spring and master kong beverages had turnover of 42.6 billion yuan and 50.9 billion yuan in 2023, respectively, up 28% and 5% year-on-year, respectively. in particular, master kong beverages has surpassed wahaha in sales volume.

at present, wahaha has accelerated the pace of launching new products and its meticulous approach to channels. for example, in the beijing market, wahaha has launched five batches of refrigerators this year to strengthen channel construction and began to focus on terminal maintenance in high-tier cities. according to the above-mentioned wahaha front-line employees, wahaha pure water's sales task this year has been completed ahead of schedule, and sugar-free tea has taken advantage of this year's trend to open up many new terminal outlets.

according to the prospectus submitted by yilibao in april this year, among the top five companies in china's packaged drinking water market in 2023, the total retail sales (non-operating income) of wahaha packaged drinking water was 12 billion yuan. ranking ahead of wahaha were nongfu spring with 50.7 billion yuan, yilibao with 39.6 billion yuan, and baishuishan with 13.2 billion yuan.

overall, the size of wahaha is not much different from that of baishuishan. if it continues to grow at this year's rate, it is very likely that wahaha will surpass baishuishan and become the third largest packaged drinking water company this year.