On August 2, the four-day 22nd China Xiamen International Stone Exhibition (hereinafter referred to as the "Xiamen Stone Exhibition") came to an end.
“The exhibition was very popular and well-organized. Buyers from home and abroad came as scheduled to see new products and discuss cooperation, demonstrating the tenacity and vitality of the stone industry.” “Many exhibitors said that the buyers invited by this year’s exhibition Strong professionalism, high accuracy, and the order conversion rate exceeded expectations." This is how Xiamen Daily reported this Xiamen Stone Exhibition, and its focus is naturally on the stone industry.
For the ceramic industry and the participating ceramic (rock slab/ceramic tile) brands, this exhibition, with the theme of "Sharing the New Ecology of the Stone World", brings together more than 1,100 domestic and foreign exhibitors, with an exhibition scale of 162,000 square meters. What is the significance of Xiamen Stone Exhibition?
Let’s first compare the two sets of data.
At the 2022 Guangzhou Construction Expo held from July 8 to 11, only 5 slate brands in the ceramic industry participated in the exhibition. The number of participating brands shrank significantly, far less than the 32 slate brands participating in the previous Guangzhou Construction Expo. At the 22nd Xiamen Stone Exhibition, there were as many as 40 exhibiting brands in the ceramic industry, with slate brands accounting for more than half. In the previous Xiamen Stone Exhibition, more than 40 brands participated, and slate brands accounted for more than half. The pomp and circumstance was almost equal.
It is also the Guangzhou Construction Expo. Why has the number of exhibiting brands in the ceramic industry shrunk so much in 2022 compared with 2021?
Some people believe that the main reason is that the situation in the ceramics industry this year is very severe. Many ceramics companies are not doing well. They are tightening their belts and significantly reducing their exhibition budgets, which is very important for participating in the Guangzhou Construction Expo. In addition, due to the recurring epidemic, some ceramic companies that originally planned to participate in the exhibition simply gave up their participation because they were worried about insufficient popularity.
Then why did the same situation not cause the number of slate brands participating in the Xiamen Stone Exhibition in the ceramic industry to shrink significantly?
It can only be said that the Xiamen Stone Exhibition is more valuable to slate brands than the Guangzhou Construction Expo. To put it bluntly, the Xiamen Stone Fair has the professional visitors/purchasers that slate brands urgently need - stone dealers, so it also contains business opportunities.
The reason why slate brands want to contact stone dealers is because slate not only exists as an upgraded product for ceramic tiles, but also as a new material for ceramic companies to develop across borders in the large home furnishing field.Stone dealers are one of the best channels for slate to replace stone in large homes. Since slate was born in China, a large part of the business of most slate brands has come from stone dealers (some industry insiders even believe that the investment and construction of more than 100 slate production lines in the ceramic industry since 2020 was actually caused by several Stone dealers who want to cross-border robberies are leveraging the demand of about 1 billion yuan).
On the one hand, the stone industry has a market demand of hundreds of billions of yuan, which is full of temptation; on the other hand, the stone industry has already formed mature circulation channels, and stone dealers have already had the capabilities to cover network locations, deep processing, and delivery of ceramic tiles. Sales and delivery system capabilities that dealers do not have. The considerable market demand in the stone industry and the strong sales and delivery system capabilities are the keys to the long-term development of slate, attracting slate brands that are in a situation of overcapacity to actively embrace stone channels. The Xiamen Stone Exhibition is an excellent platform for rock slab brands to actively embrace stone channels.
Based on this reality, although the impact of the epidemic on the exhibition this year is greater than in the past two years, the ceramic industry is facing an unprecedentedly severe situation. Many slate brands have also overcome many difficulties and are fully participating in this year's Xiamen Stone Exhibition. . Moreover, compared to simply participating in the exhibition last year, some slate brands participating in the Xiamen Stone Exhibition also moved forums, product launches and even brand launches to the site, showing full recognition and high participation in the Xiamen Stone Exhibition.
In addition, at this year's Xiamen Stone Exhibition, slate brands such as Xinmingzhu slate, Shunhui Tiancheng slate, and Inno slate Feinze focused on displaying full-body slate. These full-body slate products and their applications such as chamfering, grooving, trimming and polishing have not only attracted the attention and praise of peers, but have also become a beautiful landscape in the exhibition hall, which is the home of stone, demonstrating the cross-border entry of slate brands. Determination to compete with stone in the field of mid-to-high-end home furnishing applications.
Of course, regarding the competition between slate and stone, slate brands are more modest, tolerant, calm and calm than in the past. In the past two years, many ceramic people boasted that the ceramic industry far surpassed the stone industry in terms of brand building and marketing, and frequently used aggressive words such as "cross-border robbery" and "replacing stone" to describe the cross-border application of rock slabs. ; At this Xiamen Stone Exhibition, everyone is more willing to use words such as "integration and symbiosis" and "learning and exchange" to describe the relationship between slate and stone.
As for how far the slate brand can go at the Xiamen Stone Fair, it should be said that it depends on how determined the slate brand is to cooperate with stone dealers in the hundreds of billions of stone market, and how effective the cooperation is.
In other words, if you take the stone channelIf the expected results cannot be achieved, many ceramic companies that have always been eager for quick success will most likely shrink across the board and no longer be keen on participating in the Xiamen Stone Fair. After all, it is very rare for ceramic companies to have a "long-term" mindset, especially today when the development of rock slabs and even the entire ceramic industry is at a low ebb.
