Halfway through 2021, after experiencing the 2020 epidemic, many home furnishing companies have chosen to adjust their business strategies.

Chen Zhongli, secretary general of the Full Decoration Industry Branch of the All-Union Real Estate Chamber of Commerce, told reporters that the most intuitive impact of the epidemic on the home furnishing industry is the pressure on rent costs and personnel wages, the fight for customers, the entry of new competitors, and more cautious consumers, which has also brought new changes to the development of this industry. "Network platforms and big data have become emerging customer acquisition channels; 'scene alternative products, ecological coverage industries' have become the general trend".

Sun Xiaoyang, secretary of the board of directors of Qumei Home Furnishing Co., introduced to reporters that in order to cope with the impact of the epidemic, the company proposed various drainage methods such as "live marketing" and "private domain traffic management" during the epidemic to help dealers adapt to the situation of substantial reduction in passenger flow during the period. At the same time, it continues to launch new series of fashionable home furnishing products, highlighting the keywords of "environmental protection", "high value" and "cost-effective" to meet the consumer demand for furniture products born in the 1980s and 1990s.

In the context of increasingly fierce competition among home furnishing companies, Internet companies such as Alibaba, JD.com, Xiaomi, and Kuaishou have entered the home furnishing market across borders in the past two years. Since the beginning of this year, Gome and Meizu have also taken cross-border home furnishing activities. 

An analyst from iiMedia Consulting believes that the reshuffle of the industry brought about by the epidemic has also promoted the transformation and upgrading of the industry. In the future, the “Matthew effect” of the home furnishing industry will be more significant, and the advantages of leading companies will be more obvious, and companies with weak competitiveness will be eliminated by the market.

Currently, the boundaries of the industrial chain of the home furnishing industry are gradually blurring. The research report of Everbright Securities believes that home furnishing companies have begun to get involved in custom cabinets and soft furnishings; in order to attract customers, custom furniture companies are trying to integrate all categories of the furnishing industry and at the same time develop soft furnishings through the supporting product supply chain and soft furnishings. The company uses its own factory to develop the upstream whole-house customization sector. Since last year, in response to the adverse effects of the epidemic, many companies have innovated ideas and tried every means to improve their performance. Transformation, smart home, digitization, live delivery, and one-stop consumption have become industry buzzwords.

In terms of digital transformation, Homekoo has introduced the more common BIM technology in the engineering construction field into the decoration process. The company has completely "built" consumers' homes in the virtual world at a ratio of 1:1, and integrated the decoration details into the BIM system after informationization. Through AI optimization and simulation, it can discover and avoid possible problems in actual construction in advance. The scheduling of personnel and materials during construction is also more scientific. Consumers can know the progress of the renovation in real time and be a "remote" supervisor, which reduces a lot of burden.

Markor Furnishings, which has transformed from a "product-based" to a "platform-based" enterprise, launched a new retail art experience space in Beijing in March this year through immersive scene experience creation and the integration of online + offline full scenes and omnichannels— Markor Cave Museum. The museum redefines "people, goods, and places" through a new retail art space that deeply integrates art, culture and commerce, to meet consumers' emotional appeals for health, refinement and individuality when shopping. Mou Li, general manager of Markor Furnishings, said that the next generation of new retail will focus on experiencing culture and artistic perception, and Markor Furnishings is launching corresponding business model changes around this direction.

Regarding the current transformation strategy, Sun Xiaoyang said that the company’s marketing transformation aims to solve the dealer team’s ability to actively attract traffic and improve the full-category, one-stop sales and service capabilities; product transformation aims to improve consumers through the improvement of product strength the selectivity in the process of shopping, highlighting the characteristics of "environmental protection", "fashion" and "cost-effective". 

“The upgrade of the store’s image is another key innovation of the company in terms of channels, mainly through the use of scene layouts, forced movement design and the upgrade of the visual recognition system in the store to improve the efficiency of store area usage and enhance consumers’ sense of experience in the process of purchasing furniture products."

In addition to digital transformation and enhanced consumer experience, many home furnishing companies have begun to broaden product categories in recent years, forming a closed-loop industry. In 2018, ZBOM cabinets were renamed ZBOM Home Furnishing, expanding into a multi-category business; Mengtian Wooden Doors was renamed Mengtian Home Furnishing, focusing on the whole house customization business. Nature Home, which started with solid wood flooring, also realized the necessity of diversification early, and laid out the business of wooden doors, cabinets, wardrobes, wallpaper, and complete decoration. Recently, the company announced its entry into the field of assembly decoration to form a closed loop of the large home furnishing industry.

Chen Zhongli believes that “commodities are tangible, services are intangible, and the experience created is unforgettable.” In the era of the Internet of Things, if you can’t create an experience, the product has no soul, so you must go to the scene experience. Online and offline integration is a beautiful vision. To truly achieve this step, not only learning and using the Internet, but also iterating and transforming from the bottom logic.