1. Introduction

With China’s rapid development, people’s living standards and consumption standards are improving, and people’s choice of food is becoming more and more diversified. Influenced by the Western food culture, the baking market at home and abroad has been in a trend of gradual growth in recent years, especially after the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, which began to grow steadily. And in the 2022 China Catering Top 10 Most Popular Bakery Brands Award List, Holiland topped the list, which shows Holiland’s unique marketing ideas, and more and more enterprises hope to make more breakthroughs by studying its business model. This paper takes the current industry development status as the starting point, analyses the advantages and shortcomings of the marketing of Goodwill products, and puts forward the corresponding marketing improvement measures for the problems existing in the marketing of Goodwill. The analysis and research of this article has certain reference significance for the future marketing development of Holiland, and can also provide certain reference for the marketing management of other dessert industries.

2. Holiland’s Marketing Strategy

2.1. Store Location

Up to now, most of Holiland’s offline shops are established in first-tier cities and a few second-tier cities, and most of them are located in large shopping districts or around residential and office buildings with high traffic flow [1]. The company’s stores in Nanjing, for example, are located in large shopping districts or around residential and office buildings with high traffic. For example, the Nanjing shop was opened in Nanjing’s busiest and most lively Xinjiekou, the Wuhan shop was opened in Wuhan’s largest shopping district Wushang Dream Time, Fuzhou Goodwill was opened in the most crowded Dongjiekou... This allows consumers to automatically put a high-end fashion filter on Goodwill. The place where consumers live in groups has the characteristics of flexible and frequent transactions, and the favourable location of Goodwill as well as the spacious and trendy shop decoration can actively welcome the products to the customers and play the role of active promotion. The offline shops are spacious and bright, with a design style that combines popular Intellectual Property (IP) characters and animation, close to the social trend and in line with the current consumption preferences of young consumer groups.

2.2. Theme Marketing

Holiland’s offline shops basically have their own characteristics, and there are a number of themed concept shops in China, such as the Pink Me shop in Nanjing, which aims to reproduce the “Budapest” style dreamy scenery. Holiland’s products are also co-branded with various ip’s basically every month, such as the Monkbot series in January 2022, Bubble Mart and Ultraman in March, Cool Rummy in May, Strawberry Bear in June, Harry Potter in July, and King’s Rank in August, etc. There are also Hi-Tea and Lelouch Tea stores. There will also be food and drinks such as Hi-Tea, Leloucha, Oreo and Häagen-Dazs, trendy cultures such as Bubble Mart and UCCA, and Tangerine Makeup brand co-branding.

2.3. Internet Marketing

As a brand with fast product renewal, Holiland has also made great efforts in online promotion. According to incomplete statistics, Holiland’s online sales channels include the official flagship stores of “Tmall”, “Jingdong”, “Xiaohongshu”, “Jitterbug” and other merchant distribution channels on major online e-commerce platforms. The official flagship shop of “Tmall”, “Jingdong”, “Xiaohongshu” and “Shakeyin”, as well as other merchant distribution channels on major online e-commerce platforms. Holiland even has live broadcasts on these apps to promote and publicise relevant products. There are a large number of well-known bloggers on Xiaohongshu advertising for Holiland, who vigorously promote the co-branding theme of each season, and attract young people in the city to make purchases both online and offline with beautiful pictures and precise copywriting, as well as specialised store-visiting bloggers flocking to Holiland’s shops to record the whole process of purchasing and enjoying desserts in Holiland’s shops in immersive videos, which has further intensified the curiosity of netizens about the brand to such an extent that many Many netizens who don’t have a Goodwill shop in their city will go to the Goodwill shop in their city to find out more about the brand when they are travelling. In this way, many themed shops have become one of the attractions for foreign tourists to visit, aggravating the brand effect and making Holiland more attractive.

2.4. Localised Marketing

Although Hollister is a western-style dessert, and belongs to the category of “Netflix”, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Lantern Festival and New Year, Holiland has launched festival products such as moon cakes, dumplings and New Year’s packets and stickers. Let customers feel the charm of local culture in this Western-style dessert shop, increase the acceptance of middle-aged and old people to the net red shop, and likewise let the dessert industry find more diversified development possibilities.

3. Advantages and Disadvantages of Holiland’s Business

3.1. Advantages

3.1.1. Quality Assurance

Since the launch of Holiland’s products, we have not seen any negative news, not to mention the emergence of food safety-related issues. On the one hand, Holiland has a clean and comfortable shopping environment, and at the same time, the offline shops have set up an open and transparent dessert production platform, so that customers have an intuitive feeling of safety and hygiene; on the other hand, Holiland has invested in a number of places in accordance with the GMP standards of the international pharmaceutical industry to set up a first-class, large-scale, modernised food industrial parks, which contain the largest modern and aseptic food processing plants in the industry. Through the high investment in technology and facilities to strictly eliminate quality problems, to ensure the production of products that customers can rest assured that they will be satisfied.

3.1.2. Price Strategy

Based on its high quality and popular netflix labels, Holiland’s pricing is based on a high-price strategy and is positioned towards the high-end market. Even if the shops are not too many, it has attracted a large number of customers flocking to its shops through the influence of ip co-branded products and popular themed shop aura, providing heat and sales for its shops. Holiland’s sales strategy is based on refinement rather than quantity, and it does not win by volume, but gradually attracts the attention of young people in big cities through its unique creativity, and then gradually spreads to other cities and other age groups. Holiland captures the contemporary young people’s psychology of pursuing freshness regardless of the cost, and attracts young people’s attention through the hot publicity on the Internet, even if the price is on the high side, young people are willing to pay for their curiosity [1].

3.1.3. Innovativeness

Holiland is used to flexibly choosing different hot ip for co-branding in different seasons. And in different festivals, such as Halloween and Christmas in the West to launch a limited edition cake, with its unique shape “out of the circle”, to meet the netizens’ curiosity. Goodwill will also choose to traditional Chinese festivals on the product innovation and transformation, such as 22 years of the Mid-Autumn Festival Goodwill launched the moon between the clouds and the magnificent Golden Autumn Moon Cake, so that customers in the Western-style dessert shops can also experience a strong sense of homesickness. Not only that, Holiland also launched a themed mooncake co-branded with Harry Potter, Harry Potter as a self-traffic ip, the co-branding makes the mooncake at the same time Chinese tradition and youthful sentiment, again impacting the consumer memories and enhancing the brand’s goodwill.

3.2. Disadvantages

3.2.1. Competitive

In this era of rapid development of the baking industry, all kinds of dessert shops are emerging, such as “Naixue” and “Xicha”, which have become popular nationwide in the past few years, and “Taoxiangcun”, which focuses on traditional Chinese old-fashioned cakes, as well as “Bao Shi”, “Lu Xi He” and “Zhan Ji”, which combine Chinese and Western flavours, are rising. There are also many “Taoxiangcun” shops focusing on traditional Chinese old-fashioned pastries, as well as “Bao Shifu”, “Luxihe” and “Zhanji” shops combining Chinese and Western styles, and there are also “Yuanzu” shops that have been flourishing in the baking field. There are also brand shops such as “Yuanzu” which has a long history in the bakery field. There are also branded stores such as “Yuanzu”, which has been flourishing in the bakery field, and similar shops on the Internet, such as “Xuanmama” and “Xiaobai Heart Soft”. Dessert industry competition is fierce, homogenisation is serious. Most of the business approach is the same. At this time, all kinds of shops compete not only with pattern but also with quality [2].

3.2.2. Limited Audience Groups

Since its birth, Holiland has been located in the domestic high-end bakery and dessert market, relative to other brands on the high side of the price. Holiland’s offline shops used to be opened in big cities, and most of them are located in department stores in the centre of big cities, and Holiland’s shops are almost impossible to be seen in small cities. Given that Holiland’s style has always been close to the Western Japanese culture, the cake boxes and shop decorations are mostly combined with comics and popular ip, and the price of the products is on the high side. Most of the attracted customers are white-collar workers with stable incomes and young people pursuing fashion trends in first-tier cities, while middle-aged and old people generally do not have much interest in these unfamiliar ip. Although Goodwill also has on-line franchises, considering the special nature of food, we have certain requirements for freshness, Goodwill’s products are basically within a week of the shelf life of its signature product “half-ripened cheese”, for example, its shelf life is only 5 days, and from the place of delivery in Beijing to the various regions of the conservative calculation to be The shelf life of its signature product “half-ripened cheese”, for example, is only five days, and it takes two days for it to be delivered from Beijing, where it is shipped, to each region, which is a conservative estimate, so the real time to enjoy the food is only three days at the most. As a result, the real audience of Goodwill is still only concentrated in the big cities among young people. The real audience of Holiland is still focused on young people in big cities [3].

3.2.3. Few Promotional Strategies

Goodwill since its launch, has always taken the “quality” route, whether it is the decoration of the shop, or made out of the products that are exquisite and beautiful, so that customers trust. But at the same time, their pricing in similar products is not cheap, the price of each product is basically more than 30 yuan, the customer may think that these kinds of commodities are flashy, focusing only on advertising, engaging in joint names, and did not really take the trouble to improve the quality of the product. But Goodwill’s goods are basically sold at the original price, rarely held promotional activities, in addition to the opening activities, at most, only a certain amount of recharge or start a bank card in order to get discounts, the lack of interest, participatory promotional activities, so that in the long term, is not conducive to Goodwill’s normal sales and promotion of the product.

3.2.4. Lack of Localisation

As a western-style dessert, Holiland is used to combining its products with western culture or Japanese culture. For example, the previous co-branding with ip such as “Harry Potter”, “hello Kitty”, “Barbie”, Japanese manga “Spy”, etc., does help to enhance the attractiveness of the product, but it is heavily stacked with foreign culture, which makes the product more attractive. “The co-branding with Harry Potter, Hello Kitty, Barbie, Japanese manga Spy Kids, and others ip’s does help to increase the appeal of the product, but it’s a lot of foreign cultures and lacks integration with local culture, enough to be a Netflix hit but lacking in the fundamentals. Perhaps this marketing strategy was novel and attractive enough to attract consumers once upon a time, but with the proliferation of this type of product today, Western culture doesn’t have an absolute advantage in today’s China. The explosion of brands such as “Tea Face” and “Bao Shi” shows that “national trend” design is gradually becoming the mainstream of national pursuit. When we think of Holiland, we often think of its colourful packaging, and it can be said that every once in a while, when we go to its offline shops, there will be a new co-branding of new packaging styles. As a 30-year-old brand, Holiland should think more about how to get close to the national culture, combined with traditional Chinese festivals, to create a real image of Holiland, for the people of the country to enhance the sense of cultural identity [4]. The brand should think more about how to get closer to its own culture and combine it with traditional Chinese festivals to create a real image of Holiland and enhance the cultural identity of its people [4-5].

4. Conclusion

This paper mainly discusses the marketing strategy choice of Chinese bakery brand Holiland as well as the advantages and disadvantages of its operation. In conclusion, in the rapid development of the baking industry, Holiland has killed its way through many brands with its unique marketing method, excellent quality, long-term persistent innovation and precise pricing strategy. However, there is no denying that the audience of Holiland is still very limited, the combination with China is not enough, and in the dessert industry is so competitive, the high price positioning and few promotions will easily be replaced by other similar affordable products. The research in this paper still has some shortcomings, on the one hand, the data of the research is relatively limited, only supported by individual shops and data on the network, on the other hand, the marketing inference of the enterprise is imprecise, only by external inference to draw conclusions. In the future, the development of the baking industry will pay more attention to the quality of products rather than just their appearance.