UNAIR NEWS – The rapid expansion of ice cream and tea store Mixue in Indonesia received public attention. The netizens even nicknamed Snow King, the snowman logo of Mixue Chinese company, as “Angel of Vacant Store” for its fast expansion across the cities.
Marketing Strategy lecturer of Universitas Airlangga, Prof Dr. Sri Hartini SE MSi, shared her views on the matter. She commended the “Mixue-zation” as an interesting phenomenon, and the company’s marketing strategy runs well.
Four marketing tools done right
Companies mostly used four marketing strategy tools: price, product, place, and promotion. Mixue managed to use those four tools well.
First, the price. Prof Hartini believed that one of Mixue’s strengths lies in its low-price product. In marketing strategy, the concept is known as penetration pricing.
“Mixue purposely grabs the existing ice cream markets with its low prices. We don’t know if Mixue’s penetration pricing does offer the cheapest price or will it raise the price once the competitors are gone,” she said.
Besides penetration price, hundreds of Mixue’s branches impact the selling price as the company had to prepare a huge supply of production. It causes Mixue to reach the economic scale so that it sells well and lowers production costs.
“For instance, we want to buy the package. If we only produce hundreds instead thousands, the latter will be cheaper. Its main strengths lie in the cheap pricing, low cost, and franchise system. Everything is taken care of by each branch,” Prof Hartini said.
Second, the product. Mixue’s product tastes as good as its competitors. Mixue has successfully made a good and competitive product at a low price.
Third, the place. The company distribution of Mixue has succeeded in relying on the strength of partnerships so that a good place with the high-priced cost is no longer necessary.
Fourth, the promotion. Mixue uses social media marketing to promote the product and go viral through Instagram, TikTok, and many more.
Marketing Strategy Expert Prof Dr. Sri Hartini SE MSi (Courtesy of Agus Irwanto PKIP)
Different from McDonaldization
The Faculty of Economics and Business professor stated that “Mixue-zation” is different from McDonaldization despite being franchises. Mixue expands more massively than McDonald’s due to the low price, making it easier for people to open a booth.
“Besides, in McDonald’s case, we weren’t really used to eating bread and fries for regular consumption. In this case, ice cream is not a new thing. The way the franchises got in are the same, but it’s different,” she said.
In the end, Prof Hartini believed Mixue would impact other ice cream and beverage booths in Indonesia, though every product has different markets. However, if the markets are not maintained, they may switch to Mixue.
“Especially nowadays, when everything can go viral and monetary crisis, everyone has a high price sensitivity. So, the local companies must improve, creating new products and innovating,” she said.
Author: Rafli Noer Khairam
Editor: Binti Q. Masruroh
