"The baby who wants to get rid of oil on his face looks at it" and "the last three orders are paid every second". In the live broadcasting room, the anchor introduced the skin care products in detail. Skilled script and low price have attracted many fans to place orders and rush to buy. Different from other anchors, these anchors in aviation uniforms have another identity - flight attendants.
Live broadcast of China Southern Airlines. Video screenshot
Nowadays, many airlines, including China Southern Airlines and Hainan Airlines, have begun to set foot in the live broadcasting field. In order to seize the market, a professional live broadcast room was built, a stewardess anchor database was established, and an IP anchor was created. Many stewardesses appeared in the beauty and food live broadcast teams.
"The price is indeed cheaper than the counter and even the duty-free shop, but it is not an official channel, and I have never dared to believe it.". When airlines entered the live broadcast room, their strong endorsement and preferential prices attracted many fans, and also brought a wave of questions: airlines are only "anchor with goods", and the source and quality of goods are provided by third-party channels. Is it reliable?
Stewardess entering the live broadcasting room: the sales of a single show exceeds one million yuan
"Get on the plane. Before you bought a bottle of fairy water, you needed 1599 yuan. Today, three bottles only cost 1299 yuan." "China Southern Airlines escorts you. The others are fake, one pays three. We are fake, one pays ten.".
At 8:00 p.m., two anchors in plain and elegant aviation uniforms in the live broadcasting room explained their products one by one to the fans in front of the camera with a gentle smile.
In recent years, the live broadcast industry has continued to heat up, with online celebrities, celebrities and entrepreneurs pouring in. Now affected by the epidemic, airlines have also extended their sideline tentacles into this field.
In February, 2022, the "China Southern Airlines global purchase" account under China Southern Airlines quickly became popular on the Tiktok platform, and received 221000 fans' attention in just a few months.
Unlike other up hosts, most of whom are online celebrities, the anchors of "global shopping" are flight attendants of China Southern Airlines. They chatted enthusiastically with netizens in the live broadcasting room, shared interesting aviation stories, and constantly introduced the goods in their hands.
"The goods in the live broadcasting room are not different from those in other industries. They are mainly cosmetics." After 1995, Xiao Xia told the shell finance reporter of the Beijing news that since she inadvertently turned to the live broadcast of China Southern Airlines a month ago, she had been thoroughly "planted with grass". Even if you don't place an order immediately, you often buy the corresponding goods in the window according to your inner impulse. "The price is much cheaper than the counter. With the endorsement of the airline, there should be no problem with the supply."
Lin Ling, a post-90s generation who has also been paying attention to the live broadcast of China Southern Airlines for a long time, said that unlike other up owners who used to create an atmosphere with exaggerated tone when explaining commodities, the tone of the flight attendants was more gentle.
On June 8, the reporter of shell finance and economics browsed the Tiktok account of "China Southern Airlines global purchase" and saw that the number of live broadcasts in the last 30 days had reached more than 28, and 150 goods were on the shelves in the window. The products range from daily wet paper towels, anti mosquito stickers to various cosmetics and skin care products, and the prices range from several yuan to thousands of yuan. In the last 30 days, 41000 items have been sold.
In addition to "China Southern Airlines global purchase", China Southern Airlines also opened a "China Southern Airlines cross border mall", with 281000 account fans. The reporter of shell finance and economics noted that the two live broadcast styles and products with goods also coincide.
However, different from "China Southern Airlines global purchase", the products sold by the latter are more concentrated in beauty and skin care categories such as sunscreen, skin care and washing care, and the commodity brands are also dominated by international brands such as SK-II, Estee Lauder and the mystery of sea blue. The two accounts enable China Southern Airlines to form a communication matrix, which can cover more fans.
China Southern Airlines is not the only airline involved in the live broadcasting field. Hainan Airlines also made a circle on the live broadcasting stage. It not only sells skin care products, cosmetics and other goods through live broadcast, but now has 1288000 fans.
According to public data, the sales volume of HNA's live broadcasting room reached 14.229 million yuan within 30 days, with an average live broadcasting income of 1.02 million yuan, making it the "top player in air live broadcasting".
China Southern Airlines cross border mall commodities. screenshot
Create Star IP and "expand" with goods
"The sweet looking stewardess introduced you to your favorite goods in a gentle tone. Who doesn't like it?" In Lin Ling's eyes, the flight attendant live broadcast has inherent advantages.
Airlines' involvement in live broadcasting is not a fad
As early as two years ago, some Airlines began to publicize routes in the live broadcasting room, and tried to bring cargo to increase revenue. In order to deeply cultivate the industry, each has its own unique moves. Some airlines have set up professional live broadcasting rooms and set up a stewardess anchor database; Some airlines have created IP anchors; More airlines have launched local delicacies to attract fans' attention according to the characteristics of their cities.
Hainan Airlines, as the first to get involved in the live broadcast field, started its live broadcast debut on Ctrip, qunar and other OTA platforms in July 2020, selling its airline tickets and hotel packages.
"Seeing the 'free flight' launched by HNA, I think it is very cost-effective." Xiao Xia was impressed by the live broadcast at that time. At that time, the epidemic came to an end, and all Airlines launched air wine packages. After comparison, I finally bought several sets because of the popular routes covered by China HNA.
Public information shows that HNA has made a lot of profits by relying on this model. Just for the live broadcast of "free flight" products in July 2021, the number of viewers reached nearly 500000, and the sales of a single product exceeded 20million yuan.
Although the performance brought by live broadcasting cannot be compared with traditional business, the considerable profits seem to make many airlines find a sideline development direction in a special period.
Soon, Hainan Airlines began to test the water and broadcast live on the official Tiktok. For this reason, it has not only set up a professional live broadcast room "Hai studio" in Haikou base, but also set up a stewardess anchor database to continuously tap and cultivate anchor talents, and even transferred personnel from the company to form a live broadcast operation team for learning and exploration.
After the initial attempts to promote air ticket discount coupons and surrounding cultural and creative products, Hainan Airlines quickly moved its goods to commodities such as daily necessities, beauty and personal care, and achieved good results in the subsequent live broadcast.
For this reason, HNA's Tiktok live broadcast team once said, "because the crew members have mature makeup and uniform management, and most of the people watching the live broadcast are women, the flight attendant anchor's recommendation of beauty and skin care products is more persuasive, and the customers' use effect is also very good after purchase, which has brought word-of-mouth and sales.".
Although Hainan Airlines entered the industry later than Hainan Airlines, China Southern Airlines has found another way. China Southern Airlines said in its 2020 annual report that it would actively expand online sales and other businesses. In addition to the regular live broadcast of goods on the platform, it also created a star stewardess IP "nannanzi" to promote the brand of China Southern Airlines through store exploration.
On June 4, the reporter of shell finance and economics saw through Tiktok that "nannanzi" did not bring goods in the live broadcasting room for a long time, but just like the host appeared in the back kitchen of China Southern Airlines, introduced the practice and origin of various aircraft meals to netizens together with the chef, and visited various hotels in Guangzhou on the spot to cooperate with merchants in the form of "exploring stores". In addition, corresponding coupons will be issued in the live broadcast room to guide netizens to place orders and purchase.
In fact, more and more airlines have also begun to explore and try in the field of live broadcast cargo. Xiamen Airlines has undertaken the group meal business of enterprises, and also created the e-commerce brand "Lu Xiansheng". In 2020, in order to prepare for "June 18", Sichuan Airlines specially held the "audition" to select the anchor, with over 1000 people from 7 departments participating.
Hainan Airlines statement. screenshot
40% discount for 1000 yuan cosmetics, doubt about low price through third-party channels
In addition to the novelty brought by occupation to consumers, the beauty of commodity prices makes consumers have the impulse to place an order.
The reporter of shell finance and economics noted that the prices of the commodities sold by airlines are mostly lower than the counter prices. Among them, a SK-II fairy water with a net content of 230ml sold in the window of "China Southern Airlines global shopping" is priced at 629 yuan, while in the official flagship store of SK-II tmall, the price of the same product is priced at 1540 yuan. For the same small brown bottle of Estee Lauder with a net content of 15ml, the price in the live studio is 398 yuan, while the price in the official flagship store of Estee Lauder tmall is 530 yuan.
"The price of many big brand skin care products is lower than that of duty-free stores, and some are less than half of the guide price." Linling was moved, mainly because grabbing was making money.
With the popularity of live broadcasting rising, the ultra-low price has aroused doubts. The reporter of shell finance and economics noticed that there were many netizens' comments questioning the authenticity of the goods in the window.
To this end, China Southern Airlines specially shot a short video response, saying, "all our goods are cross-border goods, because it is the cooperation between China Southern Airlines' cross-border e-commerce and bonded warehouse, and all of them have been exempted from tax, so there will be such a price."
HNA also issued a statement to dispel the rumor that netizens claimed that the live broadcast room sold fake and shoddy products, saying that the company had never sold the goods displayed in the netizens' videos, nor had it cooperated with the stores in the videos, requiring netizens to immediately delete the defamatory content and stop spreading false information.
However, buyers' concerns about quality have not been dispelled
"I was going to place an order in the live broadcast room. I saw that the shipping merchant was not the official channel of the airline, but a third-party store." A consumer told reporters that after a long struggle, he finally cancelled the order. "The price is too cheap. In addition, it is not an official channel. I still don't believe it."
Recently, some netizens wrote in the little red book that the skin care products of SK-II brand purchased in Hainan Airlines' live broadcasting room are fake. After clicking the link of HNA live room, I directly jumped to the third-party business page. After the goods are identified by other platforms, the results show that they are fake. In the follow-up communication, the merchants said that they did not support the third-party identification agency and needed to find the local authoritative identification agency for cosmetics. The reporter saw that this netizen subsequently issued a document saying that the store said it could return the goods.
The reporter of shell finance and economics searched on the black cat complaint platform and found that many netizens complained about the suspected fake cosmetics bought in the airline's live broadcasting room.
On June 5, the reporter of shell finance and economics found that the goods in the windows of Tiktok of HNA and China Southern Airlines came from third-party channels. Taking the goods carried by "Hainan Airlines" as an example, the top 10 with the highest sales are from 6 different third-party overseas flagship stores. This means that airlines are only "anchor with goods" in the live broadcast, and the source and quality of goods are provided by third-party channels.
The reporter randomly opened a number of third-party channel stores and browsed the "business qualification" information to see that many of these third-party channels are registered in Hong Kong or overseas.
However, when the reporter left a message asking "Why are all third-party channels" during a live broadcast of "cross border e-commerce of China Southern Airlines", the anchor did not give a reply. Only the system pops up the prompt "China Southern Airlines does not produce cosmetics, but is only a good thing recommender" and "China Southern Airlines guarantees genuine products and after-sales services, and everyone can rest assured to buy".
"Generally, airlines do not build their own stores. After all, this model requires airlines to invest more resources, manpower and technology. If it is supplied by a third party, it only needs traffic and user approval. Airlines' main business is not e-commerce, so they will choose a lighter model when doing these businesses." Senior Internet observer Ding Daoshi analyzed and said, "not only airlines, but most cross-border industries that do live broadcast and carry goods choose third-party channels for cooperation. There is no need to build their own channels."
Ding Daoshi told the reporter that the drawback of the third-party channel is that it is difficult for the live broadcast party to control the goods. Because all products do not enter the warehouse and system of the aviation company, it is difficult to supervise its quality. This requires airlines to have a complete and rigorous ability to select products. "If the airline wants to go deep into the live broadcast field, it must start from the brand source and establish a relatively professional selection team. Only in this way can it gain the lasting trust of users and make the live broadcast bring goods for a long time."
"When airlines bring their own products and services, they will also choose to cooperate with a third party to recommend more kinds of products. Consumers choose to place an order based on their trust in the enterprise. Therefore, the enterprise needs to strictly review the product quality, improve after-sales service and be responsible to consumers." Fu Jian, a lawyer from Henan Yulong law firm, told the reporter of shell finance that if consumers buy fake goods sent out through a third-party channel, they can contact the customer service in the live broadcasting room of the airline for a refund. If the product causes personal or property damage due to quality defects, the consumer may require the producer and seller to compensate for the loss. If it is the responsibility of a third-party producer, the airline may recover from the third party after assuming the liability for compensation.
Part time job seeking sideline, stewardess performing transformation
"Whether it's live broadcast or take out, it's an attempt by the airline to 'relieve pain'." The person in charge of live broadcast of Sichuan Airlines said in an interview with the media.
The involvement in live broadcasting stems from the active transformation of the aviation industry to seek new growth points
According to the annual report of 2021 disclosed by the three major domestic airlines, during 2021, the net loss of Air China was 16.642 billion yuan, that of China Southern Airlines was 12.103 billion yuan, and that of China Eastern Airlines also reached 12.214 billion yuan.
In May this year, the CAAC website released a statistical bulletin on the development of the civil aviation industry in 2021. According to preliminary statistics, in 2021, the industry achieved a total operating income of 752.92 billion yuan, an increase of 21.5% over the previous year; The loss was 84.25 billion yuan, a decrease of 18.71 billion yuan over the previous year. Among them, airlines realized an operating revenue of 424.51 billion yuan, an increase of 13.3% over the previous year; The loss was 67.09 billion yuan, a decrease of 14.92 billion yuan over the previous year.
"Now the income has decreased compared with that before the epidemic, so we really need to find some sidelines to do." Zhang Ke (not his real name), a flight attendant in a domestic airline, told shell that the income structure of flight attendants is "basic salary + flight hour fee + other subsidies", of which the basic salary is mostly twoorthree yuan, and most of the income sources mainly rely on flight hour fee.
The shell financial reporter learned that although the flight hour fees of various airlines are different, most of the fees are maintained at around 100 yuan per hour. The civil aviation administration stipulates that the maximum working hours per flight attendant per month is 100 hours, which means that the flight hour fee directly determines the income level of flight attendants.
"Before, the summer and spring transportation were the busiest time for flight attendants, and the flight time every month reached more than 90 hours." Ma Yue (a pseudonym), a flight attendant working for an airline, said.
Under the declining income, part-time job and transformation naturally become the choice of flight attendants
Ma Yue told the reporter that many of his peers have run sidelines after work. Some colleagues shoot short videos and plan to make profits by taking goods; Some colleagues use their resources to start selling goods through wechat in the circle of friends; Some colleagues invested in opening stores and started small businesses.
Zhang Ke also plans to obtain the certificate of etiquette trainer to pave the way for future career transformation. She once heard that some peers conducted etiquette training online for young people eager to become flight attendants. The considerable income made her very excited. "After all, the flight attendants have unique advantages in becoming etiquette trainers, and the identity of flight attendants is easier to be recognized.".
It is worth mentioning that the state has taken action against the serious losses of the industry as a whole. On June 8, the Ministry of Finance announced that the Ministry of Finance recently allocated a total of 3.29 billion yuan of financial subsidies for domestic passenger flight operation (the first batch) to support the safety, stability and relief development of the civil aviation industry.
Recently, the Ministry of Finance and the Civil Aviation Administration jointly issued a notice specifying that in principle, when the average daily domestic passenger flights per week are less than or equal to 4500 (maintaining the minimum number of flights for safe operation), financial subsidies will be started. Set the upper limit of the maximum loss subsidy standard to 24000 yuan per hour. The subsidy funds shall be shared by the central and local governments.
On May 26, xiongyanhua, director of the Finance Department of the Civil Aviation Administration, said at the regular press conference of the civil aviation administration that since this year, due to the continuous and repeated outbreak of the epidemic, especially the frequent occurrence of the local concentrated epidemic in March, the situation of civil aviation production and operation has taken a sharp turn. Transportation production once fell like a cliff, and the industry as a whole has suffered serious losses. The original intention of this phased financial subsidy policy for domestic passenger flight operation is to subsidize airlines, make flights fly, make all units of the civil aviation system and other related industries operate effectively, stabilize the income and employment of front-line employees, and drive the airport, air traffic control and other aviation industry chains, as well as the upstream and downstream extended industry chains of manufacturing and tourism.