大规格在中国找到归宿 THE BIG SLAB FINDS A HOME IN CHINA
我与一些人进行了一次有趣的对话,他们有些来自意大利,有些是我们公司刚从意大利和西班牙出差回来的同事,谈论的话题关于陶瓷行业的总体状况,而其中更关注的是大规格2400x1200mm和3200x1600mm产品的销售。
业内人士从Esmalglass、Colorobbia、Torrecid等原材料供应商到Tecnografica、Stylgraph、Digital Design等设计公司,甚至从Sacmi、Siti等设备制造商到意大利的大规格制造商,都与我们进行了交流和分享。
总的来说,结论和讨论都是围绕这个行业以及经销商通过传统零售渠道在意大利和西班牙不同的市场销售大规格的失败。
运输、搬运、加工和安装方面的挑战,是导致这两个市场一致失败的原因。使用现有的零售店面基础设施销售这些大规格产品令人痛苦和失望。在墨西哥,情况也是类似的,你根本看不到住宅或商业空间中有很多大规格在使用。至少在这三个不同的市场,底线是相同的,其中两个是这类产品的大制造商,另一个是墨西哥,一个不生产大规格的陶瓷消费大国。
但他们向我提到了一些有趣的事情,在某种程度上很有意义。制造商已经找到了一个市场或一种销售这些产品的方式,就是利用现有的石材制造商,他们正在慢慢喜欢并且越来越多的使用陶瓷大板作为替代或加强他们现有的天然石材产品。
因为我在石材行业工作过一些年头,这对我来说非常合理。这些人已经做好充分的准备来处理这类型的产品和规格,他们拥有设备、基础设施、加工工具和安装知识,并开始认识到除了天然材料外,使用陶瓷产品替代的好处。价格差异显然而见,而且陶瓷更容易操作,其他的好处包括可以使用不同的产品风格,如水泥和金属,而不仅仅是大理石和石头,甚至使用木材瓷板作为台面,以便更易于清洁和护理。
总而言之,这些产品在这些国际市场中找到了归宿以及销售渠道的方式,推动了行业向前发展。超大规格产品的销售并没有以任何方式呈指数级增长,但至少稳步增长,尤其在世界上最大的市场的巨大帮助下:中国!
毫无疑问,这些产品已经在国内市场找到了归宿,销售情况与上述国家完全不同。它的需求持续增长,我们看到越来越多来自意大利和西班牙的高端进口产品以及印度的中到高端进口产品,后者的价格明显低得多,同时款式和质感有限。
产品大多通过现有的零售渠道展示和销售,安装专业公司不断涌现,使得这类产品在市场上以非常健康的方式增长。高端公寓和别墅的住宅销售很常见,大型商业项目也是如此。
设备制造商提到了在中国的增长和潜在的全生产线销售,他们给我们的印象是,在市场上现有的四家大规格的工厂的基础上,在不久的将来可能会有另外三到四家大规格工厂出现。
毫无疑问,中国是大规格最好的市场,我们可能只看到了冰山一角。
I had a very interesting conversation with some people from Italy and some of our people of our company that just came back from a trip to Italy and Spain in regards to the general status of our ceramic industry focusing more specifically on the big slab super large size of 120x240 and 160x320 sales.
People of the industry from raw materials suppliers like Esmalglass,Colorobbia, Torrecid and Design Companies like Tecnografica,Stylgraph and Digital Design and even some equipment manufacturers like Sacmi and Siti to large size manufacturers of Italy talked and shared information to us.
In summary what was concluded and discussed was the failure of the industry and the ceramic distributors to sell the big sizes through the traditional retail channels of the different markets in Italy and Spain.
The failure was consistent in these two markets due to the challenges of transportation, handling, processing and installation. Selling these items was miserable and disappointing using the existing retail stores infrastructure. In Mexico the situation is similar and you simply don’t see that many big slab installations neither in residential homes or commercial space. The bottom line is the same at least in these three different markets, two of them big manufacturers of these type of items and the other one Mexico a big ceramic consuming country that does not produce the big slabs.
But they mentioned something interesting to me that made in some way a lot of sense; The manufacturers have found a market or a way of selling these items using the existing stone fabricators that are slowly liking more and more using the big porcelain slabs as an alternative or to enhance their existing natural stone offering.
As I was in the stone industry for a few years this made perfect sense to me. These people are fully prepared to handle these types of products and sizes, they have the equipment, the infrastructure, the processing tools, the installation knowledge and are starting to understand the benefits of using the porcelain products instead or in addition to the natural ones. The pricing difference is obvious, the easiness to work with the ceramic, other benefits like the different product styles like cements and metals available and not only marbles and stones, the possibilities of using even wood as countertops and easiness of cleaning and care of the porcelain slabs.
This is in summary the way these products have found a home or a channel of distribution in these international markets that have kept the industry moving forward. The sales of the super large sizes are not improving exponentially by any means but at least is growing steadily especially with the big help of the largest market in the world: China!
These items without a question have found a home here in the domestic market and the sales are not in any way similar to the countries mentioned above. The demand keeps growing and we see consistently more and more imported products from Italy and Spain on the high end side and from India on the mid to high end side as they are significantly lower priced but with more limited styles and different finishes.
The sales and the products are in most cases shown and sold through the existing retail channels and installation specialized companies are popping up consistently allowing the growth of this group of items to grow in a very healthy way in the market. Residential Sales on high end Condos and Villas are common and also in big commercial projects.
The equipment manufacturers mentioned about the growth and potential full plant sales in China where they gave us the impression that there might be an extra 3 to 4 big slab plants coming up in the very near future in addition to the existing four that exist in the market.
The is absolutely no denial that the best market for the big slabs is China where we maybe have seen only the tip of the iceberg!
Humberto Valles
ICC General Manager
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