In January, air-conditioning sales led the company's market leader in layoffs more than half

Home air-conditioning retail market started in 2012 in a downturn. According to AVC monitoring data, the domestic retail sales of air conditioners dropped by 45.7% in January compared with the same period of last year and decreased by 41.6% from the previous month; retail sales decreased by 39.1% year-on-year and decreased by 40% from the previous month. Domestic air-conditioning sales hit a record low for 28 months.

Air-conditioning companies struggle to eat. Air-conditioning leading company insiders revealed to the South, due to high inventory and weak sales, the company's marketing department has more than half the number of layoffs.

January sales fell half year-on-year

Ovid said that in January this year, domestic air-conditioning sales were 1.545 million units, which was only about half of the same period last year.

“This is the largest decline in domestic air-conditioning sales in a single month since August 2009, the lowest level in 28 months since its inception.” Han Wei, director of Ovi Consulting White Power, said that the decline in retail sales is affected by many factors: First, The Spring Festival is earlier than last year, and the regularity of household appliances consumption is sluggish during the Spring Festival holiday. Second, the hikes effect of the old-fashioned trade-in policy and the exit of home appliances to the countryside policy were released in early 2011, and some of the demand was released ahead of schedule. Third, the external environmental factors from the outside have not yet been significantly improved. The overall market growth rate is still in the process of correction.

An insider of an air-conditioning faucet revealed to this newspaper that in January and February of this year, the market sales were dismal. “The bigger dealers' hands, each of which almost presses the tens of millions of yuan in inventory, will almost never be restocked this year. ."

The person further disclosed that the company’s marketing department has recently been dismissed by more than half. “Like 2010, the new arrival was definitely resigned, and some old employees were also cut. The remaining income was reduced by 30%.”

Loss pressure strikes

Reporters yesterday visited Guangzhou Suning, Gome found a number of stores, air-conditioning counter door deserted, Liu surname sales staff frankly "selling really bad." But at the same time, he also said that although the sales are dull, the price of air conditioners has increased, and in April, the price of air conditioners may be raised in an all-round way. "The raw material copper is too expensive."

Since December last year, copper prices have shown a clear upward trend. The two-month increase amounted to about 4,600 yuan, and the price of raw materials was transmitted to the whole machine. According to Ovid data, in January, the average retail price of household air conditioners rose by 2.8%. Break through 4,000 yuan/set. The average retail price of the fixed-frequency on-hook, variable-frequency on-hook, and frequency-variable container machines all increased year-on-month, with the average retail price of the frequency conversion cabinets up 1.0% from December 2011.

As for future price hikes, Wang Jinliang, Vice President of China Refrigeration Appliance Group's China Marketing Headquarters, said that there is currently no specific target, "but the price of air-withered oil has hardly fallen in the past two years. With rising raw materials, the cost of labor for air-conditioning companies will continue to rise, and business pressure will increase. Very large, the net profit of the entire white-market market has been very low, and it will even face losses.