Haven’t figured out yet why an animal’s head is so frequently served with the rest of it here in China.

Visited Youkai today, one of the biggest laundry pod makers in China. About a billion pods a year, 100,000+ tonnes of detergent, ¥1bn (€130m) revenue, and contract manufacturing for Unilever and hundreds of other brands. 80% of production is white label. Their own brand is growing double digits a year, but they reckon a consumer brand takes 5–10 years to build. The unit economics: a pack sells for ¥18 and costs ¥14 to make. 22% gross margin, single-digit net. Very representative of the Chinese market: Hypercompetitive, super tough for companies, great for consumers, and it forces everyone to get very efficient. Most companies here want to sell abroad though, where they say they make 5–6x the profit. Youkai does roughly 35% of their production for companies abroad. Favourite detail i saw: floor 12 (building has 16 stories in total, 16 is CEOs office) is for livestreaming. I knew livestream shopping was big in China, but I wouldn’t expect people to buy laundry pods like this.

Seems to be a global problem.

Around 3 million Chinese private companies face a generational handover in the next 10 years, and it‘s the founders' kids who grew up in the digital age we should probably be watching. Today, we visited a mattress factory in Foshan where the son is taking over, and he's gone all in on the brand: > built an entire museum of sleep explaining the production process > added AI point-cloud scans to match mattresses to body types > or my favourite: wrote a song about the company's history and sang it himself (yes, this was pre-AI slop; last video). Reminds me of many other new owners on TikTok rethinking online marketing. Next to highly automated consumer lines, they sell handmade mattresses filled with white horsetail hair that go for up to ¥600,000 (~€80k, second pic). Horsehair in mattresses is an old European high-end tradition. Tail hair is longer and thicker than mane, so it springs back better and lasts for decades. White hair is finer and rarer and so in part it’s about selling the idea of luxury that some people care about.