Want It All? The Performance Pressure and Expansion Dilemma of She De Liquor

Why is AI · Shede Liquor’s Old Wine Strategy Losing Favor in Stock Competition?

As the Baijiu industry enters a phase of “shrinking stock competition” and consumer preferences become more rational, Shede Liquor, a well-known Sichuan brand that returned to the capital stage with its “Old Wine Strategy,” is now facing multiple challenges including declining performance, channel fluctuations, and management changes.

According to its recent financial report, Shede Liquor achieved a revenue of 4.419 billion yuan in 2025, a decrease of 17.51% year-on-year; net profit attributable to shareholders was only 220 million yuan, a sharp drop of 35.51% year-on-year.

Performance shows a clear “cooling trend” each quarter.

In Q1, net profit attributable to shareholders was 346 million yuan, but by Q3 it had fallen to 28.73 million yuan, and in Q4, the company recorded a net loss of 249 million yuan.

In terms of product structure, mid-to-high-end products (such as Wisdom Shede and Tasting Shede) generated 3.12 billion yuan in revenue for the year, down 23.83% year-on-year; ordinary wines (such as TuoPai T68) earned 733 million yuan, up 5.75%.

The decline in high-end products combined with limited gross profit margins on regular wines makes it difficult to bridge the profit gap.

According to Shede Liquor’s early-year equity incentive assessment targets, revenue in 2025 was expected to grow by 20% year-on-year, and net profit attributable to shareholders by 164%, with targets set at 6.428 billion yuan and 913 million yuan respectively. The actual completion rates were only 68.7% and 24.4%, highlighting a significant gap between operational expectations and market reality.

Channel stability is also turbulent. Wholesale and agency revenue reached 3.249 billion yuan, down 25.19% year-on-year; 516 distributors exited, reducing the total number of distributors by 138 to 2,525.

The company’s e-commerce channel achieved sales of 603.593 million yuan in 2025, up 35.46%, becoming one of the few bright spots in the financial report. However, given that Baijiu consumption still mainly relies on offline banquets, online growth alone is insufficient to change the overall situation.

Not long before the financial report was released, the company announced the resignation of Vice President Wang Yong.

Over the past five years since Fosun’s involvement, Shede Liquor’s core management team has experienced frequent changes. Wang Yong’s resignation further heightened market concerns about the stability of its execution.

Despite these challenges, the board continues to send positive signals to shareholders.

According to the 2025 profit distribution plan, the company intends to pay a cash dividend of 3.1 yuan per 10 shares (tax included), with an estimated total payout of about 102 million yuan, accounting for 45.67% of the annual net profit attributable to shareholders.

Strategically, Shede Liquor continues to uphold the “Old Wine Strategy” narrative.

The company explicitly states in its annual report that it will focus on traditional advantageous markets such as Sichuan, Hebei, Shandong, Henan, and Northeast China, gradually advancing its nationwide brand layout. It has built a dual-brand matrix centered on “Shede” and “TuoPai,” aiming to establish “Shede” as the leading brand in the old wine category, while promoting “TuoPai” to become the most cost-effective mass-market famous wine.

However, this “high-end premium and mass volume” strategy faces significant resource allocation challenges in an era of stock competition.

Regionally, revenue in the provincial market is expected to decline by 20.19% year-on-year in 2025, while revenue from outside the province is projected to decrease by 19.25%.

In the industry’s de-stocking cycle, Shede Liquor is at a crossroads between holding its core territory and expanding outward, caught between “She” and “De.”