With the hot sales of Kao Miao's comfortable diapers, Kao's sales in the Chinese market have grown rapidly, and the profits have reached new highs year after year. In 2017, the sales volume of Kao diapers in China was about 5 billion yuan, accounting for one-eighth of the market, which can be called the industry leader.
 
Kao came to China in 1993, initially through Shanghai Jahwa agent sales, covering the offline market and establishing brand awareness, and then built its own Hsinchu factory in Taiwan and Hefei factory, and began to produce diapers in China. At present, the mainland version, the Taiwan version and the Nissan version of Kao diapers are the three versions that can be bought in China.
 
Nissan Kao has attracted the most attention, and it has three production lines in Tokyo, Osaka, and Sakata, and the origin can also be determined by packaging coding. The first line with the letter U was Tokyo, and the E stood for the second line, Osaka, and after its popularity in China, Kao added the S Sakata Line for export in 2014. Through purchasing agents or import and export trading companies, you can buy a direct-to-buy version of Kao, that is, all versions sold in Japan, with white Chinese labels of various sizes on the packaging; The official channel sells the color standard version of Kao, commonly known as "licensed goods", which is imported directly from Japan through Kao (China), and the left side of the package is uniformly affixed with a color Chinese label.
 
For Nissan Kao, there are rumors in China that "the U version is the best, the E version is the second, and the S version is the most inferior for China's export". In fact, there are currently 3 versions sold in Japanese supermarkets, and which factory ships is also random, as long as the purchase channel can be guaranteed, there will be no such difference.
 
"Nissan Kao supplies Japan, domestic Kao supplies the mainland" seems to be the bright future envisioned by the Kao Group, but it backfired, and the "cheap and good" domestic wonderful and comfortable and breathable series encountered the dilemma of not being able to sell. According to Tmall data, the sales volume of imported Kao has even reached 40 times that of the domestic version.
 
In terms of weight, softness, cut, and size, the Japanese version of Kao is indeed the most ideal. The mainland version of Kao is the thickest, followed by the Taiwanese version, and the Japanese version is the lightest and thinnest, and uses microfiber and lined cotton for a better wearing experience. In terms of feel, the domestic Kao can touch the absorbent particles, while the Japanese version does not. The Japanese version of Kao is also the best, the large size of the Taiwan version is two folds left and right, although the mainland version is the same as the Japanese version, but the Japanese version of the back waist has an elastic waist design, the length and width of the same size are 0.5-1cm larger than the domestic one, the baby wears it more obediently, not easy to leak, and the reference price of a single piece is 1-4 yuan.
 
Kao diapers generally have the shortcomings of poor absorption, especially the domestic Kao, China Consumers Association and other evaluations have shown that its absorption is slow and the infiltration is large. Kao has occupied the first place in the Japanese diaper market for 11 consecutive years, perhaps because it is too hot and in short supply, resulting in unstable production and frequent counterfeit turmoil. Repeated safety problems and frequent fakes have made Kao's reputation among mothers relatively average.