Fat Donglai exploded Yonghui, and there was an acquaintance behind the capital bureau

City Boundary

2024-06-29 12:13The official account of the city

If you want to say that the hottest Internet celebrity at present, it is none other than Yu Donglai, who is from Fat Donglai.

In 2023, Fat Donglai, a supermarket enterprise deeply cultivated in Henan, will become popular all over the country because of its unique business model, high-quality service, and generous treatment of employees. The founder, Yu Donglai, was also called "China's good boss" by netizens across the country because of his "arrogant to employees".

Since last year, Fat Donglai has been on the hot search. On June 27 this year, topics such as "Fat Donglai compensated customers who bought dough rolling dough by nearly 9 million yuan" and "Fat Donglai rewarded customers who complained about dough rolling by 100,000 yuan" and other topics appeared on the hot search list again. In the few days before that, Fat Donglai received unprecedented attention from netizens across the country because of the explosion of Yonghui Supermarket.

So far, Yu Donglai has led the Fat Donglai team to blow up three old supermarket enterprises out of the circle, including Jiangxi leading supermarket Jiabaile, Hunan veteran supermarket BBK, and Yonghui supermarket. Among them, it is also Yonghui Supermarket that is particularly eye-catching.

Just because, in front of the top five Yonghui supermarkets in the industry, Fat Donglai is still a little brother-like existence. On the 2023 Hurun Global Rich List, Zhang Xuansong, the founder of Yonghui Supermarket, also became the only entrepreneur in Minhou, Fujian Province to be on the list with a net worth of 9.5 billion. This abnormal sense of conflict attracted countless netizens to watch.

With the help of the "golden finger" of Fat Donglai, since June 19, Yonghui Supermarket's Xinwan Plaza store in Zhengzhou has performed extremely hot for many consecutive days. This made Yu Donglai's aura dazzling again. Zhang Xuansong also breathed a sigh of relief for the time being.

Zhang Xuansong, born in 1971, is a native of Minhou, Fujian. Before graduating from high school, Zhang Xuansong gave up school, joined the business world, and entered the supermarket industry in 1995. Zhang Xuansong has spent more than 20 years to become the "king of Fujian supermarkets".

However, although Zhang Xuansong is still the richest man in Minhou, Fujian, in the past two years, Yonghui Supermarket has rarely had good news worth clinking glasses, but has fallen into the quagmire of store closures and sluggish performance, and its market value has fallen from more than 106.4 billion yuan at its peak to 22.5 billion yuan on June 26.

Thirty years in the east of the river, thirty years in the west of the river. Yu Donglai stood proudly in the spotlight compared to Zhang Xuansong, the king of supermarkets, who has been retreating. The reason for this is that a senior retail person told "City Boundary" that in recent years, the economic environment has changed due to the change of cycles, but the large supermarkets that have not been able to recognize the situation still follow the strategy of continuous expansion.

"The 'Yonghuis' did not shrink in time to achieve a soft landing, so they hit a wall one after another. After decades of development, Fat Donglai has become popular in recent years, precisely because of its strategy of focusing on regional development, which fits the theme of this cycle switching. ”

Behind the "King of Fujian Supermarket" bent down to "Henan's biggest Internet celebrity", there is actually a hidden capital bureau.

1. There is a capital bureau behind it

The grass gray snake line, the veins are thousands of miles.

The story has to start with the opportunity for Fat Donglai to become popular. This is not unrelated to a man named Pang Xiaowei. Pang Xiaowei, born in 1973, has an educational background of Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Zhejiang Gongshang University. He has been named one of the top 10 emerging angel investors by authoritative media.

In 2000, Pang Xiaowei founded the retail business portal Lianshang.com, and served as the actual controller and chairman. Yu Donglai and Pang Xiaowei jointly initiated the establishment of the Lianshang Donglai Business Research Institute. Pang Xiaowei served as the president of the United Merchants Donglai Business Research Institute, and Yu Donglai served as the chief tutor of the Donglai Research Institute.

"City Boundary" found that as early as 2008, there was information on Yu Donglai and Fat Donglai on Lianshang.com. But the first time the two met, according to Pang Xiaowei, it was in 2021. This year, Fat Donglai, with sales of 7 billion yuan, was not on the list of "Top 100 Chinese Supermarkets", and Yu Donglai only enjoyed a certain popularity in Henan.

However, Pang Xiaowei recalled that when he saw Yu Donglai, he felt "full" and "too many valuable things", so that he quickly invited this "amazing entrepreneur" over and became the protagonist of the "Donglai Business Philosophy" private meeting. It was one day in December 2021, and Yu Donglai talked about his business philosophy at the meeting.

This private session was a success. Pang Xiaowei once recalled to the media that more than 500 people came to the event, the venue was not large, the location was not enough, and the back was full of people. The participants included the chairman, general manager and senior management of retail enterprises across the country. So, Pang Xiaowei struck while the iron was hot, and in March 2022, he and Yu Donglai jointly initiated the establishment of the Donglai Research Institute.

Donglai Research Institute has successively launched the seed class, the first president class and the second president class. There is a threshold for entering these classes. Red Star Capital Bureau reported that due to the personal on-site guidance of Donglai, the tuition fee for the seed class is 500,000 yuan per family, and there are 12 students in the first phase, and the companies that sign up need to pass layers of audits. Compared with the seed class, the tuition fee of the president class is much lower, the first phase is 30,000 yuan, and the second phase is 100,000 yuan.

However, the teaching method of the students in the president class has become eating "big pot rice". The number of companies has also soared to no more than 100. Even so, to enter the president class, you must meet three hard conditions, that is, the enterprise must be established for more than three years, the net assets must not be less than 5 million yuan, and the profit of the previous year is positive.

The people who participated in the training are all over the catering, e-commerce, retail and other industries, and these people have more or less influence in their respective business fields. In the eyes of the industry, this has laid the foundation for Fat Donglai to explode on the whole network. In the training, Yu Donglai repeatedly mentioned the business details, which were widely disseminated and spread.

For example, the "grievance award" that makes Fat Donglai really popular in 2023, as well as "the minimum average salary of employees is 7,000 yuan", "employees who don't want to go to work are not allowed to take leave" and so on. At this point, the big foreshadowing has been buried, and the protagonists who were blown up by Fat Donglai have completely stepped forward to the stage.

There are traces of public reports to follow, and it is Fat Donglai's several explosive changes: in July 2023, the Jiangxi leading supermarket Jiabaile will begin to be adjusted; In April 2024, a senior management team of 20 people will be sent to Changsha to help the Hunan veteran supermarket BBK; In late June, the first store of Yonghui Supermarket opened after the explosion.

All of a sudden, good news came frequently. Zhou Shan, general manager of Jiabaile, even said gratefully that Donglai Ge pulled him back to the ICU from the "morgue". As a result, following Jiabaile, BBK, and Yonghui supermarkets, Zhongbai Group was also rumored to learn from Fat Donglai and was about to change the store. When there are many discussions in the outside world, some people also ask: There are so many supermarkets in the country, why these companies?

As a mentor, Yu Donglai positioned himself as "preaching" and "spreading beauty", and he once mentioned why he wanted to reform Yonghui Supermarket, "Yonghui has made a lot of contributions to China in China's retail industry, and the later development has taken some detours too quickly, and I look forward to Yonghui being able to set sail again through this adjustment." ”

Yu Donglai also talked to Chinese entrepreneurs about the original intention of Yonghui Supermarket and BBK, "The concept of Fat Donglai is too precious, and we can do everything well with this concept, and we also want to share our experience and methods with more enterprises, at least pull them." Let this society have less suffering and more beautiful elements. ”

However, a number of industry insiders told "City Boundary" that the companies that have been or are about to be reformed have a direct or indirect relationship with Yu Donglai and Lianshang.com. According to public information, Jia Baile is a student of the seed class of Donglai Research Institute, and will study with Yu Donglai in 2022, and from the second half of 2023, he will accept the help of Fat Donglai and 11 other companies in the seed class.

As the leader of Hubei supermarket chains, Zhongbai Group also announced that it would adjust the model according to Fat Donglai, and it is also close to this acquaintance bureau. In 2017, Zhongbai Group and Yonghui Supermarket jointly established Yonghui Zhongbai Supermarket. Although Yonghui Supermarket has continued to reduce its stake in Zhongbai Group since 2022, as of now, it still holds 9.86% of Zhongbai Group's shares, making it the third largest shareholder. And between BBK, Yonghui and Lianshang.com, there is a relationship between continuous cutting and chaos.

▲ (BBK, Yonghui, Yihe Network Equity Structure Chart Source: Tianyancha)

Tianyan check shows that BBK Investment Group Co., Ltd. has a stake in a new third board listed company called Yihe Network. Lianshang.com is a subsidiary of Yihe Network, and the two companies have a common actual controller, Pang Xiaowei. Pang Xiaowei, the actual controller of Lianshang.com, is also the actual controller of Yihe Network, and the former holds 60% of the latter's shares. The main business of Yihe Network is training, exhibition services, etc.

"City Boundary" further flipped through the prospectus of Yihe Network and found that BBK was originally the fourth largest shareholder of Yihe Network, and in 2015, it transferred 6.25% of the shares held by Yihe Network to a person named Zhang Haixia. Zhang Haixia is a shareholder of a number of BBK companies such as BBK Investment Group and BBK Commercial Chain. At the same time, Bubu Investment Group also participated in Shenzhen Julin Chengze Venture Capital Partnership.

Another key point is that a person named Xie Xiangzhen has a stake in Yonghui Supermarket Co., Ltd. while participating in Shenzhen Julin Chengze. Xie Xiangzhen is not ordinary, he is a former executive of Yonghui Supermarket, and he is also the brother-in-law of Zhang Xuansong and Zhang Xuanning. Zhang Xuansong's elder brother, Zhang Xuanning, is the other founder of Yonghui Supermarket. In this interlocking capital bureau, Yonghui Supermarket is the largest and ranks the highest in the industry, and because of this, it was blown up by Fat Donglai, which is particularly touching.

A question that is about to arise is: Can the explosion reform of Yonghui Supermarket be rolled out on a large scale across the country?

2. "It is impossible to open 200 stores"

Feng Qing, a former employee of Yonghui Supermarket, heard the news that Fat Donglai had broken up Yonghui Supermarket, and his first reaction was, "This is a good thing." "The Internet celebrity effect of Yu Donglai and Fat Donglai can bring traffic to Yonghui Supermarket. Moreover, Fat Donglai and Yonghui can complement each other. "Fat Donglai has a higher positioning, which is not the same as Yonghui's overall market. Yonghui Green Mark is a bit similar to Fat Donglai's positioning. ”

The Yonghui Green Label in Feng Qing's mouth, commonly known as the boutique Yonghui, is a high-end supermarket brand launched by Yonghui Supermarket in 2010. Yonghui Green Label stores sell better quality and slightly higher prices. "But it's a pity that when I did it, it wasn't so high-quality, and it was more of a people's livelihood route." Today, it can be seen from the popularity of Yonghui Supermarket Xinwan Plaza Store that Yonghui Supermarket and Fat Donglai have joined forces to indeed produce an unusual chemical reaction.

Zhang Xuansong seems to have great trust in Yu Donglai. At the mobilization meeting for the adjustment and reform of Yonghui Supermarket, Zhang Xuansong once said, "From today on, Yonghui will follow Donglai Brother to pursue light, quality, and love." As early as June 19, the day of the opening of the Yonghui Supermarket Xinwan Plaza store, Yu Donglai replied to the media "When will more stores be opened", he confidently said, "There will be 20 stores one after another." The 20 stores in Henan have been transformed in this way. ”

Can Yu Donglai's wish come true? In the view of Zhang Lan, a senior retailer, if it is simply carried out in the Henan region, it is not a big problem. The labor cost of a single store, such as a salary increase, will win word of mouth and gain some traffic. This will definitely help Yonghui's performance.

It is undeniable that Fat Donglai does have innate advantages in Henan, it has a complete supply chain, providing popular and popular self-owned and self-procured products, and has also accumulated an excellent reputation in people's hearts. Many people in Henan have the same trust in Fat Donglai, "In Henan, Fat Donglai is the guarantee of quality, and the things in this supermarket can be entered with closed eyes." ”

If you want to roll out this model to the whole country, "it's very difficult. "Yonghui Supermarket has continued to carry out strategic contraction in the past three years, although the number of stores has decreased a lot compared with the peak of 1,440 stores, but the 2023 annual report shows that Yonghui Supermarket still has 1,000 stores." For hundreds or thousands of stores, the labor cost is calculated according to the adjustment, which is not realistic. Zhang Lan thinks.

After all, Yonghui Supermarket is a listed company, and it also depends on the return on investment. And the supermarket giant's cash flow has been tight in recent years. "Yonghui Supermarket's capital chain is tight and does not settle payments, which leads us to become more and more cautious in cooperating with it." A supplier of Guangxi Yonghui supermarket told "City Boundary".

Taking 10,000 steps back, even if Yonghui Supermarket chooses to launch it nationwide, it is very likely that most of the goods in the store will be replaced by Fat Donglai. Because, judging from the popular categories after the explosion of BBK and Yonghui supermarkets, most people are going to Fat Dong to sell their own products.

Zhu Danpeng, an analyst of China's food industry, explained to City Boundary that Fat Donglai is only a regional brand, and when it goes to do one of the few single stores, it vigorously promotes the refinement of in-store management, the precision of category mix, and the humanization of team management, which can be achieved on a small scale. "But when it comes to replicating a big chain, national or even global, the difficulty is not ordinary."

Regarding the question of "whether Yonghui Supermarket can be rolled out nationwide", Feng Qing is more optimistic. "If you really recognize this model, it can be replicated on a larger scale." Feng Qing continued to explain to "City Boundary", "The key depends on whether Yonghui Supermarket has the determination to change, whether the Fat Donglai model can be adhered to, and whether customer service can be in place." This depends on whether Yonghui has a clear position on itself. ”

Yonghui Supermarket earlier also borrowed from others. For example, it has studied with Ito-Yokado in Japan and from Dairy Farm International in Hong Kong. "It's just that after learning, there aren't many people who can land." Feng Qing said frankly. In addition, "City Boundary" learned that at the same time as being bombarded by Fat Donglai this time, Yonghui Supermarket also had some actions in its stores in some cities, such as Fuzhou and Beijing.

However, compared with the stores in Henan, the changes in the stores in Fuzhou and Beijing are still relatively superficial. In the case of a Yonghui supermarket in Xihongmen, Daxing, Beijing, for example, "there are no obvious changes except for the morning work time being changed from 7 to 7:30 a.m. A clerk told City Boundary.

On the issue of scale expansion, Yu Donglai is much more cautious. Also on June 19, the media asked Yu Donglai again, "Why don't you open 200 (200 Yonghui supermarkets)", the Internet celebrity boss shook his head and waved his hand and said, "That's impossible, there have to be other brands to serve this market together." ”

▲ (Yonghui supermarket stock price chart Source: Straight Flush)

In any case, from the current point of view, Yu Donglai and Zhang Xuansong have achieved a win-win situation. Fat Donglai's goods can be sold to Yonghui Supermarket, and Yonghui Supermarket has gained Fat Donglai's popularity and management experience. In addition, just when it was rumored in the market that Zhang Xuansong was going to worship Yu Donglai as a teacher, the share price of Yonghui Supermarket gained three complete daily limits, an increase of nearly three percent, and the stock price rose from 2.3 yuan to a maximum of 2.93 yuan.

After the explosion and reform, the first store of Yonghui Supermarket, the performance has been hot for many days, and behind the magnification of the effect of this single-store rectification, the news of "Yonghui Supermarket closed 200 stores nationwide" has not been paid much attention to. "The news that Fat Dong came to help Yonghui Supermarket, to a certain extent, released some positive information to the market and made a hedge for the news of Yonghui Supermarket's closure." Zhang Lan is also familiar with the PR industry.

On the evening of June 18, some retail self-media reported that Yonghui Supermarket will greatly optimize the existing store system in 2024, planning to close about 200 tail department stores, accounting for about 20% of the existing stores. Yonghui Supermarket replied to a number of media outlets, saying, "There is no response to this for the time being" and "this news is not the content released by the company, it is a market rumor." The company has a plan to open or close stores every quarter. The specific content released by the company shall prevail. ”

However, there are all kinds of signs that the news of the store closure is not groundless.

3, the richest man in Minhou, the more anxious and chaotic

At about 9 o'clock in the evening on June 23, Wang Si, a post-90s girl in Zengcheng District, Guangzhou City, suddenly wanted to eat watermelon. So, she placed an online order for something from Xintang Wanda Yonghui Supermarket. In her opinion, because it is over 38 yuan, it can be delivered to the door within 1 hour, "It's very convenient, and it's more suitable for lazy people like me." ”

However, something unexpected happened to Wang Si. When the delivery man knocked on the door and handed her something, he said, "I know you often buy Yonghui things, but this supermarket will be closed next month." You have to be mentally prepared. At that moment, Wang Si was extremely lost. Calm down, Wang Si knew that it was reasonable for Xintang Wanda Yonghui Supermarket to close its store.

Xintang is just a town below Zengcheng District, and its consumption power is not strong, especially in the past two years, everyone has become more and more cautious in buying things. I don't know when, Wang Si also found that there are a lot of stores and shops around, because of the decrease in the flow of people, business is bleak. Even the Yonghui supermarket in Wanda shopping mall is no exception.

The bigger shock started in 2021. This year, next to Wanda Mall, another AEON MALL was opened, which is known as the largest comprehensive shopping mall in Asia, "This shopping mall has taken away the middle and high-end customer flow." Wang Si regretfully told the "City Boundary". Situations like this are also happening in other cities.

After buying a stinky chicken leg at Yonghui Supermarket, Xiao Yang in Chongqing never went to Yonghui again. Yonghui Supermarket originally dominated the fresh food, and the quality control is getting worse and worse. Compared with other competing supermarkets, Yonghui's price is not dominant, and "the service attitude of the staff is not good." Xiao Yang complained to the "city boundary".

"City Boundary" understands that at present, Yonghui Supermarket is still carrying out strategic contraction, and the store closure operation is still continuing. It is mainly concentrated in some third- and fourth-tier cities, such as Zengcheng in Guangzhou, Chongqing, Guangxi, Sichuan, etc. In the main urban area of Chongqing, for example, four Yonghui supermarkets were closed. However, in some big cities, such as Beijing, Yonghui supermarkets are operating fairly well.

The reason for this is that Beijing focuses on centralized procurement, the volume is large enough, many supply chain advantages can be covered, and the quality will be more controllable. "Third- and fourth-tier cities are mainly based on regional procurement, because the purchase volume is limited, the quality control is not strict enough, and there is a lack of long-radius support." Feng Qing explained the reason.

▲ (Zhang Xuansong, chairman of Yonghui Supermarket)

"It's right to shrink now, because some stores are opened blindly. If the revenue of a single store is not good, it must be closed. Zhu Danphong explained. Yonghui Supermarket, which is listed on the A-share market, also had a "highlight moment".

Since landing on the A-share market in 2010, Yonghui Supermarket's share price has continued to rise, reaching a high of 11.72 yuan per share in 2018, with a total market value of 106.4 billion yuan, and is known as the "king of supermarkets" by the outside world. Zhang Xuansong has also become the richest man in Fujian Minhou many times, even in 2023, when the strategic contraction continues.

But in fact, since 2018, after the net profit suffered a sharp drop for the first time, Yonghui Supermarket turned around and gradually declined. Since 2021, Yonghui Supermarket has embarked on the road of closing stores and laying off employees. According to public information, Yonghui Supermarket has closed more than 400 stores with poor performance in three years. It has not come this far without warning.

The turning point actually began in 2015. Feng Qing obviously felt that Yonghui was no longer developing upward. Although the stock price had not yet reacted at that time, internal employees felt that the company's development had encountered a bottleneck. Not only that, but the business differences between the two brothers, Zhang Xuansong and Zhang Xuanning, have also become obvious.

"The boss wants to be a boutique supermarket green label, and the second boss is mainly engaged in capital, and later intervenes in specific businesses." Feng Qing explained to the "City Boundary" that it was also for the stock price to look good and not affect the performance of the listed company, so that the money-losing Yonghui Life (a subsidiary of Yonghui Yunchuang) was spun off, thinking about making money and coming back.

At the end of 2018, Zhang Xuanning took the new retail business Yonghui Yunchuang and spun off the Yonghui supermarket system. This caused a lot of trouble back then. The key point is that Zhang Xuanning and Zhang Xuansong, acting in concert, originally held a total of 22.17% of the shares of Yonghui Supermarket.

But also in 2018, the two dissolved the relationship of acting in concert. It was also after this move that the two brothers ceased to be the largest shareholders of Yonghui Supermarket and lost management control of Yonghui Supermarket. Although Zhang Xuansong and Zhang Xuanning later shook hands and made peace, Yonghui Supermarket had missed the opportunity to overtake in the corner.

"With the entry of capital such as JD.com, Tencent, and Dairy International, many of Yonghui Supermarket's decisions are not something that can be decided by oneself. Because capital needs innovation and topics. Feng Qing thinks. It was also since 2015 that the internal structure of Yonghui Supermarket has been continuously adjusted, and the focus has been constantly switched between regions and headquarters.

In the view of Yonghui's internal employees, the company has been changing, there is no precipitation, it is not energetic, the organization is a bit scattered, and it has lost its execution. Some employees joined Yonghui around 2015, and for the next 9 years, they basically had to change positions every year, and the city of work has been changing. Talking about his old club, Feng Qing sighed.

Along with this, Yonghui Supermarket is unable to achieve 100% of its performance targets. Although at that time, the overall data of Yonghui Supermarket was good and continued to grow, but only internal employees knew that the growth of the same store had begun to decline, mainly relying on continuous expansion to bring better results.

Unfortunately, at that time, Yonghui Supermarket was expanding too fast and scattered, "including opening stores in Tibet, in fact, there is no way to give full play to its scale and supply chain advantages." In this way, until 2021, the decline of Yonghui Supermarket is well known. Zhang Jingyi, the former secretary of the board of directors of Yonghui Supermarket, when he left his post this year, posted on Moments that Yonghui Supermarket was "going down the mountain".

Over the years, Zhang Xuansong has also worked hard, and he has done a lot of things. What impressed Feng Qing was the private brand made internally. For example, mini Yonghui, Yonghui life, super species, etc. Zhang Xuansong also wants to do these well. At that time, at the internal meeting, Zhang Xuansong expressed that he actually hoped to spend the money on the supply chain to enhance the competitiveness of products.

However, what made Feng Qing feel helpless was that many decisions were followed up in a swarm, and when he saw that there were actions in the market, he rushed into them without thorough research. "It's a bit of a cliché. When problems are encountered, they are not reasonably analyzed and solved, resulting in these things being learned quickly and ending quickly. ”

There was a hustle and bustle, and there was a lonely place. Mini Yonghui, Yonghui Life, Super Species, etc., did not end well. In desperation, Zhang Xuansong, who had been in the limelight, lowered his head and bent down, becoming Yu Donglai's "disciple". On this side, Yonghui Supermarket was blown up by Fat Donglai and the matter is still to be continued, and Zhang Xuansong, the richest man in Minhou, Fujian, still wants to use this to turn the tide.

On the other side, the wheels of the times are still rolling forward.

(The characters in the article, Feng Qing, Zhang Lan, Wang Si, and Xiao Yang are pseudonyms.) ）

Author | Tao Ting

Edit | Chen Fang

Operations | Zhang Daxing

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