Along the way‖ Catering, I think it is difficult to be the No. 1 industry

During the holidays, I made dinner dates with several groups of friends, and many of them were talking about letting us invest in a business. When they mentioned it was a catering business, I smiled and said I didn’t understand and refused.

The industry I dare not touch the most is catering, and I have almost no friends who are really good in this industry.

The seemingly low threshold of the catering industry makes people mistakenly think that it is particularly easy to get started and do well. Looking at many popular restaurants, they are jealous and think that it is an industry that can make money quickly and quickly. Therefore, there are many that open, and of course, there are many that collapse. Those that open well are almost rare.

In the 1990s, I was still in primary school. There was a relative named Zhang. He was already a millionaire at that time, so his nickname was Zhang Wanwan.

He rented a big restaurant in our city when I was in the third grade of elementary school. At that time, I loved going to his restaurant to visit relatives. There were all kinds of rare dishes and the team of chefs hired by Zhang Wanwan from other places. One of the dishes that impressed me most was sweet shrimp balls stir-fried with flower petals and fruits, which were poured on top of fried golden rice balls. As a young person, I could eat a whole plate by myself.

The restaurant has always been busy and bustling, mainly for guests and banquets, and the private rooms are basically full. We always thought that the business must be so good that we must make a lot of money. I never expected that two years later, Zhang Wanwan actually transferred the restaurant out. I only remember that he said it was a flat sale and that he made no money.

Uncle Million himself has a very generous character and lacks control over details, while catering is diligent and makes money by controlling costs through details.

This is an example of a company that was successful in turning over business but failed in cost management. It also planted the seed in my heart that catering is not good.

The year before last, we opened a Sichuan snack bar called Shu Zhi Zhi on the pedestrian street in the center of our city. The store is about 80 square meters. The dandan noodles are very delicious. Wang Xiansen and I made a special trip to eat there several times. Every time, it was deserted and the restaurant was never full. The best thing is that the food is served quickly and it looks clean and tidy. The good times did not last long, and the store closed within a year.

A few years ago we went to another city for business and chose a shop called Chongqing Xiaomian and ordered dandan noodles and chicken offal noodles. The taste is really average, I'd say it's below average to be honest, but it can't handle the large number of people, so you have to wait for a seat, and the table turnover rate is relatively high. When we went there, it was already over 60 before dinner time, and it was expected to be open for one day. The amount is around 5,000. The store is next to the entrance door of a local large supermarket, and there is plenty of traffic. In addition to noodles and noodles, the store also sells Bobo chicken and a shop-in-shop window selling braised food, which can be taken away or cooked on site.

After the meal, we analyzed the pros and cons of these two stores on the road. < /p>

2. Location selection: The Taste of Shu is located on a small road in the central block. Most of the surrounding areas are famous stores, and the crowd has no willingness to consume snacks; the Chongqing Noodles is located at the entrance of the supermarket, where the consumer willingness of the crowd is in line with the store. The content provided is consistent;

3. Meals: Since you open a restaurant, it is necessary that most of the meals are above the ordinary level and have something unique.

We have a friend who started his own business when he was just 20 years old. It has been 25 years now and has several relatively successful companies. He personally prefers the catering business, so he has been working in the catering industry on and off. He has opened restaurants 5 times in a row, and the last time he joined the franchise and opened a hot pot brand store is considered a real success.

The first time he opened a store was when he was in his 20s. According to him, it was a smooth operation and he worked hard for two years without making any profit.

The second time I opened it was a Hong Kong-style tea restaurant in the back alley of a university. The business was good at the beginning. As time went by, the number of customers began to sparse, but the renovation costs were so high that it couldn’t sustain it within 2 years. Live, lose more than 100,000 yuan.

This is the third time I opened a Mediterranean-style coffee bar in the downtown area of ​​a provincial capital city. I hired someone to come up with the name, and the publicity and promotion was in place, but the attendance rate was not good. Later, my friend said it was The feng shui didn't suit me, so I left it hastily. I've been there several times since it changed hands, and business has been good.

The fourth time was when we dined together in a Chaoshan restaurant. The food was very unique, but the boss didn’t want to make it anymore, so a friend took it over, hahaha, and later changed hands.

For the fifth time, my friend got smart and took some local foodie friends to try out more than a dozen hot pot restaurants in Sichuan and Chongqing, and then chose one to join. The stores have been open for just over a year, and the investment payback period has not yet reached. Of course, my friend is very attentive, and the store managers are all people who have specially dug out Haidilao to do it. We have been there several times, and we have to wait for a seat every time. Group purchases and various activities have never stopped. However, according to friends, it only increases daily cash flow.

After meeting a group of friends in 2014, various ideas about starting a business have never stopped. Cafes are the one I hear the most.

Coffee shops are one of the most difficult types of catering stores to open now. Even companies that specialize in coffee shops cannot guarantee that every store will be profitable. Starbucks is highly regarded, in fact, largely because it does difficult things well.

Usually when friends come to talk to me about coffee shops, I can’t say anything further. Ask about the business plan, investment ratio, business ideas, and precipitation period. Basically, everything is negative. This is normal. Most people who want to open a cafe have a literary heart, but business is so cruel that there is no room for this kind of literary imagination.

Howard Schultz, one of the founders of Starbucks, once opened a coffee shop called "Tian Tian", which later failed. He also returned to Starbucks, and it took more than 10 years to open the current coffee shop. Starbucks we saw. The core factors have not changed, but failure is still possible.

The catering business is an ancient industry. But now, it has become more than just hard work. Diligence can only ensure that the losses are not so severe.

Even if you do everything from naming, location selection, meals, and cost control, there is still a chance of failure. The good stores you can see all have survivor bias.

I remember that there was an outlet that was recruiting investment before it opened. I wanted Haidilao to open a store there, so I asked Zhang Yong to visit the store and offered many preferential terms. Zhang Yong spent half a day walking around the empty O'Leary, and then said that although the conditions were really exciting, he could not open it because the mentality of the crowd was not suitable for customers who wanted to eat Haidilao hot pot.

What we cannot learn from Haidilao is Zhang Yong’s ability to “do something and not do something” as a confidant.