Reflection on Yonghui's "New Retail": Follow the trend and close the store ... Where is the way out?

Yonghui Supermarket has made a series of new retail attempts. Today, Yonghui has reached a consensus from the chairman to the top, and there is only one way to break through the bottleneck, that is, to achieve comprehensive changes through digitalization. Whether Yonghui, who is "going downhill", can climb to the top again is still unknown.

Editor Mina

Toutu Photography Studio Xiao Bing

On July 7th, Zhang Jingyi, director of Yonghui Supermarket (hereinafter referred to as Yonghui), announced his resignation in a circle of friends. "I followed Yonghui people to realize the dream of * * * in ten years and climbed to the top of the mountain with hundreds of billions of stores. We may have seen higher peaks in the distance through the clouds, because we are going down the mountain, restoring physical fitness, updating equipment and reorganizing logistics. "

"Going downhill" may be the most accurate description of Yonghui's current situation. Zhang Jingyi has worked in Yonghui for 12 years, witnessing the glorious moment of Yonghui Supermarket and the attempt, struggle and anxiety of Yonghui under the impact of new retail formats.

After experiencing the shrinking profits, the off-line of super species and the large-scale bankruptcy of Yonghui mini, Yonghui no longer mentioned "new retail".

20 1 7 65438+1October1,the first "super species" Fuzhou store in China opened. Zhang Xuansong, chairman of Yonghui Supermarket, is quite confident about the future of super species. In a speech in June of that year, Zhang Xuansong said: "Superspecies is a good name. It is a business model of competitive iteration and survival of the fittest. " At the same time, he also talked about how the business model of "catering+supermarket+Internet" changed the retail industry in China.

Yonghui had planned to have 50 super species stores nationwide by the end of 20 17. But in the end, only 27 were opened that year. It is reported that the number of stores in this format does not exceed 80 at most. Today, except for a super species in Beijing and Fuzhou, all other stores are closed.

In this regard, Yonghui told China Entrepreneur that closing the stores of Superspecies is a normal business adjustment, and returning to the main business and seeking new growth under the strategic guidance of "Yonghui in science and technology, digital empowerment" is Yonghui's core proposition at present.

Yonghui is reluctant to respond too much to "new retail", and even the relevant person in charge said: "We have never mentioned new retail internally."

At the 20 19 shareholders' meeting, Zhang Xuansong responded to the shareholders and said, "It can't be said that getting an APP is a new retail, and finally we have to solve technical problems."

On May 2 1 day, at the 2020 shareholders' meeting, Zhang Xuansong announced that Yonghui would return to the origin of Minsheng Supermarket, further promote digital transformation and strengthen its technology and supply chain capabilities.

Not to mention new retail, returning to the origin of Minsheng Supermarket and carrying out digital transformation will bring Yonghui a second chance of rebirth?

At the beginning of the new retail wave, in order to alleviate the offline dilemma, entrants including Yonghui tried almost all new formats.

"There were many new formats at that time, but no one was sure which one would succeed, and many times they were very anxious." An executive of a fresh retail enterprise in Beijing told China Entrepreneur. Confusion and anxiety, chasing the wind, and following the trend if you don't think clearly are the common feelings of many fresh food industry practitioners in the exploration of new retail.

20 17 is also called "the first year of new retail". In this year, Box rode on Ali, held high the banner of "new retail" and entered the fresh food industry, followed by JD.COM, Meituan and Suning, followed by traditional retailers such as RT Mart, Carrefour and Wal-Mart, and the new retail field began to "fight with God". This year, Yonghui Yunchuang, a subsidiary of Super Species, received a strategic investment of 4.6 billion yuan from Tencent. With the help of capital, all parties began to burn money crazily to expand their stores.

Catching up with the new retail outlet has also brought a "halo" to Yonghui. 20 18 10, Yonghui's share price once reached the historical high of 1 1.83 yuan, and its market value exceeded 100 billion.

However, the good times did not last long. In 20 18, the situation changed, and the decline of Yonghui gradually became obvious. According to Yonghui's financial report, in the first three quarters of 20 18, Yonghui Yunchuang's business lost 6170,000 yuan. From 20 16 to 20 18, Yonghui Yunchuang lost nearly 10 billion yuan for three consecutive years.

Yonghui is not a chicken feather. New retail formats such as Box Horse and Meituan Elephant Fresh have been involved in the tide of closing stores. Hou Yi, the founder of Box Horse, also claimed to change from "running for his own life" to "running for his own life". Opening a store on a large scale without running the format is a "diagnosis" of the new retail "farce" in the industry.

"When others do new formats, I will reflect: Am I wrong? Not taking a new and fashionable road is like doing something wrong. " The above-mentioned executives said that during that time, they seemed to be held hostage by capital and tried many new formats with the wind. Looking back now, the business models of these new formats are not mature enough. But at that time, they were immersed in the commercial imagination of industrial upgrading woven by "new retail" and were convinced that new retail was the future of the industry.

At the same time, a large number of entrepreneurs such as pre-warehouse mode, community group buying and fresh e-commerce have also entered the market.

The competition faced by offline retail is diversified and all-round. Because of these potential competitions, Yonghui has also laid out a pre-warehouse model and made a group purchase in Yonghui Community. The pre-warehouse mode belongs to the mode of large capital consumption, which can run through local areas, so it is not so easy to go to the whole country.

"User habits are migrating online, but what kind of mode is used for docking? I can pat my head and say that most of the online models are losing money now. " The above-mentioned executives said that in the past, new retail used capital to burn money and did online business in a way that was out of normal operation.

This is not a lie. Take the fresh e-commerce platform with the front warehouse mode listed recently as an example, the daily fresh net loss will reach 65.438+64.9 billion yuan in 2020; The net loss of Ding Dong's grocery shopping in 2020 was 365.438+77 billion yuan, and the net loss in the first three months of this year increased from 245 million yuan in the same period last year to 654.38+38.5 million yuan. Boxma Xiansheng has been rumored by the outside world, and most stores are at a loss.

An entrepreneur of B2B fresh supply chain trading platform explained to China Entrepreneur: The solutions of many platforms are Internet plus traditional channels, but the upstream supply chain is still a first-class wholesaler and a second-class wholesaler. "This is equivalent to the installation of aircraft engines in the retail industry, but the source industries such as wholesale are tractors, just like an old cow pulling a broken car."

The entrepreneur believes that the traditional retail links are already perfect. On this basis, the e-commerce will further reduce costs, sell at low prices, and have service costs such as warehousing and logistics. He bluntly said: "If you don't solve the supply chain problem, you will just be a porter and lose money forever."

It will take at least three to five years, or even more than ten years, to settle down and do a good job in the supply chain. "Many people don't have this mentality, and there are too many people who are eager for quick success." The above entrepreneurs said.

For the fresh e-commerce online platform that started from the Internet, the supply chain is a huge challenge. However, Yonghui has been deeply involved in the supply chain for many years, which should have been its core competitiveness. However, due to the company's lack of Internet genes, the transformation line is now blocked, which is also a difficult problem for Yonghui.

All attempts to innovate business were initially carried out under the system of Yonghui Yunchuang.

Yonghui Yunchuang was established on 20 15, and its internal positioning is to provide innovative exploration and services. It owns super species, Yonghui Life APP, Yonghui mini and other businesses.

In the exploration of innovative business, there was once disagreement within Yonghui.

2065438+In June 2008, at the shareholders' meeting, Zhang Xuansong once said, "CEO Zhang Xuanning and I have differences on super species. He emphasizes catering, and I think the focus should be on home. "

In the first three quarters of 20 18, Yonghui Yunchuang lost as much as 6170,000 yuan. At the end of 20 18, Yonghui Yunchuang was spun off from Yonghui listed entities. For this "separation", an industry insider told China Entrepreneur, "Listed companies need to consider profitability and give investors an explanation. Stripping is for operational reasons. "

2065438+In the second half of 2009, Yonghui Supermarket launched Yonghui Shopping APP, which is very similar to Yonghui Life APP, and transformed into online business. This move is considered by the outside world to be a serious disagreement between Zhang Xuansong and Zhang Xuanning. This "internal friction" lasted less than a year and ended.

In March 2020, the interface reported that Yonghui Shopping APP was removed at the end of the month, and the two apps will work together to develop the home business. An Yonghui employee revealed in an interview with the interface that "the two platforms are operated by two groups of people, and there is a certain internal friction in publicity and promotion activities."

On July 3, 2020, Kloc-0, Yonghui announced that Zhang Xuanning transferred 20% equity of Yonghui Yunchuang to Yonghui Supermarket for 380 million yuan, and Yonghui Supermarket held 46.6% equity of Yonghui Yunchuang, becoming its largest shareholder again. For this transaction, Yonghui said that Yonghui Yunchuang's resumption of trading is based on the importance of Yonghui Life APP in the company's business. This transaction will enable the company to better integrate resources and improve the efficiency and service quality of online business.

According to the relevant person in charge of Yonghui, Yonghui Yunchuang, which has returned again, has been integrated with Yonghui Supermarket. At present, both teams are working in Yonghui Headquarters. "The management and assessment at the employee level are unified."

In addition, Yonghui is also accelerating the integration of new formats tried in the past.

It is reported that the super species under Yonghui Yunchuang system opened 27,46,65,438+05 stores continuously from 2065,438+07 to 2065,438+09. Yonghui mini 20 18 opened its first store at the end of 2008, and it grew rapidly to 5 10 in the first three quarters of 20 19.

The epidemic is like the last straw to crush the camel, which makes new retail models such as super species stand out.

From 20 19 to 2020, the number of Yonghui mini stores decreased from 573 to 156. The number of 202 1 and Q 1 is further reduced by 86, leaving only 70. At the beginning of July this year, China Entrepreneur inquired about Yonghui Life APP again, and found that only Fuzhou and Beijing each had a super-species store, but no other cities could find it.

In addition, after the outbreak, changes in user habits and store demand directly promoted the transformation of business models, especially the impact of community group buying. How to "break through" has become an important issue for traditional retail supermarkets.

The battlefield of retail has been constantly adjusting and changing, and the first few waves have fallen on the beach. Even if it is a community group purchase that has been in the limelight since 2020, some insiders said that with the intensification of industry competition and the return of capital to rationality, it is expected that there will be a wave of adjustment and reshuffle in the second half of this year.

On July 7th, Tongcheng Life Insurance, a community group-buying unicorn, declared bankruptcy, which was called "the first case of community group-buying bankruptcy".

On April 30th, Zhang Xuansong reflected on Yonghui's innovative layout in the past at the 2020 performance briefing. "Innovation is a very difficult thing, and it needs a group of core team elites, intelligent and practical people to do it."

So, he found Li with 10 years of technical experience as the CTO of Yonghui, and established a wholly-owned subsidiary of Yonghui Technology in Beijing.

Before joining Yonghui, Li worked for 65,438+00 years, and deeply participated in the reform of mobile Internet, the construction of Taiwan and the empowerment of technology. Joining Yonghui this time, Li will lead the team to explore the digital transformation of Yonghui.

The above-mentioned Yonghui people said that within Yonghui, from the chairman to the top, a * * * understanding has been reached. There is only one way to get out of the bottleneck of operation, users, efficiency and business, and that is digitalization. "Everything speaks with technology and numbers" is the core of Yonghui's reform.

Can digital transformation solve Yonghui's dilemma?

"When the technical team can build the underlying data and computing platform, digitally transform every link of the operation, and continuously optimize and integrate online and offline, home-to-store business, the operational efficiency can be improved." The above-mentioned Yonghui people said.

For the investment in digital construction, Yonghui executives have given great respect and authorization to the grassroots.

According to a developer of Yonghui, when I first came to Yonghui for five or six months, there were many urgent things that needed to be dealt with immediately. To this end, he led the team to start several closed development. For example, the management and development of supply chain, the development of data center, and the revision of Yonghui APP. "We hope that within three months, the APP will be revised many times, requiring at least no major shortcomings compared with other Internet platforms."

With the listing of online fresh e-commerce platforms such as Tiantian Fresh and Ding Dong Shopping, with the help of capital, the competition of fresh track is more intense. If you want to grab users, time is particularly important.

Also accelerating are talent recruitment and team building. Beijing Yonghui Technology, which was just established, quickly set up a team of 100 people from scratch within 100 days. In the whole Science and Technology Innovation Center, including Yonghui Shanghai, a technical team of more than/kloc-0,000 people has been recruited in just over half a year. Today, they are building the middle platform of Yonghui.

According to China Entrepreneur, the online and offline teams of Yonghui in the past, including the new business team, were separated from each other. Through the establishment of the central platform, the former chimney should be overturned and replaced with a fusion system. Compared with Internet e-commerce, Yonghui's intermediate platform is more complicated. The intermediate platform to be built has at least seven or eight big modules, including some transactions, some supply chains and some logistics performance modules. Logistics is also divided into large central warehouse, normal temperature warehouse, fresh warehouse, terminal performance and distribution, and then the path planning of the last three kilometers.

At the 2020 performance briefing, Zhang Xuansong revealed that Yonghui's management team has been discussing recently to carry out transformation management. He particularly emphasized that "it is change, not reform."

In order to meet the current business needs, Yonghui began to focus on building a flat organizational structure. The premise of all this is the exchange of information at the bottom, which requires team members to have consistent values and identity with what they are doing now.

For a long time after exploring new retail, the outside world questioned Yonghui. "Has Yonghui thought clearly about its future transformation?"

"It is clear now that we have to take the road of integration of online and offline and supply chain." Yonghui related people said.

At the performance briefing in 2020, Zhang Xuansong said that Yonghui Supermarket has the ability and confidence to take the lead in creating an innovative retail model through a new round of self-innovation and integrating the three core elements of quality, service and commercial efficiency under the pressure of thousands of store resources.

But how to integrate is a difficult problem. At present, all traditional retailers are undergoing digital transformation. Whether it is Carrefour, Wal-Mart or Gaoxin Retail backed by Ali, the complexity of digital transformation is "far more complicated than imagined"

As a traditional supermarket, Yonghui is different from the Internet platform, with obvious regionality and scattered data. For example, in the past, Yonghui's regional expansion was promoted to various regions with a strong mentoring operation mode, and the details of the business will also be carried out around the regionality of this region. Therefore, Yonghui's offline situation is far more complicated than what he saw. Whether the model can be penetrated from all regions to the whole country will be the difficulty of future breakthrough.

In fact, before the establishment of China Taiwan Province, Yonghui also invited "foreign aid" for its digital transformation. 20 17 12, Tencent invested 4.2 billion yuan in Yonghui Supermarket and began to help Yonghui carry out digital transformation. However, from the final result, the practice of cooperation and empowerment with third-party platforms did not make Yonghui successful. Investigating the reasons behind it, informed sources revealed that on the surface, digitalization is a technical problem, but in fact it is an organizational problem.

In the future, Yonghui will conduct a pilot project in this area according to its actual situation. According to the plan, the digital transformation of some supply chains and stores will be piloted in Fujian and Chongqing; Some supply bases will be transformed in Yunnan and other places; Omni-channel integration will be placed in Fujian, the base camp of Yonghui.

Today, Yonghui's digital transformation work is in full swing. The whole process is like building blocks. First, build a basic and standardized bottom layer. However, these efforts are far from enough. It is still unknown whether Yonghui, who is "going downhill", can reach the top again.