What happened? This brand endorsed by Wang Shi and Wang Feng has been issued 20 suspension warnings

Text | Wang Jincheng

After two consecutive years of losses and on the verge of being suspended from listing, the well-known domestic outdoor sports brand Pathfinder finally passed the risk.

On the afternoon of January 15, Pathfinder released a performance forecast, realizing a net profit of 111 million yuan to 116 million yuan in 2019. It issued 20 suspension warning announcements and finally passed the risk.

Since the release of the 2019 semi-annual report, Pathfinder has issued 20 listing suspension risk warnings. This year, through selling houses, selling stocks, and closing stores, it can be said that I have tried my best.

However, although the "shell preservation" is successful, the path Pathfinder will explore next may not be easier than that for their chairman Wang Jing to climb Mount Everest.

In May last year, Pathfinder Chairman Wang Jing climbed Mount Everest for the fourth time. Pathfinder’s official account posted a special article to congratulate her.

However, Pathfinder’s investors didn’t buy it and shouted to Wang Jing from a distance: Can he do something serious?

As "China's No. 1 outdoor products stock", Pathfinder suffered consecutive losses in 2017 and 2018, and its stock price has fallen by 90% compared to 2015. Under such circumstances, it is inevitable that Wang Jing’s behavior of climbing Mount Everest will be considered as “not doing his job properly”.

According to the annual report, Pathfinder achieved revenue of 2.878 billion yuan and a net profit of 166 million yuan in 2016. In 2017, revenue increased by 150 million yuan, but net profit lost 84.85 million yuan. The situation was even worse in 2018. Revenue was one-third less than the previous year, and losses reached 182 million yuan.

However, Pathfinder took its time.

In the 2018 financial report, they attributed the substantial losses to the cumulative amount of goodwill, investments and asset impairments of 268 million yuan and operating losses from other businesses other than the main outdoor business. Moreover, Pathfinder said that its main business has developed steadily and its product competitiveness continues to improve. Among them, the Pathfinder sales revenue was 1.177 billion yuan, and the Discovery Expedition brand achieved sales revenue of 141 million yuan.

The real reason for Pathfinder's losses lies in "indiscriminate buying".

Pathfinder’s growth was very good after its listing. In the first few years, annual revenue growth exceeded 30%, and net profit growth averaged over 50%. At its peak, net profit in 2011 was almost double that of the previous year.

At this time, Pathfinder was no longer satisfied with the outdoor products industry. It began to expand its territory by "buying, buying, buying."

Since 2013, Pathfinder has successively acquired Singapore’s online travel platform Asia Travel, outdoor platform Luye.com, Jizhimei, Yiyoutianxia, ??Tutu (Xiamen) Outdoor Products Co., Ltd., and more. The two major businesses are tourism services and sports.

This operation is also normal. However, Pathfinder's vision was not good, and most of these companies ended up being failures that dragged down their performance.

Among them, Yiyoutianxia is a "pit".

Since 2015, Pathfinder has strategically invested RMB 230 million in Yiyoutianxia. Then, the latter has been losing money until now, with a loss of 4.36 million yuan in 2018. In the first half of 2019, it suffered a loss of 470,000 yuan.

In addition, many companies such as Tutu (Xiamen) and Luye.com have experienced substandard performance or losses. Relevant data shows that by the first half of 2019, Pathfinder Investment and Equity Of the 16 companies, very few are profitable.

According to "21st Century Business Herald", as of the 2019 semi-annual report, only four of Pathfinder's main holding and joint-stock companies were profitable. The most profitable, Liaoning Beifuyuan Trading Co., Ltd., made a profit of 193.46 in the first half. Ten thousand yuan. In comparison, the scale of losses of other companies is much larger.

For example, Feifan Discovery (Tianjin) Outdoor Products Co., Ltd. suffered a huge loss of 14.8125 million yuan, and Tianjin New Starting Point Investment Management Co., Ltd. lost 9.9596 million yuan.

The investment vision is not accurate, and the growth rate of the industry is slowing down. After 2015, the growth rate of the domestic outdoor products industry fell to single digits. After Pathfinder reached the peak of revenue this year, it began to decline for many years. By 2017 and 2018, continuous losses began.

If it fails to achieve profitability in 2019, it will face the risk of suspending its listing.

In order to reverse the loss situation, Pathfinder tried every means in 2019, selling houses and stocks to get back from the cliff.

In the first half of the year, Pathfinder sold some of its own properties and obtained a net income of 36.2526 million yuan. In addition, we returned to our original aspiration, refocused on the main outdoor business, and reduced the tourism service business. Following Xiamen Tutu's repurchase of 15.7% of Pathfinder's equity in December 2018 due to substandard performance, in June 2019, Greenfield International Travel Service repurchased 43% of its equity for the same reason.

In November last year, Pathfinder transferred 29% of its equity in its tourism business subsidiary Yiyoutianxia.

Pathfinder has also made adjustments to its offline stores.

At the end of 2018, Pathfinder had 1,413 offline stores, including 1,210 TOREAD (Pathfinder) stores, 171 Discovery Expedition stores, and 32 Pathfinder children's clothing stores. In the first half of 2019, some stores that were not operating well were closed. There were 57 fewer TOREAD stores, 10 fewer Discovery Expedition stores, and 7 more children's clothing stores.

After this series of operations, Pathfinder's performance improved significantly. Revenue in the third quarter of 2019 was 987 million yuan, 20.55% less than the same period last year, but its main business was 795 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 11.11%. In addition, operating costs were significantly reduced by 30.99%, achieving a net profit of 99.4895 million yuan, an increase of nearly three times year-on-year.

In the subsequent listing suspension risk warning announcement, Pathfinder predicted that the net profit in 2019 would not be less than 100 million yuan.

Relevant surveys show that the degree of concentration in the outdoor products industry will become higher and higher, and market share will continue to be occupied by leading companies.

If we can make good use of this industry development trend and do a good job in product line layout and brand marketing, Pathfinder still has opportunities.

They have already taken action.

In 2019, Pathfinder became the exclusive sponsor of the sports brand "The Climber", a major tribute film for the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. It also created a series of mountaineering products based on the film's IP, and also conducted brand promotions based on the film. , to promote sales linkage.

"The Climber" eventually grossed more than 1 billion at the box office and gained a good reputation. In this wave of brand promotion, Pathfinder has a very accurate vision. Some investors also made a special suggestion to invite the movie star Wu Jing to be a spokesperson, so as to have a long-term influence on outdoor sports through movie culture.

In addition, the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics will also bring opportunities to the outdoor products industry. According to data from the "2018 China Ski Industry White Paper", the number of ski resorts in China reached 742 in 2018, an increase of 39 year-on-year. , the number of skiers visiting the resort reached 19.7 million, a year-on-year increase of 12.6%.

Pathfinder has laid out the core categories of winter sports, including product lines such as ski lines, alpine lines, and hiking cross-country lines.

Of course, Pathfinder will also have to deal with the impact and challenges of sports brands such as Li Ning, Anta, and Peak in the future. These brands have gradually begun to join the outdoor sports goods track.

The Winter Olympics is an opportunity, and it will also make the market competition for outdoor sports products more intense. How will Wang Jing lead Pathfinder to break through?