Fat Yonghui, who wants to be "the happiest supermarket in Beijing", is squeezed to be unhappy.

Text｜Zhong Yixuan

Editor｜Qiao Qian

"The Happiness Washed Away by the Flow of People"

On October 19, the first store of Beijing Yonghui that was adjusted and reformed by learning from Pangdonglai opened. The several big red characters, "To be the happiest supermarket in Beijing", are unanimously regarded as one of the important signs that Beijing Yonghui is moving towards "becoming like Pangdonglai".

However, just one week later, this place has become so crowded that it is no longer happy.

Last Saturday, in the smoggy weather in Beijing where the visibility was so low that the city seemed almost flat, the Yonghui Xilongduo Store in Shijingshan District of Beijing still had an incredibly large flow of people. On the 7th day of its opening, the baking area set up a flow-limiting belt for the first time. The staff told 36Kr that the flow of people on this day even exceeded that of the opening day. The cooked food area had the longest queue. If you want to buy a big fried dough twist like the one in Pangdonglai, congratulations, please go to the end of the queue first and slowly move along with the crowd for 15 minutes. Don't even think about trying it because the people in front of you who are just as bored have already eaten it as their meal.

The phrase "rubbing shoulders and elbows" is the most appropriate description for this place - there is no clear circulation route, shopping carts often collide, and the displays are not visible. Looking around, there are only dark heads. Because the vision is so chaotic, Yonghui even arranged several staff members to stand at the crossroads. The job is very simple. The person holds a red sign with an arrow marked on it, saying "The cashier is over there".

To some extent, the visibility here is no different from the smoggy weather outside.

The flow of people at Yonghui Xilongduo Store in Beijing on October 26

At 4 p.m., the flow of people reached its peak. In a situation where it was already quite difficult to walk, Yonghui's broadcast announced that a child was lost. Parents were requested to quickly arrive at the service desk to claim their child. In the past, especially before the emergence of member warehouse-style supermarkets like Sam's, which are known for their spaciousness, it was very difficult to hear that a child was lost in a supermarket of Yonghui's size. Not to mention that the space itself is not large, and those idle shopping guides would help you catch the children who were running around in the first place.

According to the official data of Xilongduo Plaza, on the opening day of the adjusted and reformed Yonghui Xilongduo Store, the number of customers who made payments was about 14,000, and more than 50,000 people entered the supermarket. The total daily sales reached 1.7 million yuan, exceeding 600% of the average daily sales before the adjustment and reform.

Because of the popular supermarket Pangdonglai that originated from Xuchang, Henan, people came to Shijingshan from all over Beijing. Although Pangdonglai does not have many self-operated products, only craft beer, mineral water, oatmeal, laundry detergent, and Baijiu (a Chinese liquor), almost everyone wants to visit the Pangdonglai exhibition area to try to find out the secret of that supermarket's popularity from the adjusted and reformed Yonghui.

An old man even opened the lid of the self-operated laundry detergent of Pangdonglai on the spot and sniffed it hard, "Let me smell what it smells like from Henan."

The changes in this adjustment and reform are obvious. According to the introduction of Yonghui Supermarket, the store removed 11,430 items in this adjustment and reform, with a removal ratio of 79%. It re-planned 12,765 items, and the proportion of new items accounted for 76.2%. After sorting, the commodity structure reached more than 90% of the commodity structure of Pangdonglai. In addition, in Yonghui Supermarket, the characteristic words of Pangdonglai such as "happiness" and "joy" can be seen almost everywhere.

From the overall perspective of the supermarket, the modified open circulation route has made the vision much wider; Yonghui has begun to attach importance to commodity displays, especially the laundry detergent in the Pangdonglai area that occupies one wall. It is replenished almost every 10 minutes. It is not that it sells very fast, but it is to always maintain the completeness and beauty of the display; and, like many member supermarkets, fresh food, baking, and cooked food are sold out on the same day.

A staff member in the fresh food area in the supermarket told 36Kr, "In the past Yonghui, it was difficult to see that there would be vacancies in the display area for fish and meat. It was always full because there were stocks from the previous day in the warehouse. Now, if it is sold out, it will not be replenished."

The Pangdonglai area of Yonghui Xilongduo Store

In its base camp Xuchang, Pangdonglai is known for its ultimate service. The adjusted and reformed Yonghui has also become more refined in service - a handwashing sink is set up next to the aquatic product area, the staff next to the automatic checkout machine will help customers bag the items one by one according to the commodity classification, a convenience service area is added, a mother and baby room and a pet storage cabinet are launched, and free self-service blood pressure, height, and weight measurement services are provided, and even a free charging area is set up.

But almost all the services and details have been dispersed by the huge flow of people. Complaints about "the large number of people in Yonghui" can be seen everywhere on the Internet. Even Yonghui Supermarket itself was not prepared to receive such a huge flow of customers. Under the Xilongduo Mall where Yonghui is located, a large number of goods are temporarily placed in the middle of the square, and the ground serves as a temporary shelf. A Yonghui staff member told 36Kr that unlike Henan where Pangdonglai is located, the land price in Beijing is expensive. The backstage warehouse of Yonghui in Xilongduo Mall is too small to accommodate such a large commodity operation, so the goods can only be temporarily placed outside. "It is much less efficient to move the goods up and down like this". Even he himself was temporarily transferred from other Yonghui stores in Beijing in a hurry.

Now, what he is worried about is that winter in Beijing is coming. Once the temperature drops below zero, if the number of people remains the same, then the beverages will simply not be able to be stored outdoors.

Goods temporarily placed outside the mall

Who Will Be Yonghui's Final Teacher

Pangdonglai is not Yonghui's first teacher.

As a supermarket that became popular due to its fresh food advantage, the high flow of customers brought by fresh food allowed Yonghui to leave Fujian in just 3 years and enter the capital market in 9 years. At its most glorious time, Yonghui surpassed Walmart with a turnover of 93.15 billion yuan in the list of the top 100 supermarkets in China, becoming one of the top three at one stroke.

Until around 2018, the emergence of front warehouses and community group buying made the offline fresh food of Yonghui instantly pale in comparison due to their higher delivery and ordering efficiency. Even in Fuzhou, Yonghui's base camp, Pupu Supermarket was able to strongly break through a gap with its pure online operation + front warehouse delivery model. As early as 2019, a person close to the senior management of Pupu disclosed to the media that Pupu's average daily orders could even reach twice that of Yonghui's home delivery.

Before learning from Pangdonglai, Yonghui had almost learned all the new business forms in the retail industry. In 2017, Yonghui learned from Hema and opened Super Species, which once had a brilliant moment in the capital market but quickly went into a major decline after 2 years. In 2018, Yonghui targeted community fresh food and opened Yonghui Mini Stores, sharing a set of supply chains with large stores and setting a goal of 1,000 stores, but it ended up in a dismal situation. In 2022, Yonghui began to learn from Sam's and Costco for the reform of warehouse-style membership. The result is self-evident. Compared with the past reforms, the goal of "China's Walmart" is obviously more out of reach.

Because learning a similar form cannot fundamentally solve the problem of the "big supermarket model" holding back.

The big supermarket model represented by Carrefour and Yonghui used to have an important source of income from the entry fees, barcode fees, display fees, and other fees paid by suppliers. Daniel Bernard, the global president of Carrefour, once said a theory, "Push the suppliers to the corner and then give them a candy", which is enough to verify Carrefour's strong attitude towards suppliers at that time. But a former Carrefour employee told 36Kr that with the rise of other channels, Carrefour's bargaining power has weakened, and it has become more and more difficult to negotiate with suppliers. Unlike in the past, suppliers will calculate the high deduction points into the cost, which also makes Carrefour lose its price advantage.

The same contradiction also occurs in Yonghui.

Now, after learning from Pangdonglai and adjusting and reforming, the first thing Yonghui did was to cancel the additional back-end fees, that is, the entry fees, barcode fees, marketing fees, etc. that the supermarket charges to brand parties and suppliers. A Yonghui employee also told 36Kr that the previous business was done separately, and Yonghui itself could not fully control the quality of all categories, and it was very difficult to coordinate. "Now that the entire adjustment is changed to self-operation, the performance is linked to everyone, and the internal conflicts of interest are reduced."

On September 23, Miniso announced in the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that it would acquire 29.4% of the shares of Yonghui Supermarket for 6.27 billion yuan. Subsequently, Yonghui's stock price soared. From the lowest of about 2.2 yuan per share in September, it continued to rise by the daily limit. In just over a month, the increase was close to 72%.

Behind this bottom-fishing, it is likely related to Yonghui's adjustment and reform learning from Pangdonglai. Ye Guofu, the founder of Miniso, has expressed his appreciation for Pangdonglai's model more than once. In a recent media interview, Ye Guofu compared Trader Joe's (Joe's Supermarket) with Pangdonglai. In the United States, Trader Joe's is undoubtedly the king of坪效 (about 1,750 US dollars), which is equivalent to the 14,000 坪效 of Pangdonglai.

However, Pangdonglai has never left Henan. Facing Yonghui's nearly 900 store volume, whether it can replicate the retail miracle of Pangdonglai is too early to conclude. But one thing is certain, Yonghui wants to be the happiest supermarket - Just yesterday, due to the huge flow of people, the adjusted and reformed store of Beijing Yonghui announced that in order to ensure the rest time of employees, from November 1, the store's business hours will be adjusted from 8:30 to 9:30.

"Happiness" banner at the entrance of Yonghui