Editor Zhao Chengsang

Produced by Ercai (ID: Kanercai)

The pot food exchange, which has grown into the darling of capital in just a few years, is being questioned by the outside world.

Recently, Pot Circle Food Exchange announced the completion of the $60 million Series C financing. However, the good news in the capital market has not cooled down. Some media reported that the promise of "starting capital of 250,000 yuan, franchisee 1 year" was questioned.

"Born in flow and died in reality", the profit dilemma has always been the long-term fate of the fresh food field. It seems that the appearance of the pot circle food sink has broken this spell, and its business model has been regarded as a classic case for many times, and it has been analyzed and even worshipped at industry conferences.

Up to now, Cookware Food Exchange has not made a public response to this, but the query about "1 year return to the original" inevitably makes people reflect on the moisture brought by the epidemic to the fresh food industry, and ask again: Has the profiteering curse in the fresh food field really been solved?

1

Back in a year?

Pot food exchange is the "highlight" from cross-border catering.

Yang Mingchao, founder of Pot Circle Food Club, is also the founder of Small Bench Hot Pot. When the bench was the hottest, he said, "We don't make hot pot."

This sentence has two meanings. First, I have been engaged in beer agency before, and I am a layman who switched from FMCG to catering. Second, the future team will not stop at the hot pot catering business, but penetrate upstream and downstream.

After a long period of planning, it became a prophecy. In 20 17, the Pot Circle Food Fair was established, which is the first supermarket convenience store chain system in China with hot pot and barbecue as the main ingredients, covering leisure snacks, fresh food, clean vegetables, diet, snacks and other commodities.

Because of years of "undercover" catering industry, Yang Mingchao and his pot circle food sink quickly occupied the market, which not only provided B-end food sources for the majority of small and medium-sized catering enterprises, but also provided convenience for more and more "homebody, anxious, busy, lazy and old" people. Online, Internet plus ingredients, B2B, B2C operation. Off-line, encouraged to join, supported by multiple preferential policies, nearly 3,600 stores were opened nationwide in three years.

Recently, a report in the media pushed the joining policy of the pot circle food exchange to the forefront.

According to a survey conducted by the Beijing News reporter, the investment promotion personnel of Pot Circle Food Exchange Beijing announced that they would not charge the joining fee, and uniformly requested to choose a storefront facing the street of 60-80 square meters. The start-up capital of a standard store needs 250,000 to 280,000, including the basic decoration of the store, the purchase of facilities in the store, the cost of the first batch of ingredients and materials, and a deposit of 20,000 yuan. Under normal circumstances, it takes 10 months or 1 year on average to recover the capital.

In addition, in the interview, the person in charge of the fruit chain in the industry revealed that "there is not much money made by fresh supermarkets at present".

In this regard, Ercai also learned about some franchisees in Zhengzhou.

A franchise store in Jingyi Road, Jinshui District, Zhengzhou City said that the store joined two years ago and invested about 400,000 yuan before and after, but it has not yet "returned to the capital".

When asked if the start-up capital of the standard store was 250,000 yuan, the staff of a franchise store in Hong Zhuan Road, Zhengzhou City immediately shook their heads. Employees don't know the profitability of the store. "It depends on the personal business ability."

How is the operation of the pot circle food exchange line? Open the online shopping mall of the food exchange of the pot circle, and there is no sales data to show. Searching for the "pot circle food exchange" near a certain area in Zhengzhou on the Meituan takeaway platform, the sales data really vary greatly, with the monthly sales volume ranging from 58 to 929.

Is the commitment of "10 month or 1 year to repay the principal" a personal act or an investment strategy of the enterprise? What is the proportion of profitable franchisees? So far, the pot circle food exchange has not been publicly explained.

2

Why a marijuana ring?

The fresh food industry is rapidly laid out, but the difficulty in profitability has always been a pain point in the industry.

Take fresh e-commerce as an example. In 20 19, the data of China e-commerce research center showed that only 1% of the more than 4,000 fresh e-commerce enterprises in China realized profit, while the other 7% suffered huge losses, 88% suffered slight losses and 4% remained flat.

"Fresh e-commerce has developed for so many years. No matter what type of platform, there are two difficulties. One is that the front end is difficult to get customers, and the other is that fresh storage is difficult and the cost is high. " Zhong Wenbin, founder of Xinnongtang, who has been deeply involved in the fresh food industry for many years, said.

Among them, storage is difficult and loss is large, which is recognized as a pain point in the fresh food industry. After all, the fresh food industry has a large investment, and the customer unit price space is limited. But correspondingly, the industry will cause losses from ordering, receiving and handling to warehousing, processing and tally. Whoever can minimize the loss will have more initiative.

The pot circle food sink seems to have solved the industry dilemma. According to the Beijing News, public data show that in 20 19, the sales of restaurants in the pot circle increased by 400% year-on-year. On the basis of making profits for two years in a row, it still maintained a large-scale growth this year, with a year-on-year increase of 400%.

The control of the loss rate of the pot ring trough is also often discussed by the industry.

In this regard, some people believe that the pot circle food exchange has two major advantages. First, the category advantage. In the fresh food industry, the loss rate of vegetables is high, but the loss rate of frozen meat is very low. There are a lot of frozen meat in the Cookware SKU, and the demand frequency is medium frequency. Gross profit can also be comparable to vegetables, but the loss is small.

Secondly, pot food sinks have supply chain advantages. At present, the boiler circle has its own factory, its own logistics and perfect cold chain cooperation, which further reduces the cost and increases the gross profit margin in disguise.

Large-scale operation under infrastructure naturally reduces costs, but for many small fresh-keeping enterprises, such a large investment is unrealistic. Under the vicious circle, we can only fill the hole through continuous financing. In the almost abnormal pursuit, "underestimating the speed of burning fresh money" has become a sentence mentioned by many fresh players after the defeat.

Liu Gang, executive general manager of Shenzhen Venture Capital Group, once analyzed the profit model of the pot circle food exchange. In his view, the special feature of the pot circle food exchange is that it is not only a frozen food chain store, but also a food supply chain. Part of the supply chain is like infrastructure, and frozen food chain stores are a profitable business. When entrepreneurs want to build their own infrastructure in the future, they need to pay attention to a business that can make profits and support cash flow. The pot circle food exchange has this business and has formed an advantage. Compared with frozen food chain stores, the pot circle food exchange now has a horizontal supply chain business direction, and the project is more flexible.

three

Individual care under the aura of capital

"If an enterprise relies entirely on external capital for blood transfusion during its growth and has no hematopoietic capacity, it is really difficult to make it last for a long time." Lao Yuling, director of the e-commerce research center of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, said.

As can be seen from the news, the pot circle food restaurant has been profitable for two consecutive years, indicating that the pot circle food restaurant has the ability to make blood.

However, we have to admit that the pot circle stands out and the strength of capital cannot be underestimated: in August 2065438+2009, it won an incredible A-round investment of 45 million yuan from venture capital; 20 19 In June, 10 won the A+ round investment of RMB 50 million from Sanquan Food. The pot circle completed three rounds of financing in half a year, and the accumulated financing amount exceeded 450 million yuan. On February 24th this year, Jiayu Fund, IDG Capital and Puzzle Venture Capital invested 50 million US dollars. On July 30th, in the C round of financing, Pot Circle Food Exchange received $60 million investment from four companies, including Jiayu Fund, Qicheng Capital, IDG Capital and Puzzle Venture Capital.

Huge scale is a powerful bargaining chip for obtaining financing. Regarding the store layout, Pot Circle Food Exchange has publicly told the media that this year's keynote is still to expand against the trend and accelerate the layout in the sinking market. It is estimated that the layout of 5,000 stores nationwide will be completed in 2020.

However, back to the "1 year return to capital" incident, although up to now, the food in the pot circle has not been publicly explained, it can be seen that under the prosperous capital, specifically to commercial individuals, lice under Hanfu always exist.

However, it seems to have a longer-term significance to insist on "altruism", show individual care for partners and promote the refinement of fresh food industry. After all, whether it is the aura of "fresh dark horse" or the highlight moment of "kiss of capital", it is inseparable from the blessing of 3,600 stores. How to seek and maintain the long-term interests with franchisees is one of the keys to determine whether the pot circle food sink can still lead in the next round of fresh competition.