Everyone who has lived in Chengdu laments the "petty bourgeoisie" of Chengdu people's life: they wear absolutely fashionable clothes, and after work, they go to taste tea, bubble bars, and play mahjong... life is absolutely comfortable. .
As soon as the reporter arrived here, someone from Chengdu reminded: "You should polish your shoes." The reporter was a little embarrassed, and then he discovered that in the streets and alleys of Chengdu, everyone's leather shoes Almost all are shiny. Later I learned that Chengdu people have an unwritten tradition, that is, after wearing shoes for a period of time, they need to have their shoes "beautified". The level of "beauty" is also rising, ranging from shoe shine stalls on the streets, to shoe shine services in some teahouses and restaurants, to the popular professional shoe shine shops today.
When I looked down at my shoes, I felt a little out of place, so I asked a kind passerby to recommend a shoe shine shop. "Go to 'Luoji'. It's the best in Chengdu. There are nearly a hundred chain stores nationwide!"
According to the introduction, the reporter quickly found the "Luoji Shoe Shine Shop" that Chengdu people talk about. . As soon as I entered the door, I was greeted by an enthusiastic clerk. The store was not very big, but it was well organized. I was dazzled by the various brushes and shoe polishes. There was also a machine that looked a bit like a microwave oven next to it, which I wanted to take a look at. As for the purpose of this guy, his thoughts were taken away by the regular sound of shoes being brushed. This employee with a crew cut looks like he is only in his twenties, and he is so perfect at cleaning shoes that a pair of worn-out leather shoes are instantly transformed into new clothes by him.
I was thinking that I had to let this person take care of my shoes before I could rest assured. Someone had already arrived there quickly, "Boss Luo, what are you busy with?" It turned out that he was the head of "Luo Ji". Man! The owner of nearly a hundred chain stores across the country even shines his shoes himself, and he is so young, he looks like a college student. With strong curiosity, the reporter revealed his identity, went straight to the topic, and wanted to have an in-depth conversation with the boss. "Yes, but you have to wait until I finish the work at hand." Helpless, the reporter had no choice but to sit quietly and wait for the interviewee to finish shining someone else's shoes...
The old lady stimulated him to change his career
Boss Luo’s name is Luo Fuhuan, who graduated from Chengdu Normal University in 1995. After graduation, Luo Fuhuan's parents arranged for him to work in their own state-owned enterprise. Two years later, Luo Fuhuan moved to an information consulting company with a lot of enthusiasm and began to lead an enviable white-collar life. "My salary back then was more than 1,000 yuan a month, and the highest I got was more than 3,000 yuan. This kind of salary level was already very good in Chengdu in 1997." Although Luo Fuhuan is very popular with his boss at work. However, his heart was still not satisfied. He always wanted to seek opportunities to start his own business.
One day, Luo Fuhuan was wandering on the street and saw an old lady shining shoes. "It was summer, and the temperature in Chengdu was extremely high. I saw an old man polishing his shoes in the scorching sun. He was quite pitiful. So out of sympathy, I polished my shoes for the old lady. During the polishing process, I chatted with the old lady. I asked her how her business was going? Is it hard?"
The old lady's answer surprised Luo Fuhuan, "She said that when business is good, she can earn seventy or eighty yuan a day. I'll give her the total. After a while, my income in a month was at least two to three thousand, which can catch up with my income as a white-collar worker." This shoe shine experience deeply stimulated Luo Fuhuan. The lower-level industries that we usually look down upon and even sympathize with actually have such great business opportunities. "I thought at the time that an old lady could earn so much income every month by shining shoes. If it were me, I am a freshly graduated college student and younger than her. If I do this, I might be able to make a career. A career is coming."
After having this idea, Luo Fuhuan used his time after get off work to practice shoe shining at home. I thought that with a college degree and work experience, it would be easy for me to shine a pair of shoes. Who would have expected that every time Luo Fuhuan polished his shoes, his hands would be covered with shoe polish and he would be in a mess, but the leather shoes would not change their appearance. "I was very unconvinced at the time, so I often went to the street to find people to shine my shoes, and secretly observed how others polished their shoes. After a period of observation and practice, I gradually mastered the essentials of shoe polishing. Later, at work, I would shine shoes every time. The shoes he wears are cleaner and brighter than those of his colleagues."
In order to test his shoe shine learning results, Luo Fuhuan came up with another "ingenious idea" and challenged the shoe shiner. “One day, I specially polished my right shoe, then I found a shoe shiner on the road and asked him to polish my left shoe.
I said that if he could polish my left shoe shinier than my right shoe, I would give him double the money. As a result, the more the shoe shiner polished it, the less shiny it became than my shoe. "
This time Luo Fuhuan smiled proudly, because here was his secret weapon: in order to be different from ordinary shoe shine stalls, he put a lot of thought into the tools: "I I specially bought high-end shoe polish and high-end shoe brush from a large shopping mall. ”
Hidden the truth from his family and set up a street stall
Luo Fuhuan mastered the shoe-shining skills, but Luo Fuhuan also struggled internally. After all, the shoe-shining industry is a low-level industry. He is a college graduate. Is it worth it to be a shoe shiner instead of working as a good white-collar worker? How would the people around him view him? After thinking about it, Luo Fuhuan felt that he should imitate the ancient people's spirit of burning everything in order to have enough courage to engage in shoe shine. He hid this industry from his family and quit his white-collar job.
“In the beginning, partly out of vanity and partly out of eagerness for success, I decided to choose some high-end teahouses and restaurants. Hotel, as a workplace. Because the people who come and go there are relatively wealthy people, I think that doing leather shoe care in that kind of place is both high-income and respectable. ”
After making up his mind, Luo Fuhuan spent more than a month conducting a professional investigation on the shoe shine market in Chengdu: he visited every large shopping mall in Chengdu to understand the sales of high-end shoes. The proportion of brands and high-end shoes; check the watch on the street, how many pairs of feet have passed within ten minutes, and what proportion of high-end shoes are worn on the feet. Luo Fuhuan then wrote down his thoughts and survey results. After writing a detailed "cooperation plan" in Chinese and English, and attaching a feasibility report, he began to negotiate with some large teahouses and hotels.
Luo Fuhuan first found the best one in Chengdu at the time. He told them his intention to add a shoe shine service here, but the reply he got was - "Sorry, we don't need it!" Luo Fuhuan said, "I could tell from their contemptuous expressions at the time Read the deeper subtext: You are a shoe polisher, and I am a high-end teahouse. Are we on the same starting line? Are they on the same level?"
Next, the outcome of the negotiation with a high-end hotel was exactly the same. The hotel The staff pointed to their shoe shine machine and said: "We have a shoe shine machine, which is convenient and practical. Why do we need you to set up a stall?" Even Luo Fuhuan patiently explained that there are similar ones in big hotels abroad. service, but the result was still ridiculed: "Don't we, the hotel owners, know this? You are just selling melons, bragging about yourself!"...
Three months of service During that time, Luo Fuhuan visited almost all the major teahouses and hotels in Chengdu, but no one was willing to cooperate with him. "During that time, I was in a particularly bad mood. I was rejected by others every day. I always had insomnia at night. I never wanted to work with him. I am an alcoholic, so I have to drink some wine every day before going to bed, relying on alcohol to numb myself. "
Without a fixed income, Luo Fuhuan lived in poverty. "During the worst three months, one day I only had two cents left on me and had to go to the market to buy groceries. , but who has two cents worth of vegetables to sell to me? I have no choice but to buy the worthless vegetable leaves they throw aside. ”
Luo Fuhuan will never forget that day, “It was the night when all the money I had was about to be used up. I wandered the streets of Chengdu for a long time, and finally felt that I had not made the wrong move. , I am still willing to start a career in this area. I began to reflect on the setbacks and difficulties I encountered, and finally realized: there is no such thing as a one-step approach to starting a business, you have to do it step by step. "Finally, Luo Fuhuan decided to go all out and work at the lowest level - setting up a street stall as a shoe shiner!
Others use 3 kinds of shoe polish to shine shoes, but he uses 15 kinds
The location of the stall was also carefully considered by Luo Fuhuan, "Taisheng South Road in Chengdu was a communication street at the time. There was a lot of traffic there, and people who came to buy mobile phones didn't care about the money for shoe polishing. "Luo Fuhuan felt that this place had the most market potential. After inspection, he officially set up a stall on this street.
Although it is a street stall, Luo Fuhuan's shoe stall is very different from the traditional shoe shine stall. The difference. First of all, the shoe stall's appearance is "five-star" compared to other shoe stalls.
At that time, other shoe stalls generally only stocked three types of shoe polish: black, colorless, and brown, but I had almost 15 different kinds of shoe polish, which came from different brands and five countries. In terms of tools and hardware, I was also specially prepared. Beautiful, even a pair of replacement slippers costs more than 60 yuan. Some customers even wanted to buy my slippers after polishing their shoes. In addition, Luo Fuhuan also bought a lot of plastic bags. If some customers are concerned about hygiene issues such as athlete's foot and are unwilling to share a pair of slippers with others, they can put the plastic bags on and put on replacement slippers. "
Secondly, Luo Fuhuan also has some "five-star" service awareness. This is mainly reflected in the stool where he sits on his shoeshine and the stool where the guests sit. Luo Fuhuan sits on two bricks, outside The "stools" were wrapped in newspapers, but the guests were sitting on very good chairs. "I specially selected beach chairs that were very fashionable at that time from the furniture store. I felt that they needed to be differentiated and distanced. I couldn't sit on them better than The customer is high, the customer is God, they must have a better seat than me. ”
In order to highlight the uniqueness of his shoe shine, Luo Fuhuan also specially made a price list, which clearly stated - shoe shine 3 yuan, 5 yuan, 10 yuan, 30 yuan to 50 yuan , Such a price is simply sky-high compared to the one-yuan shoe-shining market that prevails in Chengdu. However, Luo Fuhuan believes that since it is a business, we cannot follow other people's old methods. Only innovation can work.
The most memorable thing about Luo Fuhuan was his first customer, a young couple. The wife said to her husband: "Husband, please polish your shoes." It looks nice here. But my husband said, "Why are you polishing your shoes? They won't be dirty the next day." "What the wife said later, Luo Fuhuan will never forget in his life: "Then we won't wash our face tonight, won't it still be dirty tomorrow? "
When my wife said this, my husband sat down to shine his shoes, but was stunned when he saw the price tag. Luo Fuhuan thought this was a good opportunity at the time, and he could not let his first customer He was scared away by the price. He immediately said: "Sir, don't look at it. Today is my first day setting up the stall. You are my first customer. I will wipe it for you first. How much do you think it is worth?" Just look at how much you give. Half an hour later, the customer was very satisfied and gave Luo Fuhuan 10 yuan and said: "Don't ask for it, 10 yuan is worth it!"
On the first day, Luo Fuhuan earned more than 80 yuan. In the first month, Luo Fuhuan made more than 4,000 yuan...
If you want to polish your shoes well, you must first be a good person. Luo Fuhuan learned this deeply once someone forgot to give him money after polishing his shoes. It was obvious from the customer's expression that he had forgotten, and Luo Fuhuan did not ask for it. He felt that it would make the customer lose face. When the customer came again a few days later, he had already remembered what happened last time and was very touched. , which brought him many repeat customers.
Several times, Luo Fuhuan picked up mobile phones that were forgotten by customers. They cost several thousand yuan. One customer even brought a leather bag to him and wiped it. Luo Fuhuan forgot to take away the tens of thousands of dollars worth of watches, and finally returned them to their original owners.
When Luo Fuhuan was shining shoes, he would also encounter counterfeit coins given by customers and posted them in a conspicuous place. Unlike others, Luo Fuhuan posted the counterfeit money in a place where only he could see it, to remind himself to be wary of counterfeit money. He felt that this was the only way to avoid putting pressure on customers. If it were posted outside, it would make the customers think that you are on guard against counterfeit money all day long. Looking at him makes everyone feel bad.
In this way, it started from a shoe shine stall on the street, and today it has more than 80 "Luoji" shoe shine franchise stores across the country. Luo Fuhuan used 8 In 2003, 29-year-old Luo Fuhuan opened the first high-end shoe shine store in Chengdu and applied to the State Administration for Industry and Commerce. It is understood that this was the first shoe shiner in my country to apply for a registered trademark from the state, and he became one of the top ten outstanding entrepreneurs in brand building in China. On January 1, 2004, Luo Fuhuan’s dream came true. Really, he invested 50,000 yuan to establish the first shoe-shining chain store for college students in Sichuan.
At this point, someone asked Luo Fuhuan to come to shine shoes. I couldn’t help but ask: "You have already done it." You are the big boss, why do you have to do it yourself?" Luo Fuhuan said: "I seem to be used to it, and I feel itchy even if I don't shine my shoes. This is my hobby and the work I like, so I do it seriously because I can find fun in the work and sublimate myself.
Including the front of my store, the word "shoe shine" is made of 72 shoe brushes. There are exactly 72 brushes, 72 lines, and the number one scholar will be awarded every line. ”