An era where laggards are being eliminated will definitely be an era where good products emerge and become popular.

For example, in the past few years, physical stores have suffered a fatal impact from e-commerce. Stores have been closed, and rents have been reduced. Life is really not easy.

In such a market environment, one brand has achieved growth despite the trend, allowing many physical stores to appreciate what hard power is.

That’s right, I’m talking about Miniso.

"When others don't take you seriously, you have to take yourself seriously." Ye Guofu's life is the best reflection of this sentence.

If you take a closer look at his entrepreneurial experience, you will find that he is particularly good at turning businesses that others look down upon into big businesses.

Before Miniso, Ye Guofu ran the jewelry store "Aiyaya". Although "Aiyaya" is just a humble street store, it opened 3,000 stores in just 6 years and became popular across the country.

Despite the success of OMG, the ceiling of the jewelry business is too low. According to data, the total sales of more than 3,000 stores in 2014 were only 359 million yuan. Calculated, the monthly sales of each store did not exceed 10,000 yuan, and the profit was really meager.

So Ye Guofu carried out a product upgrade and expanded the scope of product categories to daily necessities. In 2013, he cooperated with Japanese designer Junya Miyake to establish Miniso.

Miniso can be said to be a very "weird" store.

The style is all Japanese - the signboard is like Uniqlo, the decoration is like Muji, and the Japanese Daiso-style groceries are sold, and the instructions are all in Japanese.

But it is actually a domestic brand - Tianyancha shows that Miniso is a Guangzhou company.

Ordinary ten-yuan stores are opened in the streets and alleys. Outside a huge speaker in the store, there was a message saying "Ten yuan for each item, you can't buy it at a loss, you can't be cheated". The store was crowded and small, and the furnishings were messy.

However, Miniso is located in a prime location of a shopping mall. The store is bright, red and white, and crowded with people. Many customers walked out of the checkout counter after making their purchases, with smiles on their faces as bright as if they had just visited Gucci.

Looking at its products alone, they can only be described as "cheap": 5 yuan hand cream, 9.9 yuan perfume, 10 yuan eyeliner pen, 15 yuan data cable, 29.9 yuan Backpacks...

But in fact, these products are quite useful. Two pairs of socks cost 9.9 yuan and will last for several months without breaking. This 29.9 yuan backpack has been carried by the e-commerce owner for several years. The 10-yuan eyeliner has sold 100 million pieces since its launch.

In addition, the general public's first impression of these products is that of "copycats". The color-changing lipstick directly "hits" Dior, the facial mask is reminiscent of Innisfree, and the appearance of the facial cleanser is similar to Shiseido. .

In fact, Miniso also has requirements for “genuine” products. It has made great efforts to seek authorized cooperation with Sanrio, Pokémon, Kakao Friends, and Marvel. It has launched co-branded water cups, bags and blind boxes, which are all very popular and even triggered a rush to buy.

It is such a "wonderful" store that has opened 4,200 stores in 7 years, covering more than 60 countries and regions around the world, with annual revenue reaching 20 billion yuan.

The 10-yuan store has become a 20 billion-yuan big business. Why?

Ye Guofu once said that only 10% of people in China understand the Miniso model. Whether this is sensational or not, e-commerce owners don’t know. But a closer look at its business model does make it interesting.

The reason why it can withstand the impact of e-commerce is mainly because it uses innovative business thinking to open stores, which makes it stand out among the ordinary retail stores, which naturally attracts people. Continuous flow of customers.

First, the product strategy of “high quality + low price” impresses consumers.

Before the emergence of Miniso, the things sold in shopping malls were either of good quality but very expensive, or low in price but of poor quality and low design.

However, Miniso’s products can give consumers a sense of surprise: the average price of the items is less than 100 yuan, but both the design and quality are decent.

This cost-effective strategy undoubtedly best meets the needs of young people in small towns.

With the popularization of the Internet, it is possible for two different levels to come into contact.

The female factory worker with a monthly salary of only 3,000 yuan was watching the same TV series as the urban white-collar worker sitting in the office building. They also pursue sophistication and petty bourgeoisie, but the stores they see are as crowded and gray as roadside stalls.

Until the emergence of Miniso, it suddenly occupied the vacuum zone of this group of people. It is both exquisite and cheap, giving these cash-strapped young people in small towns an unusual consumption experience, greatly increasing their sense of happiness, and is naturally very popular.

The Minso Consumer Experience Report shows that 51% of consumers are attracted by the ultra-high cost performance.

Secondly, the unique supplier cooperation model forms the core competitiveness of Miniso.

There is a reason why Miniso’s product prices are so low.

You know, in the traditional retail industry, after products leave the factory and pass through dealers one after another, the price has increased countless times.

In order to lower the price of goods, Miniso does this:

First of all, it customizes goods directly from suppliers without going through any distribution links, making the retail link gross. Interest rates dropped to 8-10%;

Secondly, purchase goods on a large scale to reduce procurement costs;

Thirdly, adopt a "buyout system", be responsible for profits and losses, and pay at a much lower price Collect payments from suppliers within the industry average 15-day payment cycle to enhance credibility and increase bargaining power.

In addition, we all joke that Miniso is good at copycats, but have you ever thought that its products may not be considered "copycats"?

According to the marketing manager of Miniso, the suppliers of the perfumes they launch are actually suppliers of Dior and Chanel. The suppliers of the cosmetics they launch are Estee Lauder's suppliers.

The reason why Miniso’s products are surprisingly low-priced and of decent quality is entirely because this company knows how to work hard on its suppliers.

Third, build a self-owned warehousing and distribution center to build a moat.

In fact, department stores like Miniso replenish goods very frequently due to high demand, replenishing goods once every two days on average.

Moreover, there are thousands of Miniso stores across the country. If the logistics are not timely, it will lead to problems such as late replenishment and stock outs, which will drive up costs and weaken competitiveness, with disastrous consequences. .

Miniso’s approach is to establish 8 warehousing centers in the Chinese market. The supplier sends the products to the designated warehouse, and Miniso distributes the warehouse products in small batches through the logistics company.

This can shorten the channel distance to the greatest extent and improve logistics efficiency. Data shows that the turnover cycle of Miniso products is only 21 days.

With so many physical stores, why is Miniso the most successful? There is an inevitability behind it.

Has anyone ever thought about how Miniso achieves a revenue of 20 billion a year since the unit price of its products is so low?

Then we have to nominate the franchise model of Chuangyoupin.

Public information shows that Miniso adopts a diversified business model, with 10% being directly operated stores, 15% being cooperative stores, and 75% being franchised stores.

In terms of cooperation with franchise stores, Miniso is a moneymaker.

If someone wants to join Miniso, they need to pay three fees: an annual license deposit of 80,000 yuan, a product deposit of 750,000 yuan, and a decoration prepayment of 2,800 yuan/square meter. Because Miniso stipulates that the store area must be at least 200 square meters, the prepayment for decoration must be at least 560,000.

The total of these three expenses reached 1.39 million yuan. In other words, every time Miniso opens a franchise store, it can earn at least 1.39 million yuan.

Although the franchise fee is high, Miniso will fully manage and operate the store, that is, everything from decoration to clerk recruitment to store operation will be handled by oneself. Franchisees only need to pay rent and wages. And water and electricity bills are equivalent to making money while lying down. This model still attracts many people to join.

Calculated based on a 75% ratio, Miniso now has 3,150 franchise stores. It earned 400 million yuan from the franchise fee alone.

In addition, franchisees have to share 38% of the previous day's turnover to Miniso every day.

Ye Guofu said that in first-tier cities, well-run Miniso stores have a daily traffic of up to 2,000 people. Based on a unit price of 30 yuan, the daily turnover is 60,000 yuan. Out of 60,000 yuan, Miniso can earn 22,800 yuan.

Calculated on a monthly basis, Miniso can earn 684,000 yuan in revenue. This number may seem small, but Miniso has 4,200 stores worldwide. Calculated, this income reached 2.8 billion.

Although this is only the income in the ideal model, without deducting the additional operating costs, it is still amazing enough.

Miniso has made a fortune just through the franchise model.

The more powerful thing about Miniso is that if the franchisee does not have enough money, it will tell the franchisee that it can use store assets and a deposit of 750,000 as a risk guarantee. Make loans on Fenlibao, a financial platform.

The investment manager of Miniso once told the media that if you join three or more stores, you can raise funds through Fenlibao.

The relationship between Miniso and Fenlibao is very deep. Tianyancha shows that before 2016, Ye Guofu served as the legal person of Fenlibao and later withdrew. At present, Fenlibao's largest shareholder is Li Minghuan of Ashin Financial Services, and Li Minghuan and Ye Guofu both hold Hubei Oiyaya Industry and Trade shares.

What’s so magical about this model is that franchisees borrow money from Fenlibao and give it to Miniso. At that time, the repaid money will ostensibly be given to Fenlibao, but we cannot rule out the possibility that it will end up in Miniso’s pocket again.

According to analysis by industry insiders, in this way, funds flow out of Fenlibao, namely Miniso, through franchisees, and then return to Miniso. Not only does Miniso not cost anything, it can also generate a steady stream of cash flow.

From a numerical point of view, this model is still very successful - Fenlibao's public information shows that as of June 30, 2019, the cumulative total transaction volume of the platform has reached 5.892 billion yuan.

You think they are engaged in retail business, but in fact there is a huge mutual financial empire hidden under the deep water. From the perspective of making money, Miniso is a genius.

Ye Guofu has always been resistant to e-commerce. The following are what he once said:

"I feel that all companies today are frightened by Jack Ma, as if there is no way out if they don't do e-commerce or the Internet."

< p> "In the past 3-5 years, a large part of physical retail has died. Starting from 2016, in the next 3-5 years, a large part of e-commerce will die."

"E-commerce is 'innately deficient', and new retail It must be born out of bricks and mortar.”

In his view, offline retail stores with high cost performance are fully qualified to compete with e-commerce. This has also led to Miniso not paying much attention to the expansion of online channels over the years. It only entered Tmall five years after opening its store, and only established a small program and service account at the end of last year.

However, due to the epidemic, Miniso finally revealed its fragile side. In January this year, Miniso’s performance fell by 30%. In February, Miniso closed 50% of its domestic offline stores, and its performance fell by 95%.

The imperfection of online channels has caused Miniso to fall into sales difficulties. In this way, even if you are as arrogant as Ye Guofu, you can only say "really delicious" to e-commerce.

During the epidemic, Miniso finally began to actively embrace e-commerce.

It launched the social e-commerce platform "MINISO Employee In-Purchase" and relied on the tens of millions of WeChat public account fans accumulated over the past six years to operate private domain traffic.

At the same time, he also started a live broadcast to bring goods, and even invited Ye Guofu himself to the live broadcast room.

Moreover, it has cooperated with platforms such as Ele.me, Meituan, and JD Daojia to launch “contactless delivery” services, and cooperated with SF Express to launch “citywide express delivery” services to achieve home delivery in half an hour.

This series of actions enabled Miniso to achieve a 300% increase in online sales.

Ye Guofu calls it a new model: "Our model is a service that does not rely on third-party platforms, but is based on our own stores and directly oriented to customers. This is different from previous e-commerce Compared with other micro-businesses, it has higher brand trust. Its biggest advantage is that it helps strengthen the stickiness of our offline members, thereby increasing the repurchase rate. ”

It can be seen that e-commerce and Physical retail has never been an antagonistic relationship, but rather a complementary relationship. If the dividends of the once innovative business model gradually disappear, then it is not impossible to embrace e-commerce to obtain new growth and achieve online and offline integration.

From the experience of Miniso, it is not difficult to see that the biggest reason for its success is because it does what retail should do - low-price products with excellent quality.

If you look around carefully, you will find that this is an era where consumerism is prevalent - which sophisticated girl doesn't own a complete set of lipsticks? Wouldn’t it be nice not to have some Starbucks for afternoon tea?

And the packaging and marketing of products are becoming more and more powerful - it is normal for a cup of milk tea to sell for 30 yuan, and a pair of sneakers can be sold for tens of thousands of yuan, far exceeding its actual value.

More and more young people are beginning to pursue high-quality products and are willing to pay for brand premiums and emotional value, but they lack financial strength. In order to realize the dream of consumerism, they are even willing to pay off credit cards or even take online loans.

This is an era full of glitz.

Only Miniso has returned to the essence of business, allowing products to be of high quality and at low prices at the same time. We face the needs of this group of young people and allow them to experience a high-quality life while enjoying low prices.

This kind of experience is also valid for e-commerce sellers. In addition to marketing and packaging, there is a better way to create a hit product in this world, and that is cost-effectiveness.

In terms of product selection, you can choose medium-quality products that can meet consumer expectations, and surprise consumers like "Tian Ji Horse Racing";

In terms of pricing, you can make the product more attractive Be price competitive to get more orders and capture more market share;

In terms of packaging, you can simplify packaging like Miniso and try to control costs. As long as costs are controllable, a slightly lower price can ensure a good profit margin.

No matter how the times change, the key to victory is actually excellent cost performance. It depends on who can seize the opportunity.

Author: e-commerce gentleman