Helens: "Pinduoduo Edition" bistro listing record

Economic Observer reporter Cheng Luyang "Go to Helens for a drink?" "If someone asks for wine in this way, he is most likely not a regular visitor to the Helens Tavern."

Young people who frequent Helens usually refer to the chain of taverns by the English name Helens, but more often than not, they use the abbreviation "hls" or, a phrase "Go to H?" "It's the authentic expression of this group of people."

At the end of March 2021, Helens International Holdings Limited submitted a prospectus to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. If successful, it will become the first offline pub in Hong Kong's capital market.

Founded in 2009, the fully direct-operated offline chain pub brand, headquartered in Shenzhen, has opened more than 400 stores in more than 80 cities including Shenzhen, Shanghai and Hong Kong, and plans to open more than 1,000 stores worldwide in 2022.

Target young people

"It's the paradise of our college students", talking about Helens, He Jia, who graduated from Nankai University in Tianjin in 2019, recalled a series of memories that happened there.

He Jia said that Tianjin does not have too many nightlife options, "go out at night, either go to KTV, or go to bars and nightclubs." Because the liquor in the nightclub is very expensive, she and her classmates usually "go to Helens first, get almost drunk, and then go to the nightclub, and order a little wine to have more fun."

Cheap, is the most obvious label of Helens.

Here, the price of most bottled beer is within 10 yuan / bottle, of which the price of Helens' own brand beer and beverage drinks is basically not more than 9 yuan / bottle, the common 275ml Budweiser beer is priced at 9.8 yuan / bottle, and in the bars on the market, the average selling price of Budweiser is 15-30 yuan / bottle.

In addition to bottled beer, 80 yuan / za, 39 yuan / barrel of large loads, more suitable for many people to gather. For helens' target young consumers, the per capita consumption of 50 yuan a night provides them with a basis for relaxation. "There is no service", He Jia recalled the time in Helens, "no one cares" can cause extreme comfort, "how you want to play how to play, feet on the stool, scribbling on the wall, or drink vomit, destroy this space, no one cares about you", she believes that this is the essence of Helens.

After identifying this tavern, he Jia and his friends often go to the Helens store is often full, they will call one by one, go to the Helens store that does not need to queue, "it doesn't matter whether it is near or far, anyway, everyone is going to take a taxi together."

The attention to young people can also be seen from the recruitment notice of Helens, "We do not have the boring work of serving dishes, picking dishes, and washing dishes in the catering industry, and there is no customer who is God's repression, and we get along with customers like friends, because our customers are as young as you."

Xu Bingzhong, the founder of Helens, once shared that once a new store opened in Wuhan, it was raining that day, and there were customers queuing. Seeing this scene, he was left in tears, lamenting that the team He De He Neng, who was loved so much, when he called the operation director and explained that starting tomorrow, all the customers who were waiting in line would drink whatever they wanted when queuing, and drink for free.

The store operator was worried at first, and put away the more expensive wines such as 1664 and Corona. Xu Bingzhong said, if you have a guest at home, don't you take out all the good things to entertain? Usually, I will take it out to the guests when I am reluctant to eat, and this is how I grew up at home. Later, Helens took out all the varieties and let the customers choose freely.

In such a brand style, something happens.

In early 2016, when the Wuhan East Lake store of Helens closed due to the expiration of its lease, a Wuhan journalism student spontaneously filmed a documentary to record the last day of business, because it is the place where he and his friends remember their youth.

Observations from peers

One day at the end of May, the Helens Tavern of Jinan Yue Cube took turns playing Lin Youjia's "Lying", Zhou Chuanxiong's "Dusk", Li Shengjie's "Hand Let Go" and Beyond's "Really Love You", these songs may come from consumers' online songs the day before.

At eleven o'clock in the evening, as alcohol took over the nerves, the atmosphere in the store began to heat up.

Lao Cui, a bar practitioner in Jinan, walked into this Helens with two friends. When he entered the door, Lao Cui said to the waiter at the door, "We are here to learn Helens", and he got the answer of "welcome to learn from peers".

This is not the first time that Lao Cui has come to Helens, he once sent people to Helens every night for a week to count the number of passengers, and he can accurately say that the live music of Helens is 80 to 85 decibels, slightly beyond the comfort range of the human ear, and customers will unconsciously be close to the distance in order to communicate.

Lao Cui revealed that the main source of common beers such as Helens' 1664 and Fujia is temporary products, and the price of 9.9 yuan can maintain a gross profit margin of more than 60%, while the gross profit margin of OEM's own brand liquor is not less than 75%. According to his observation, the average full rate of the three stores in Jinan of Helens is 90%, and the attendance rate is 55%, of which the Minghu store has the best business.

It is not only his peers who pay attention to Helens.

In February 2021, the new consumer fund Black Ant Capital led a $33 million investment in Helens Tavern, the first and last financing of Helens in the private market.

He Yu, managing partner of Black Ant Capital, first walked into the Helens Tavern on the second floor of Shanghai Maoming North Road, the location is good, but the location is extremely poor, there is no façade, and there is almost no popular business around, but at 11:00 pm, there are still customers queuing, and the popularity is very strong. Sitting down, the waiter is clean and sincere, the price of beer is extremely cheap, surrounded by young people sitting around the square table, the atmosphere is very good, which is how He Yu felt at that time.

He Yu believes that Helens provides users with a truly free and relaxed universal social space without thresholds, and once this atmosphere is formed, it is the biggest moat of the brand.

In addition to this "moat", Xu Bingzhong once revealed that Helens has two "shocking" places.

The first is the site selection, Helens is good at choosing the "worst" location, when Xu Bingzhong opened his first store in 2009, it was in a remote location in Wudaokou, Beijing, when the annual rent was 200,000 yuan, 500 meters away, the annual rent reached 2 million yuan. This site selection strategy will be adhered to because most of the guests who come to the store are brought by old customers.

Second, helens does not have a KPI assessment. Xu Bingzhong agrees with Huawei's concept, co-creation and sharing, everything can be learned, the only thing that cannot be learned is the unity and trust of the team, and the KPI is to assess whether the store manager is good or not.

Xu Bingzhong studied with Kazuo Inamori, the founder of Two Fortune Global 500 companies, Kyoto Ceramics Co., Ltd. and Nippon Telecom.

Taverns in second-tier cities

Second-tier cities are the main battlefield of Helens.

According to Helen's prospectus, in 2020, the number of Helen's pubs in China's first-tier, second-tier, third-tier and below cities was 56, 200 and 94 respectively, accounting for 16%, 57% and 26.8% of the total number of pubs in the corresponding year.

Moreover, in recent years, Helens has always accounted for the largest proportion of pubs in second-tier cities. Although the proportion of sales in first-tier cities has increased year by year, the average daily sales of individual directly operated pubs in the three years of 2018, 2019 and 2020 are higher than that of second-tier cities, third-tier cities and below. In addition, from the average number of daily order users of a single directly operated pub in 2020, the number of second-tier cities, third-tier cities and below cities is higher than that of first-tier cities, of which third-tier cities and below have the fastest growth rate.

Over the past three years, the total number of pubs in the Helens Bistro network has been 162, 252 and 351, respectively. Citing Frost & Sullivan data, the prospectus shows that Helens has maintained its largest market position in the Chinese pub industry for three consecutive years in terms of the number of taverns.

According to the prospectus, in the past three years, the revenue of Helens has increased from 115 million yuan to 565 million yuan, and then increased to 818 million yuan, and under the influence of the epidemic in 2020, Helens has opened 105 new taverns, and its annual revenue has increased by 44.8% year-on-year.

However, the rapid expansion of revenue did not bring about the same increase in profits, and the adjusted net profit of Helens was 10.83 million yuan, 79.14 million yuan and 75.75 million yuan in the same period.

In terms of operation, Helens has developed a business intelligence system, including ERP system and CRM system, forming a unified data analysis and management platform, which can understand the sales, passenger flow, weather, personnel and electricity consumption of each store in real time, can judge the personnel arrangement and energy consumption of the pub, and employees can access according to their permissions.

Therefore, Helens said that at present, only 5 employees can control the background music of each pub nationwide, and set up a unified song library, based on the software test of the track bpm labeling the mood label of the track, each pub can choose the appropriate track according to the business hours, peak period time, consumer groups, holidays and other factors to play.

The obvious characteristics of the sinking market also make Helens known as the "Pinduoduo version of the tavern".