How did the little-known Tomato Capital become the first catcher in China's catering track?

The reporter | lost the tube

There are not many investors who invest in catering fiercely and can make money.

Unknown Tomato Capital, invested in the banu hot pot project that many investors wanted to enter but did not enter, and then invested in the Mo mo dim sum bureau in the angel round, these two projects made people in the industry have a strong interest in Tomato Capital.

Tomato Capital also invested in fengmao skewers, forrest Gump pot helmets, bullying, expensive phoenix, drunken noodles, fish you together and other restaurant chain projects. Some people concluded that when other VCs invested in the mainstream track of TMT, Qing Yong, the founder of Tomato Capital, turned his attention to the vertical catering track, differentiation, few competitors, and deep ploughing for many years, and finally caught up with the outbreak.

But this is an afterthought, and choosing catering is one of the few choices of Qingyong, who had no connections and no background in the early days. Qingyong strives to be self-motivated, more willing to pay than others, re-operate, do catering community, take members of the community to visit well-known enterprises, open up the circle, through these he finally became a celebrity in the local catering circle.

Investing is like the process of making friends. In March 2020, Tomato Capital exclusively invested in Banu Mao Mao Hot Pot for nearly 100 million yuan. Before investing, Qingyong had known The founder of Banu, Du Zhongbing, for more than four years, and for four years he had a deep understanding of Banu, and some of Banu's internal and small meetings would be attended. Du Zhongbing also said that what Banu needs is not pure capital, but comrades who can fight side by side, and believes that Tomato Capital is a very suitable external partner and finally reached a cooperation.

Wang Yuxiao, the founder of Mo mo dim sum bureau, has previous experience in retailing, is an agent of the glasses brand Mujiushi Hunan, and has previous experience in tea drinking. One day she called Qingyong and said that she wanted to create a Chinese dim sum brand, and Qingyong invited her to come to the Narrow Gate Society to learn and communicate, discuss the new brand differentiation together, and finally the two sides also reached a cooperation.

"Sourcing" is his forte, a skill he learns at the bottom, from one circle to a larger circle, from marginal roles to C positions. Making investment is more like the realization of Qingyong's connections.

For traditional VCs, investment is the core, first do investment, and then do investment later. The core of Tomato Capital is post-investment, what is important is the community and data behind it, most of the catering entrepreneurs invested by Qingyong are in his community, and he firmly grasps the data resources of this industry.

Originally unknown, but catching up with the investment fever in the catering industry, Qingyong finally became a well-known catering investor.

Struggling second-level chef

In 1999, Qingyong studied cooking and obtained a second-class chef qualification certificate, at that time his greatest ambition was to become a master of Hunan cuisine.

In order to get ahead, he chose to go to Shenzhen on March 31, 2001 to work hard, living in a single room in a partition room in the urban village. Looking for a job with my fellow villagers, it was not smooth, there was no income, and there was no place to live in the most difficult time.

One day, it was difficult to find a place to stay under the overpass, a beggar-like person came back and said that it was his place, Qingyong could only find a place with his fellow countrymen, until he walked to the central park, and then stayed in the park for one night. After falling into a desperate situation, Qingyong absolutely fought back and found a job the next day.

He joined Pizza Hut, starting as a part-time waiter, and at Pizza Hut he had a new name, BOB, which has been with him ever since. With his hard work, he won the praise of colleagues and customers, and also got the opportunity to be promoted, all the way to the supervisor, manager assistant.

At Pizza Hut, he learned about the operating system and training system of the catering industry. With the accumulation of this time, he is more confident in the catering industry, feels that he has unlimited possibilities, and sometimes even thinks that "if there is an opportunity in the future, he will also build a world-class brand like Pizza Hut".

In 2005, Qingyong became a trainer at Pizza Hut's parent company Parkson Catering, and he felt that he had achieved little compared to the past. That year, he took a course called "Coaching Techniques," which gave him the inspiration of what kind of person I was in the past, "letting me see clearly what kind of person I was in the past, letting me see clearly what kind of person I am now, and letting me really understand what kind of person I want to be in the future." Let me really think and understand why I want to live. ”

In 2006, he returned to Hunan to establish Zhuohang Education, similar to the courses he attended in Shenzhen, but the imitation did not succeed, and at the end of the year, the money was lost, and the creditor came to the door to move the company's only three computers away from two.

There is no way to know what Qingyong experienced in 2007 and who he met, but in 2008, like a transfer, Qingyong was hired by several companies as a consultant. He continues to run his own training school, the curriculum is very mixed, there are large commercial equity incentive program class, coaching technical organization construction president class, as well as New-life New Life International Youth Leadership Quality Training Camp, "Sowing Hope, Love to the Gardener" primary and secondary school teacher quality training course, "Transform Life, Let Go of Dreams" University graduates public welfare training course...

By 2015, Qingyong had run several companies in Hunan, all of which were not large, and had become an entrepreneur. In addition to money, the temptation of personal connections to Qingyong has always been great. He went to various classes and courses, and the purpose was clear, to get to know more people, from one circle to a larger circle. When they get along, he is good at helping people and loves to do things.

Break into the dining core

In March 2015, Zhenghe Island landed in Hunan and held the first island neighbor organization conference, and Qingyong was one of the many organizers.

According to the employees of Zhenghe Island, Qingyong is very willing to do things and actively promote activities. But the employee denied that QingYong had been the secretary general of the Hunan Island Neighboring Organization Assembly.

This conference made Qing Yong, who is doing business, open his eyes, and even be impacted, he felt like a frog at the bottom of the well, "There are so many changes outside, there is so much new information, I feel that I am too lagging behind." He was attracted to the Internet, which other people always mentioned, and had a strong desire to come to Beijing to learn about the Internet.

In 2015, Qing Yong applied to China Europe Business School and was not admitted. But he wanted to come and decided to settle in Beijing for a few months.

Without too many channels to obtain information, Qing Yong was recommended to come to "Carbon 9" to learn. The introduction of "Carbon 9" is very demagogic, and it is committed to cultivating entrepreneurs' independent inquiry and learning ability with innovative learning methodologies and creating learning entrepreneurs. The founder's name is Feng Xin, and Feng Xin claims to have been a partner of Zhen Fund, but he did not find any reports after checking the information. Today, "carbon 9" is still there, Feng Xin is still active, and some people have revealed that Feng Xin has done a lot of community cutting leeks.

In "Carbon 9", Qingyong met a group of people who did the Internet, spent a month visiting them, and made friends. "Carbon 9" is helpful to Qingyong, in the "Carbon 9" activity, Qingyong talked about his own entrepreneurial ideas, want to be an Internet crowdfunding platform, he got a financing.

At the beginning, he wanted to do crowdfunding in all categories, thinking that the opportunity was very large, and when he came in, he found that there were too many crowdfunding platforms and many competitors, so he adjusted to do crowdfunding for catering projects in Hunan, named "Reliable Investment".

"Reliable investment" two-way fee, the cost of the project side is low, mainly rely on the income commission, if the restaurant makes money to charge a 7.5% commission.

Previously, Qingyong invested in a company that filmed videos for restaurants, and through the company, Qingyong contacted many people in the catering circle, who became the first source of projects.

In the process of operating "reliable investment", Qingyong found that not all catering brands are suitable for crowdfunding, and the logic of project screening is gradually formed, that is, the kind of restaurants where many people queue up, because the single store has influence, and the rate of return is also guaranteed.

Qing Yong, who has become a small boss, understands that only giving money will not help much in the later stage, and investment in the same city is helpful and valuable. In addition to raising money, investors in the same city can also participate in improving products, helping to promote and so on.

He didn't look for shareholders across the country like other crowdfunding platforms, he would do a few more steps: First, filter the geography. When registering, investors will be allowed to choose the city where they are located and some investors in the same city will be screened out. Second, communicate by phone and examine investment intentions by telephone.

"Reliable investment" is more like the FA platform of the catering industry, helping the project to find the right investor, and after finding investors, it will do other services, project site selection, management process, etc., because it is more refined than other crowdfunding projects, and the success rate is also higher than other crowdfunding platforms.

In the process of doing "reliable investment", he also broke into the local catering circle in Hunan and met more people. In the same year, Qingyong established the narrow door society, the vertical community of the founder of the catering, which usually gathers people to study in the form of collective training, and also organizes dinners, mutual visits, and study tours, and has established multiple rudders in Beijing, Tianjin, Liaoning, East China, South China, Henan, Sichuan and so on nationwide.

The Narrow Gate Society has a very loud slogan, "Enter the Narrow Gate, that is, brothers", Qing Yong believes that "the restaurant owner is more insecure, but also emotional, this industry pays attention to human feelings", and eating and drinking in the Narrow Door Society is also an indispensable activity.

At the Narrow Gate Society, Qingyong meets a key figure, Dai Wenjun, the founder of The Tasteless Duck Neck. In 2017, Qingyong founded Tomato Capital, and The Tasteless Duck Neck is one of his LPs. Absolute Duck Neck is a local enterprise in Changsha, listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange on March 17, 2017, and is the industry leader.

Qingyong and Dai Wenjun met on August 2, 2017, when Qingyong brought more than 100 catering people to visit and study duck neck. In the evening, Dai Wenjun invited Qing Yong to dinner.

The two have similar backgrounds, both of which have been working hard for many years from the bottom. Dai Wenjun started from the sales of health care products, and started a business to set up a tasteless duck neck to achieve today's results. The two felt sorry for each other, pushed the cup and sent the cup to talk with each other. They met again a week later, and out of appreciation, Dai Wenjun gave QingYong a sum of money to support his project.

With the development of community activities, new business needs have also been reflected, and narrow-door consulting services have been derived, including operation consulting, supply chain consulting, investment consulting, crisis public relations consulting, flexible employment consulting, tax optimization, equity consulting, food safety consulting and catering legal counseling services.

Narrow-door dining eye, which is also another business derived from, is a database summarized in practice and research, so that catering practitioners can understand the city and competition status of their categories in China. Narrow Door Restaurant Eye collects catering-related data such as catering store distribution, switch stores, hot products, user evaluations, takeaway sales, trademarks, equity and investment and financing, brand-related network public opinion information, brand supplier data, real-time prices of ingredients, and national shopping center passenger flow, and is currently one of the most popular catering data platforms for the catering industry and related parties in the market.

Qingyong started with "reliable investment", and then did a series of businesses, and VC's post-investment help is the same, first do the connection, do the connection to do specific help, while doing business while learning, Qingyong himself became the largest IP in this system. Stretching to investment, it can be said that it is natural.

He was so different from the other investors that it was hard to find a second such person. Qingyong believes that female entrepreneurs want to succeed depending on whether they have men's career ambitions, rational judgment and courage, but when expressing themselves, they have their own set of words, he will say that female entrepreneurs will be more likely to succeed if they are hermaphrodite Mulan.

Make friends with Meituan and Xicha

Qing Yong never forgot two things, and he mentioned them several times in different interviews, which shows how much he cares.

Around 2015, it was almost the time he founded the crowdfunding platform, and he wanted to deal with the US group, but the other party did not care. He also mentioned that he had wanted to see Xu Xin of Today Capital, and he was looking for someone to bring someone to ask her to be an LP, but he was also rejected.

Before 2019, the capital market had little interest in catering, and it was only interested in 2019 that it ushered in an outbreak in 2020, regardless of the frequency of financing, or the amount of financing.

QingYong, who used to be unable to climb, has become a partner today. Meituan Dragon Ball and Tomato Capital joined forces to invest in a dumpling wonton shop Uncle Bear in August this year.

In the project of the Mo Mo Dim Sum Bureau, QingYong achieved a good harvest. Mo Mo Dim Sum Bureau is an incubated project of the Narrow Gate Society, established in 2020, positioned as a new Chinese baking brand of Guofeng, established less than a year ago, financing five times. From the seed round, Qingyong invested, and the valuation in ten months doubled by 500 times, up to 1 billion yuan, and today's capital invested in it, and only two months after the investment, meituan Dragon Ball also invested.

His network continued to expand, and he co-invested with Heytea on the pre-mixed liquor brand WAT cocktail project, becoming the same round of investors in the project.

Qing Yong and pre-mixed wine brand WAT cocktail Zhao Xinrong met for the first time, he could not hide his enthusiasm and said: "Your product, I fell in love with it as soon as I drank it, which is definitely better than Jiang Xiaobai, although Jiang Xiaobai meets the low-alcohol non-professional population, you will always remember this principle After any track is large, there will be a layering of demand." ”

Zhao Xinrong did not express an opinion on the remarks. Before the meeting, Xicha has decided to invest, Zhao Xinrong is particularly confident, his demand for capital has become very clear, after a short exchange, he said to Qingyong that Shenzhen landed on Neo (Heytea founder Nie Yunchen), hoping that through BOB, it can land in Changsha and Chengdu.

Qingyong thought he had connections, did not accept defeat, and said to the founder: "In addition to Neo, I can also do some things in Shenzhen." ”

A few months later, WAT announced Series A funding from BAI Capital, Heytea and Tomato Capital.

Resources:

Reliable investment: analysis, a different scenery of financing for non-professional investors

Tomato Capital was awarded the most active, stable and popular consumer investment institution loved by entrepreneurs

The once-chilling catering track is in full swing, why is "Tomato Capital" good at digging underwater projects?

In the early days, he exclusively invested in Banu and Mo Mo Dim Sum Bureau, he sold the company to start a business, and vowed to be the first catcher of China's catering track

Good man Qingyong