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Today, the first helens of the tavern was listed on the market, and the stock rose 22.66% after the opening of the market at a price of HK$24.250 per share (as of press time).
Helens can have developed to today, founder Xu Bingzhong bluntly said that the most grateful is still 5 million + "kelp".
So, how did Helens' "kelp" culture develop?
How does Helens treat its customers well?
Image source: Helens official website
"Life goes on, struggle is not stopped" is the best interpretation of the entrepreneurial road of Xu Bingzhong, the founder of Helens.
1, life is endless, the struggle is not stopped
Xu Bingzhong has had a restless heart since he was a child, and loves to "toss".
Due to his poor academic performance, he chose to join the army and became a surveyor.
It was this experience of joining the army that made him understand what is tenacity and what is persistence.
At the end of his enlistment, he worked as a security guard for three years.
But his restless heart began to stir again, and in a communication with his comrades-in-arms, the comrades joked that he went to Thailand to open a bar.
Although it is a joke, Xu Bingzhongzhen went abroad to open a pub, not Thailand but Laos.
The trip to Laos not only allowed Xu Bingzhong to earn the first bucket of gold in his life, but also accumulated some experience in doing business for foreigners.
This set the stage for the later birth of Helens.
2. The first shop in the corner is on fire
In 2009, Xu Bingzhong returned to China and founded the Helen Division.
The first store, due to limited funds, Xu Bingzhong chose a place in the corner of the horn, near wudaokou near Peking University Tsinghua.
This Helens continues the business model of Laos PUB, doing business for foreigners, and the target users are college students.
But what about such a remote place?
Xu Bingzhong relies on his heart and cost performance.
For example, in order to make the slogan more professional and understandable to foreign customers, he grinds guns to learn bucket;
As for the cost performance, he mainly relies on low prices to attract customers, others Qingdao 20 yuan / bottle, he will be 10 yuan / bottle.
Slowly, a number of customer bases have been accumulated.
Until now, Xu Bingzhong has always adhered to a concept: to see people's hearts for a long time, to maintain sincerity, and never to count customers.
In order to thank customers, on Halloween that year, he held a free thanksgiving event, the store is a beer machine, and there are two rows of draft beer outside the store, all of which give customers free drinks.
On that day, the house and outside were full of people, and many customers stood on the road to drink.
Since then, Helens has been on fire in the international student circle.
3. Clear self-positioning: a gathering space for young people
The success of the first store gave Xu Bingzhong confidence.
He has opened 8 branches in Shanghai, Tianjin, Xiamen and other cities, and the location is still next to the university, doing business for international students.
By chance, Xu Bingzhong realized that in the tavern, the free and happy exchanges between friends should be the beauty that all mankind pursues together, why doesn't Helens do business for young people in China?
He felt that Helens would be made into a meeting space for young people at home and abroad.
After clarifying its position, Helens began to expand.
At present, Helens operates 351 stores in a direct-operated mode, with 56, 200 and 94 stores in first-tier, second-tier and third-tier cities and below, respectively.
According to the Helens prospectus, based on the mature high-standardization store expansion model, about 400 new taverns will be opened this year, and the total number of pubs will be increased to about 2200 by the end of 2023.
In addition, Helens' cash flow has been stable and there is no shortage of money.
It wasn't until February this year that the $33 million initial funding round was completed, which is also in preparation for the listing.
As the only external investment institution, He Yu of Black Ant Capital said: "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.
This also makes us determined to participate in the growth and development of Helens, to accompany such an entrepreneurial team with original intentions, patterns, and business essentials, and to witness them in a humble industry, in line with the concept of user first, to achieve a 'Night Starbucks' business miracle. ”
Helens can have developed to today, Xu Bingzhong bluntly said that the most grateful is still 5 million + "kelp" (Helens fans and customers call "kelp"). This group of customers is very sticky.
Only by treating this group of "kelp" kindly can Helens stand firm.
In early 2016, before the Wuhan East Lake store of Helens closed due to the expiration of its lease, a journalism student spontaneously filmed a documentary to record the last day of business.
The college student said it was the place where he and his friends reminisced about their youth.
As the operator of an offline space, Helens can become a place that carries the memories of young people, which is indeed a very remarkable achievement, even more remarkable than the scale and sales.
Another time, a new store in Wuhan opened, it was raining heavily that day, and there were customers queuing, Xu Bingzhong was very touched after seeing it, and could not help but cry.
There are actually many such stories.
According to the company's prospectus, about 93.9% of the respondents who have visited Helens Tavern are satisfied with the consumer experience, of which about 61.8% are very satisfied with the consumer experience, and about 91.9% of the respondents are willing to visit Helens again.
So, how did Helens capture the hearts of these young people?
1. Offline free space + online interactive platform
Offline free space, first of all, is reflected in the store decoration design, pay attention to details, eliminate all barriers, and achieve the effect of barrier-free communication.
For example, the width and height of the stool and table are very exquisite, and the armchair is replaced by a bench to facilitate customers to communicate freely.
Helens Tavern uniformly adopts interiors with Southeast Asian and Chinese ethnic minority styles, creating a warm and amiable atmosphere.
Secondly, the music is adjusted according to the time period and the number of people.
If the tavern has no soul without music, so the control of the music can also add points to the tavern.
Helens adopts a central music control system to achieve standardized and process-oriented management.
The online interactive platform mainly relies on the operation of private domain traffic.
At present, Helens Tavern has 561,000 fans on Douyin, and the cumulative number of fans on each official account has exceeded 5 million.
Among them, the public account not only accumulated millions of fans, the activity of each topic is very high, and there are even thousands of people to leave messages on a topic, which is very interactive.
2, the ultimate cost performance
Free, first of all, let young people consume without pressure, Helens firmly grasp the life of cost performance.
Since Xu Bingzhong founded Helen Division, he has served the university student community.
This group of consumers has low incomes, some of which do not even have a source of income, so price-performance is the number one factor they consider.
For example, go to a bar, beer 20-25 yuan / bottle, drinkers, four or five people, let alone more than 20 bottles of beer, four or five hundred yuan, young people can not afford it.
If it is 10 yuan / bottle, four or five people consume more than two hundred, fifty or sixty per day, and the consumption pressure is reduced a lot.
The price of Bottled Beer Products of Helens is within 10 yuan / bottle.
The realization of the ultimate cost performance of products, on the one hand, is based on the scale advantage and the product matrix based on its own products, on the other hand, Helens mainly adopts the direct operation model.
No middleman earns the difference, and the profits of the channel and the middleman feed the user back, which is the greatest sincerity to the user!
In order to give users a more ultimate independent experience, Helens began to incubate its own brand a long time ago.
1. Sustainable development of its own brand
In the tavern, the main source of income is alcoholic beverages, supplemented by snacks.
At present, the product matrix of Helens is mainly based on its own products, accounting for nearly 70%, supplemented by external products.
From 2018 to 2020, the proportion of helens' own liquor sales revenue to total liquor revenue was 68.4%, 64.2% and 69.8%, respectively, and the gross profit margin was 71.4%, 75.3% and 78.4%, respectively.
Its own products are Helens Logo, Helens Craft Beer, Helens Fruit Beer and Helens Dairy Beer.
Third-party brand products include Budweiser, Corona, etc.
For the consumer and retail industries, the success of achieving a private label strategy is extremely valuable, and it is also the embodiment of continuously stabilizing its own moat.
Well-known companies in the retail industry have all achieved the success of their own brand strategies, such as 7-11, COSTCO, etc.
For example, 7-11:
Since 2007, it has adopted the joint development model and successively launched sub-brands such as Seven Premium, Seven Gold, Seven Select, seven Lifestyle, etc., including refrigerated food, ambient food, snacks and beverages, and daily necessities.
The gross profit margin level of domestic convenience store companies is about 25%-26%, while the gross profit margin of 7-11 comprehensive commodities reaches about 32%.
The realization of the private brand strategy is inseparable from the recognition and trust of users.
Today, Helens has formed a certain degree of user culture, which has a significant role in promoting the realization of its own brand strategy.
In addition to building its own brand moat, Helens has also explored a business model that is in line with its own sustainable development.
2. Mainly based on the direct operation mode
Before 2018, Helens still operated as a franchise tavern.
According to the relevant franchise arrangement, a one-time franchise fee and management fee will be charged to the franchisee.
Based on the understanding of the development trend of the industry, combined with the overall strategic system of Helens, it is currently adjusted to the business strategy of the direct operation model.
Compared with the franchise model, the direct operation model can better control and more effective supervision of products, operations, services, supply chains and talent training.
Judging from the current data, Helens' direct-operated business model seems to work.
Since the development model of directly operated pubs was determined in 2018, the number of directly operated pubs in Helens has achieved high growth.
In 2018, 2019 and 2020, there were 84, 221 and 337 directly operated pubs respectively, with a compound annual growth rate of about 100.3%.
Revenue generated by directly operated pubs accounted for 60.2%, 95.7% and 99.4% of the total revenue in the same year, respectively.
The biggest feature of the direct operation model is that the headquarters is in charge of the ownership and operation rights, which can uniformly mobilize funds, unify the business strategy, and unify the development and use of the overall business.
Moreover, the direct operation model is conducive to the headquarters to obtain effective market information, closer to consumers, and has a significant role in improving service and brand image.
The direct model is suitable for enterprises with a foundation of brand and capital.
There are many catering enterprises in the market that have adopted the direct operation model, such as Hefu Noodles.
1, 100 billion tavern market, the competition pattern is scattered, sinking market is an important point of view
Pubs are part of the Chinese catering industry. As of the end of 2019, there were about 42,000 pubs in China.
China's pub industry is highly decentralized, consisting mainly of a large number of independent pubs (referring to pubs with fewer than 3 venues) and a small network of chain taverns.
Of these, more than 95% are independent pubs.
In terms of revenue in 2020, the combined market share of the top five tavern operators in China's pub industry is about 2.2%.
As the head player, Helens' market share is only 1.1%.
Benefiting from the increase in the disposable income of Chinese residents and the increase in the number of Chinese pubs, the total revenue of China's pub industry increased from about 84.4 billion yuan in 2015 to about 117.9 billion yuan in 2019, with a compound growth rate of 8.7%. And the CAGR for 2020-2025 is expected to be 18.8%.
Specifically from the perspective of urban distribution, the growth rate of the pub market space looks at the third-tier cities> second-tier cities > first-tier cities, and the sinking market will become an important focus in the future.
Taking Helens as an example, its store layout is mainly based on second- and third-tier cities.
In 2020, the number of pubs in the second and third tier cities was 200 and 94 respectively, while in the first tier cities, the number of pubs was only 56, accounting for 16.0%, 57.0% and 26.8% of the total number of pubs in the corresponding year, respectively.
Second-tier cities contribute nearly 60% of revenue, and the average daily sales of single stores in second- and third-tier cities are higher than those in first-tier cities.
2. Backed by the trillion-night economy, young people's drinking habits have gradually developed, helping the development of the pub industry
At present, the night economy has become the mainstream of the development of the consumer economy.
China's night consumption accounts for about 60% of the overall retail sales, and continues to grow at a scale of about 17%, which is an important starting point for China's domestic demand.
With the increase of government support for the night economy in various parts of China and the increase in the service market of night consumption places, the scale of night economy development will show rapid growth and exceed 30 trillion yuan in 2020.
On the demand side, with the expansion of young people's drinking habits and the improvement of consumption levels, more and more young people are beginning to consume alcohol products.
At the same time, the increase in the income level of residents and the expansion of urbanization have made the demand for night social consumption more daily and popular.
On the supply side, more and more players are entering the game and seizing the tavern business.
In the walnut of high value, the hearts of countless literary and artistic young people are harvested.
Walnut Lane combines music, food, wine and performances to become a rich form of nightlife that is more cultural than a bar and offers cost-effective drinks and food.
Literature and art style + music scene + red wine house + Sichuan cuisine restaurant, like a quartet of stereo positioning and one-stop consumer experience, is the representative of the city's net red restaurant.
In addition, the chain of taverns that focus on community stores, "Cat Staff Outside", has recently completed more than 100 million yuan of pre-A and A rounds of financing. At present, there are more than 50 stores in Shenzhen, all of which have achieved profitability.
Under the night economy + slightly drunk economy, the business of taverns is surging, and even some traditional catering enterprises can't sit still and have entered the game.
At the end of last year, Lao Xiang Chicken launched its first bar in Shenzhen in a high profile.
Subsequently, Xijiade, who sells dumplings, also launched the "Dumpling Tavern" to lead the new trend of the market with the new model of dumplings + wine.
Around May Day this year, even Hoa Fu Noodles and Le Caesar also entered the bistro market.
More and more new and old brands are entering the market, and the "day of the beginning" of the bistro industry should not be far away.