Author | Restaurant owner Inner Counselor Sun Yu
Boards for niche categories
38,000+ stores nationwide
Back in my hometown village, I ate three meals of noodles + fritters in three days, but I couldn't eat enough.
So, I went to the board noodle shop and bought a pound of board fabric, ready to cook it at home. To be honest, whether it is the taste of soup or the taste of noodles made at home, it is far less than the street noodle shop, especially without the golden combination of fritters, it is really less tasteful.
In Neisanjun's hometown in Hebei, there are five small noodle shops in the village. There are brands without names, there are "fly restaurants" like and simple decorations, basically located on the side of the road, 5-9 am is the peak period, the house can not be crowded directly sit out to eat.
In addition, on Dianping, Neisenjun saw that more and more new stores operating banmen have appeared in Beijing, most of which are named after Anhui beef noodles, Anhui authentic beef noodles, Taihe noodles, etc.
On Xiaohongshu, there are more than 80,000 diaries about bannoodles, including in addition to the picture sharing of netizens eating noodles, there are also bloggers who explore the shop lining up the noodle stall, and foodies share the Anhui bannoodle recipe, which details the method of making noodles at home.
According to enterprise investigation data, as of mid-April, there were 38,000 existing restaurant enterprises related to noodles in China. Among them, 10,900 in Shandong, accounting for 28.54%, 9,276 in Hebei, accounting for 24.26%, and Anhui accounted for 10.92%, a total of 4,175. In the past five years, an average of 7,000 new restaurant companies have been registered every year, and 5,590 were newly registered last year, down 27.11% year-on-year.
If you want to say where the authentic Anhui plate comes from, it must be Shijiazhuang, Hebei, China. But in fact, the plate noodles originated from the county seat of Taihe County, Fuyang City, Anhui Province, where it is "mutton plate noodles", after coming to Shijiazhuang, in order to adapt to the taste of the locals, the mutton was replaced with beef.
Therefore, the mutton noodles of Fuyang Taihe, Anhui Province have become the most beef noodles now, and the noodles are thick and fine, and the heavy oil and spicy noodles naturally meet the taste of northerners, so that they can be loved and respected by people.
As a "city pulled by train", Banmian took root in Shijiazhuang with the arrival of migrant workers from Anhui in the early years. Eating Chinese food, you can taste the thickness of history. There is news on the Internet that as early as when the third ring road of the international village was not yet there, there were more than 2,000 noodle shops in the city, and the density of stores was like real estate agencies in Beijing, convenience stores in Taipei, and hot dry noodles in Wuhan.
Therefore, as long as you search for Anhui panels, there will be Hebei Shijiazhuang behind, and some people ridicule that "Shijiazhuang specialties are Anhui authentic panels" or in the words of netizens "Anhui banmian where to look, Shijiazhuang, Hebei, China".
Just like Shaxian snacks, Lanzhou ramen, yellow stewed chicken and other snacks, Anhui banmian is also the first to make a circle in foreign cities. So that when the people of Anhui mentioned the board, they all asked: Where is the plate in Anhui?
Low investment, high return on cost
The small shops in the village make a net profit of 300,000 or 400,000 yuan a year
By visiting the noodle shops in the village and town, the basic bowl of noodles is five yuan, some stores are cleaner decoration will be one or two dollars higher, don't look at these two dollars, for the villagers, the basic choice is cheap, although the environment is not very good, but love to eat that bite.
In addition, the owners of the noodle shop are mainly Anhui and Henan people, and several of them have come to the village to set up shop (in fact, they rent a roadside farmer's compound) for nearly 30 years, and the annual net income of the small shop can reach 400,000 yuan, which is already very high in the village.
For noodle enthusiasts, the saddest thing is that around the Spring Festival, you can't eat noodle fritters, because the bosses of the noodles have returned to their hometown for the New Year, and they basically can't eat them until after the twentieth of the first month.
That is to say, the locals also have a business of eyeing the board, but no matter how they do it, they can't surpass it. Peers have different benefits, if everyone who does the board business makes money, then there will be no poor people, and they will become Jack Ma second.
What is the concept of a small noodle shop in the village selling a bowl of noodles for 5 yuan, with an annual net income of 400,000 yuan?
Some "Fly House" noodle shops are popular not only because of their price, but also because they have their own unique secret recipe in the taste of the marinade, which will attract regular customers to miss the taste of their noodles, and it is not possible to taste it in other noodle shops.
In the hometown village of Hebei, a bowl of noodles + an egg + two fritters costs about 8 yuan in the morning, and you can eat until you can eat enough, and there is no hunger after eating in the morning until the afternoon; You can also change it to tofu brain/soy milk + eggs and fritters for only 5 yuan.
Therefore, the market demand is very large, basically small shops open on the side of the road, people who come and go to work, small traders, and most of the people who gather early choose to eat these, eat well and cheaply. Compared with urban noodle stores, village and town noodle shops mainly do early business, and they close their doors at noon.
Moreover, it not only has noodles and fritters, but also side dishes such as eggs, ham sausages, and meatballs can be added to the board, as well as cheaper tofu brain, soy milk and other staple foods and drinks, which can drive up customer orders. Office workers, students, and the whole family have made it a must for breakfast, because there is no time to make breakfast, and it is more convenient to buy it directly.
In the city, such as Beijing's noodle shops, the main business is still noon and evening business, business hours are basically 9 am to 9 pm, and the pricing is generally in the dozen to twenty a bowl of noodles, per capita about 30 yuan, after all, there is a high rent cost.
In addition, in the hometown of Neisenjun, some noodle shops began to sell plate base, on the one hand, you can increase your income, a pound of 35 yuan, this catty can make about 15 bowls of noodles; On the other hand, it realizes the freedom of the board for customers at home.
Looking back at the scale of the board in Shijiazhuang, not long ago a company in the village called "Noble Noodle Family Panel", because of its sky-high price of 20,198 yuan a bowl of noodles, the menu shows that this bowl of more than 20,000 noodles, with sea cucumber, abalone, wagyu beef, porcini mushrooms, morels and matsutake mushrooms.
This price is really ridiculously expensive, but in fact, the average store is still 16 yuan, and it is too exaggerated to say that it is a marketing gimmick. Some netizens ridiculed that "I can't even afford to eat noodles", "This is obviously the price of two cows", "I can only eat noodles once in half a year's salary? ...
I have to say that this board brand has successfully achieved the purpose of advertising and marketing, at least attracting the attention of people and the industry, regardless of the reason. From the side, it also reveals the eagerness of board operators to receive urgent attention.
Anhui plate noodles are like Shaxian snacks
There are categories, but there is no brand
This is because, although there are 10,000 noodle shops scattered across the country, there are very few chain brands.
There are more than 70 Niu Chunhua plates in Hebei, concentrated in Hebei, ranging from 10-18 yuan per capita; There are more than 60 old Zhai noodles in Xuzhou, and the stores are concentrated in Jiangsu, with 10-20 yuan per capita. What the two have in common is that the location of stores is mainly in townships and schools, and the difference is that the per capita consumption, side dishes, and taste of the stores are different.
Most of the noodle shops are concentrated in the sinking market, such as township stores, school stores, etc.; There are categories without brands, or almost chain brands, and even board categories may not be very well-known in the country; At the same time, as a single noodle category, it is impossible to survive alone, and the product structure in the store must be richer.
Bannoodles are mainly composed of noodles and soup, and the soul also lies in the noodle soup. Some people say that if you can unify the taste of the plate and the quality of noodles, and integrate industrialization, will you be able to make the plate chain up. But some people say that once the taste is standardized, it loses the characteristics of small shops and is easy to be abandoned by customers, not to mention those delicious noodles and soup ingredients have the so-called "exclusive secret recipe".
Just like Shaxian snacks have finally been integrated and embarked on the road of standardized development, just like snail flour has been industrialized after receiving government support, Lanzhou beef noodles may be written into legislation. Not long ago, Xinye County, Henan Province was awarded the country's first Chinese landmark food hometown - "the hometown of Chinese bannoodles". According to incomplete statistics, by the end of 2022, the county had more than 20,000 people directly engaged in the board noodle industry, and more than 3,000 large and small plate noodle restaurants, covering more than 10 provinces and cities across the country.
Of course, this is inseparable from the promotion and support of the local government, the development of the new wild panel noodles as a landmark food industry, the formulation of "new wild panel noodles" technical specifications, and the strengthening of brand promotion. It is said that the history of "Shinno Itamen" dates back to the Three Kingdoms period.
As a Chinese specialty snack, the noodle category has a long history, but it is still in the development stage. Perhaps, as it gradually enters the public's field of vision and broadens the consumer group, a distinctive "plate culture" will be formed in the future.
What do you think about this?