If an entrepreneur focuses too much on his or her own suffering and failure, it is a kind of immaturity in itself.
Text: "Chinese Entrepreneur" reporter Liang Xiao
Edited by Mina
Header photo by Deng Pan
42-year-old He Chang has been on the road of entrepreneurship for 15 years and has experienced three ups and downs.
The most well-known time is Huang Taiji, under the operation of He Chang, this pancake shop operating the most traditional food has become a hot Internet celebrity restaurant, and is even known as the "originator of Internet catering", winning a valuation of up to 2.5 billion yuan.
Fame came too quickly, and Hechang's ambition grew. In his words, he has entered the trap of self-reinforcement after success: no longer satisfied with only making pancakes, Huang Taiji began to expand to multiple categories such as stews, small hot pots, dumplings, etc.; and then he was no longer even satisfied with only doing catering, Huang Taiji invested heavily and released a self-proclaimed "aircraft carrier-style" takeaway service platform, taking a step towards the territory of Internet giants;
Flowers and applause turned into ridicule and crusade, falling on him, this is a psychological level, compared to the reality of the level is more difficult. In an interview, he mentioned an unforgettable memory, which was the first time he was listed as a dishonest person and was restricted from height. He suddenly found that he could not buy a plane ticket, but the next day there was an important negotiation waiting for him in Shenzhen, he did not have a driver's license, so he had to ask for help from friends, and the three of them set off from Beijing and drove for 26 hours in one go.
Later, there were so many such experiences that he became numb, "The old saying says no Ji Tailai, every time I thought I was already in the position of 'no', but I didn't expect that there was a bigger pit ahead." But he has no intention of exaggerating this, "Don't think how miserable or unfortunate I am, starting a business is inevitably embarrassing, but as long as you don't get off the table, anything is possible." ”
This is also the realization that he has only gained in the past ten years: entrepreneurship has fewer wins and more losses, and the most important thing for an entrepreneur to learn is not only how to succeed, but also how to face failure: when you go up the mountain, you must think about the way down the mountain. This road, He Chang walked back and forth three times, and he joked to himself, "I am indeed familiar with this road." ”
Now, he also wants to tell more people what he has seen and felt, struggled and redeemed on this path.
The following is He Chang's account, with deletions:
"After success, you will fall into self-reinforcement, and at this time, you will not see the risk at all"
Before founding Huang Taiji, I sold boxed lunches, studied abroad, worked at Baidu, Qunar, and Google, and then cooperated with M&C Saatchi in the United Kingdom to open a Chinese interactive marketing company for more than three years.
In 2012, I felt that it was very tiring to be Party B, and I had accumulated Internet marketing methods, so I thought about making my own brand, and found that there might be opportunities in the catering industry: "Can there be fast food chains like McDonald's and KFC in China? So in fact, I don't know how to eat, and I didn't be born in a pancake and fruit "family", so I started from scratch.
The first store opened on July 28, 2012, and on the fourth day it caused a sensation, diners began to line up around the building, and by 3 p.m., the ingredients we had prepared for the day were gone, and I knew I was on fire that day.
Source: Interviewee
In the next 15 months, there have been investors to come over, at that time, Huang Taiji has a store, more than ten square meters, but the average monthly revenue can exceed 1 million yuan, to be Huang Taiji's first store, I only spent tens of thousands of yuan, but the money before and after, a total of 360 million yuan, Huang Taiji's valuation reached 2.5 billion yuan.
All of a sudden, there was heat, there was traffic, and there was money, and the psychological state at that time was actually always upward.
That year, I was in my early 30s, not a very experienced entrepreneur, and it was my first time in contact with food, and I suddenly won something that is self-evident, which formed a continuous self-reinforcement - I got it right, and this concept was like an acceleration, pushing Huang Taiji faster and faster.
But to be honest, my mindset wasn't ready. So in retrospect, the pitfall of success is that people will fall into a process of self-reinforcement and become more and more self-consistent. Self-consistency is a good state, but there must also be an opening, otherwise you will not see the risk at all. Therefore, in my later entrepreneurship, I will be very careful to detect whether I am in such a state.
Speaking of back to that time, in 2013, Huang Taiji really became popular. Like many of our catering peers later, we began to explore the second growth curve: if Huang Taiji pancakes can be made, can dumplings be made, can hot pot be made, can Northeast stews be okay?
These projects did not stand on the ground. Looking back today, we may have made the mistake of making a strategic rash move, which is a bit of an "afterthought." In fact, the expansion of these different categories at that time allowed Huang Taiji to go deeper into the catering industry and think more about the construction of the supply chain. For chain restaurants, this ability is indispensable, so although category diversification failed, it was a good training opportunity for us, and at that time, a brand opened one or two stores to test the waters, and it did not cause much substantial loss.
Moreover, please pay attention to the background of the times at that time, the mobile Internet came, and the wave of capital chasing of "sharing everything" became more and more fierce than our crazy mode, and it was actually difficult not to be coerced in this frenzied atmosphere, or in other words, there was nothing to calm down, because you watched these things be done. The combination of these business elements is a big opportunity, since you are a person who leads the army to fight, and the fighter plane has appeared, do you still have to stand still? Will it become a strategic conservative again, and will also be eliminated from the game? I believe that the catering brand that can survive to this day is also because of the ups and downs again and again.
So looking at it now, although I did take a detour at that time, I still don't think that diversity is Huang Taiji's fatal injury, so where did he lose?
"As the 'No. 1 position' of the enterprise, my mistake is that the level of awareness is not enough"
My reflection is that from the perspective of the "No. 1 position" of the enterprise, I may be too good at making products, which is like being too good at sharpening guns as a commander who leads troops to fight.
In fact, everyone always thinks that I am doing marketing, in fact, I do all the details of Huang Taiji's products and services. But the problem is that because of the excessive pursuit of these details, and the influence of the Japanese craftsman spirit, I feel that things can be done as long as they are exquisite, but the life-and-death battle of the enterprise is not at this level, but in the founder's choice of direction and choice of grand strategy.
Huang Taiji is also planted on this problem.
In 2015, Huang Taiji's store was full of people at noon, because it was a bright stall, and he might have waited in line for 20 minutes alone, and he would be very annoyed when he saw that the pancake stall was ready, but it was taken away by the delivery person. In order to improve this dining experience, we separated the dine-in and take-out scenes, and opened a small shop for take-out, and the efficiency suddenly increased, and we slowly found that the turnover of this store reached 30% of that of dine-in restaurants So we expanded the store and moved upstairs to make a takeaway factory store of more than 300 square meters, and the income of the takeaway store was even worth the dine-in restaurant, and Huang Taiji's takeaway orders ranked first on each platform......
So you see, it's the problem I just mentioned, the takeaway thing is also a self-reinforcing process, I didn't have a plan, but this business has evolved all the way from solving Huang Taiji's queuing problem, and I was caught in it at that time, I think it is a very big market and opportunity, and the actual feedback is also like this, only the daily turnover of the takeaway factory store is about 1.5 million yuan, and the total takeaway income accounts for 70% of the overall income, this model has financed more capital, which in turn prompts you to invest more. I used to think that Huang Taiji was a pancake company, and then I wanted to be a scene company and a content company, but at that time, I already felt that I had become an Internet company, and accordingly, your determination to develop would be different. But looking at it now, this process of self-reinforcement is actually a process of self-paralysis. That's why I say that the feeling of "self-consistency" is dangerous, because the logic is clear, but the result can be tragic.
Source: Interviewee
Yes, I have improved the takeaway experience, equipped with the best equipment, done a lot of standardization work, and the market is very recognized. I have a photo of Mr. Jia (Jia Guolong, the founder of Xibei Catering) sitting in my takeaway car. It can be said that at that time, I was desperate to do this, but the problem is that I didn't think clearly about what my position in the whole ecology is? This is a bit like the relationship between Dongfang Selection and Douyin, we think that the platform provides better products and services to the platform, and the platform should be supported, but if you want to be a takeaway platform yourself, then why does the platform still give you traffic? Support an opponent? To be honest, if I stand in the other party's position, I also feel that I should be blocked.
So, when the idea of making a takeaway factory arose, Huang Taiji was already dead. The problem is still in oneself, the cognitive level is not enough, I see the short-term benefits, but I ignore the future space, so to do business to seek big, but also to seek a long time, and to seek a long time lies in the coupling relationship with others.
Later, I was asked how I could have escaped. I think there may be two ways: the first is that the capital market has not been tightened, and I can still raise money, so that even if the platform is removed from the shelves of Huang Taiji, I still have an adjustment period of about a year, and I may be able to save my life by returning the business to traditional stores, but the reality is that I have only two or three months of time, and the flow of funds has been cut off at that time, even if the idea is right, I am unable to realize it.
The second one may be more direct, I ignored the problem of queuing at the time, and after waiting for about a year, the small program will come out, ordering online, picking up food on the spot, and the problem of queuing is self-defeating, and this is how Heytea came. Because the actual demand I want to solve is actually takeaway in the dine-in queue, so I will not cut into the takeaway track, and the company can still move forward honestly.
I wanted to choose to make pancakes and fruits, which was a battlefield that would almost never be defeated, but in the process of doing it, I formed an idea of surpassing the giants, as if saying, I was originally the Monkey King of Huaguo Mountain, but after seeing the Heavenly Palace, I wanted to make trouble in the Heavenly Palace, and was crushed under the Five Fingers Mountain.
Therefore, entrepreneurship is still a real thing, there is no so-called martial arts cheats, and there is no formula for success, to put it bluntly, it is four words - seeking truth from facts, being pragmatic, the so-called commercial labels "Chinese-style McDonald's" and "aircraft carrier-style takeaway service platform" at that time are actually things that fool people, I fooled myself, I really believed, but looking back today, the slogan sounds exciting, but it is wrong.
"Huang Taiji's story is not over yet, and I am still paying off my debts"
For a long time afterward, everyone used me as a negative teaching material.
Huang Taiji just closed the store, in 2017 and 2018, there were a lot of voices criticizing me on the Internet, to be honest, I also felt that they were right, because in the end they really failed, just like playing chess, losing the old handsome, no matter how right the front is, what can it do?
At that time, there was also a deep self-doubt, so I resolutely quit the network, the first reaction was to escape, out of sight and out of mind, but now looking back, it is precisely the past 5 years of abstinence from network traffic, and even the "addiction" to the once very popular one, in order to really sink down to think about the essence of business.
On the other hand, it is also a time for self-observation and self-reflection. After Huang Taiji's incident, I am also thinking, the advantage of doing one thing today, after a period of evolution, may become a disadvantage to lock you up, if my previous advantage is Internet marketing, then I will throw away the network ability. So then I went to do e-cigarettes, which belong to the retail and manufacturing industries, which are very different from the operating model and regulatory environment of the catering industry, and I also want to gain new experience and capabilities.
But the ups and downs, accepting it does require mental adjustment, and it takes time, many entrepreneurs do not have this kind of mental journey, they just want to climb high, yearning for the top of the mountain, but just like Navar (a well-known angel investor in Silicon Valley) said, if you reach the top of a mountain and find that there is no road ahead, and a higher mountain is elsewhere, can you accept yourself to go down the mountain again, return to the original point, and charge again?
Everyone is willing to go up the mountain, because there is a sense of achievement, excitement, flowers and applause, but the road down the mountain, with the sun on its back, is a dark journey, but an entrepreneur must think of these two roads at the same time, because the road down the mountain is likely to be taken, and it is more likely that it will not be walked again.
I've walked this road three times. Chinese often say no pole Tailai, and I have felt many times that I am already in the position of "no", only to find that there is a deeper pit. When Huang Taiji closed the door, the company's creditors came to lock the door, and I wanted to lay off one or two thousand employees; this e-cigarette also laid off a lot of people, which is a super difficult thing, but this is part of entrepreneurship, just like a boxer, being punched a few times on stage, and being knocked down, it is normal, this is part of boxing.
It also took me almost a decade to really understand this: entrepreneurship is like this, even if you make a lot of money, even if you are successful now, you still have to be in awe, and when you go up the mountain, you have to think about the way down. Huang Taiji closed his business in 2018, but for me as an entrepreneur, this story is still not over, and I am still paying off the debt it owes today. This time I'm going to Changsha to give offline classes, and for the course on the 19th, I'm going to leave on the 15th, because I'm limited again.
People may say that you have been successful in the early days, so it must be hard to go downhill, but I don't feel that way because I calmly accept that I have to go down. What am I afraid of? I'm not sure about it, but I'll be able to do it if I know it. Besides, it is already slowly getting smaller, it is impossible that the difficulty today is greater than in 2018, although I am still on the way down, but I am now very close to the bottom of the mountain, and I may be able to land on my feet in another year or two, and the whole mountain - up and down the mountain will be completed.
Including this time, I have also paid off several big debts one after another, and even some creditors feel that I have been taking offline classes for a while and have made them, so the remaining 100,000 or so arrears, they told me not to pay it back, and it was directly converted into a class ticket.
It may be in 2025 and 2026 that these debts will be repaid, and I dare to say that Huang Taiji's entrepreneurial journey will really end. Looking back now, I think it was as it should have been. Entrepreneurship is like a movie, there are ups and downs, highs and lows, happiness and sadness. Well, when you have enjoyed happiness, you must also accept the bridge of sadness.
"Entrepreneurs pay too much attention to their own suffering and failure, which is a kind of immaturity in itself"
So, I'm not trying to express how sorry my failure is. Recently, there are many people who have failed to start a business and talk about the difficulties they once had, and they have been listed as dishonest people, old men, and have been restricted. I've been through this many times, but I'm more against this rendering.
Under this rendering, it seems that every entrepreneur has become a lone hero, no, we have to be responsible for our past behavior, and I am just facing these things. When we exaggerate some kind of failure of entrepreneurs and interpret them into some tragic stories, it will make us more reluctant to fail, and make every entrepreneur feel that "I have not been easy", "I have paid so much for entrepreneurship", "you should sympathize with me". Entrepreneurship is a basic business behavior, within the framework of the agreement, you must admit that you are wrong, and you cannot say that only the benefits are yours, and there are no disadvantages, which is impossible. Therefore, I think that if entrepreneurs focus too much on their own suffering and failure, it is a kind of immaturity in itself.
If these stories show the cost of entrepreneurship, so that more people have awe of entrepreneurship, this is a good thing, but if the final packaging is to say that every entrepreneur's failure is worthy of respect, I think this should not be, because there are various reasons for failure, in fact, many entrepreneurs go into a predicament because they don't understand the rules, or even don't understand the law, or don't realize the real cost of entrepreneurship, this kind of blind enthusiasm is what we want to encourage?
To be honest, the abundance of capital and the superposition of the mobile Internet wave in the past have catalyzed a lot of entrepreneurial bubbles, and I may have been part of the bubble in the past. Today, it has entered a stage of calm and cautious entrepreneurship in the market, and in my opinion, this is also a turning point for entrepreneurship to disenchant and return to rationality. For entrepreneurship, success is relative, conditional, and short-lived, and unhappiness is absolute, unconditional, and long-term, so don't always think that I'm so unlucky, it's right to be unlucky, entrepreneurship is to solve problems.
When every entrepreneur can face his or her own choices and problems, China's entrepreneurial environment will be truly healthy, more mature, and more tolerant of entrepreneurs' failures. When we feel that failure and success are just as commonplace, it is easier for truly capable and ambitious entrepreneurs to start over.
For me, there is only one war, that is, a one-person entrepreneurial war, the previous three ventures, whether it is Huang Taiji, or Laimi, are just a battle, the battle may fail, but the decisive victory of a war is not to win more, as long as you don't play the table, everything is possible.
Now the war that belongs to me is in the stage of strategic stalemate, and the stage of retreat has definitely passed, but it is not yet time for me to counterattack again. Huang Zheng (founder of Pinduoduo) has a sentence that inspires me a lot, he said that entrepreneurship is to wait for the rabbit. Entrepreneurship does not rely on fighting and killing, it is not about rushing to win, it is relying on long-term vision, relying on pattern, and relying on strategy.
I used to want to be a strong man, try to be a good person today, maybe be a person with ideas before, today I want to be a person with methods, and in the future, I will be a person with rules. The process of starting a business is to have a harvest and a harvest, like a war, always to train and raise soldiers, I may be a recipient mentality now, I have walked through this mountain. At this stage, the value of being a guide may be greater than climbing a mountain on my own – that's how I position myself today, focusing on offline classes. Maybe one day, when the opportunity comes, I will rekindle that flame, but today this flame does not belong to me, I just accept it calmly, why should I live vigorously every day?
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