With a net worth of over 100 million, the clothes are patched! The aircraft industry "comes from the east", and the more you pick, the more you make money

Golden wrong knife

2024-05-26 15:01Published in Beijing

After "Durian Freedom", airplane freedom is also coming?

In the past two years, a frequently searched topic is low-cost aircraft. Either 300 pieces to Osaka or 100 pieces to Jeju Island.

When it comes to low prices, no one can compare to Spring Airlines, which can be called the ancestor of cheap air tickets, and once launched a poor ghost ticket for 9 yuan to fly abroad, and now it is also a second kill for all peers.

Behind the low price, Spring Airlines' picks are also well known.

Although other people's flights are ridiculed as "vomit", they are at least free of charge, and they will also provide a variety of free drinks.

In the Spring and Autumn Period, not only did there be no free catering, no free consignment, but even the kitchen was dismantled, and seats were installed in the vacated places, and 6 people were pulled at a time, which was jokingly called the "green train in the sky".

Many people know about Spring Airlines, but they don't know the man behind it: Wang Zhenghua is the real king on the track.

He has worn a suit for more than 20 years, he has to bring his own pickled vegetables and instant noodles on business trips, he only lives in hotels below three stars, and he even thought about launching a standing ticket on the plane.

is such a man who "picks" to the extreme, but he has become the most profitable airline in China.

In 2023, it will make a profit of more than 2 billion yuan, which does not sound particularly powerful, but thanks to the support of its peers, the three major domestic airlines generally lost money, China Eastern Airlines lost 8.1 billion last year, China Southern Airlines lost 4.2 billion, and Air China lost 1 billion.

can rely on the ticket price of poor ghosts to sell to make money, Wang Zhenghua obviously has some ability.

A poor boy,

But it is necessary to "let migrant workers get on the plane"

Although he didn't get the male protagonist's script, Wang Zhenghua lived his life into a proper cool article.

He was born in a poor family in Shanghai, he was still the eldest, he started working after graduating from high school, was assigned to the iron rice bowl, and could have spent his life in peace.

But one day, Wang Zhenghua suddenly received a life-changing task assigned to him by his superiors - to solve work problems for the intellectuals returning to the city. In accordance with the requirements of his superiors, Wang Zhenghua founded six enterprises in one go: an automobile repair shop, a passenger transport company, a freight company, a taxi company, a travel agency, and an embroidery factory.

For ordinary people, this is the pinnacle, but the times are changing rapidly, Wang Zhenghua followed the trend of going to the sea to do business, and he was told that he could only take one of the six enterprises he started.

Wang Zhenghua, who didn't have a few dollars in his pocket, could only choose the travel agency with the lowest operating cost in the end, and the travel agency was considered a laborious and unprofitable business at that time, and Wang Zhenghua wanted to find a way out all day long.

By chance, he read a book that changed him - "The American Southwest". This book tells the story of Southwest Airlines, and Wang Zhenghua suddenly realized that he wanted to become an airline.

Wang Zhenghua sees that there are still more than 1 billion people in China who have never flown on a plane, and this huge group should not be ignored.

Therefore, at the beginning of the establishment of Spring Airlines, Wang Zhenghua made a decision that sounded quite unreliable: to run a "low-cost airline" and bring down the price of air tickets that were often hundreds or thousands at that time, which can be called a lot of aviation in the aircraft industry.

The rationale is that "aviation should not be rich or expensive, and more families should be able to afford to fly." ”

He is not talking about it, nor is he fighting a short-term price war, but he has implemented this point of view for a lifetime.

His fare is generally more than 30% lower than his peers, and special tickets will be launched in the off-season, 99 yuan, 199 yuan, 299 yuan, etc., and even once sold 1 yuan of special tickets, as long as you can earn back the fuel surcharge.

At first, his peers didn't take him seriously. The chairman of Okay Air, the first private airline in China, once mentioned in an interview: "China is not yet in a position to engage in low-cost airlines, and it will take at least three to five years for China's low-cost airline market to mature."

In reality, it is indeed not satisfactory, although the "poor ghost" tickets are not worried, Spring Airlines' first flight from Shanghai to Yantai has all 180 tickets sold out.

Wang Zhenghua burned 70 million yuan in the second half of 2005, and in 2006, he lost more than 200 yuan in February.

But Wang Zhenghua didn't care, "In my opinion, the loss of 2 million yuan is too little, the aviation industry is originally a money-burning industry, and it takes five or six years for the average airline to make a profit." ”

Wang Zhenghua, the head iron, is even getting more and more crazy on the road to low prices.

At the end of 2006, Wang Zhenghua launched a 1 yuan air ticket on the route from Shanghai to Jinan, and this time it was not the disdain of his peers, but a joint report.

Some peers jointly complained to the Civil Aviation Administration, and the Jinan Municipal Price Bureau also issued a fine of 150,000 yuan to Spring Airlines, which could only temporarily cancel the special ticket, and the 1 yuan ticket was also urgently stopped after selling 400 tickets.

Many people waited to see Wang Zhenghua's jokes, but they didn't expect that the reality was beyond everyone's expectations, and in 2007, Spring Airlines really turned losses into profits, and even began to plan to go public.

A few years later, Wang Zhenghua, who started Tai Chi on the trading floor of the Shanghai Stock Exchange, finally realized his long-held dream:

Let migrant workers also get on the plane and go home for the New Year.

A suit has been worn for more than 20 years,

But the shares are distributed to the employees

Spring Airlines, which relied on poor ghost tickets, has created a lot of "myths" over the years:

Due to the low fares, his family's flight occupancy rate is unusually high, about 90%, almost full and much higher than the average of 75% of his peers.

The flight time is also more than that of its peers, and the daily flight time of other airlines is about 9 hours, and it is 11 hours in the spring and autumn, which is comparable to the king of volumes.

Orders have been high, and the earning power also ranks first among more than 50 domestic passenger airlines.

But in strong contrast to the dazzling money-making data, as the head of a dignified 100 billion enterprise, Wang Zhenghua's food and clothing conditions are even worse than ordinary people:

If you are out on a business trip, you will bring instant noodles, mustard and eggs, and you will only stay in hotels below three stars;

I have worn a suit for more than 20 years, and I even have to patch it, and the largest patch is 24 cm × 34 cm.

The most valuable thing in his office is the sofa that he bought for 100 yuan and sat on for more than 20 years.

is also "ruthless" to his son Wang Yu.

only gave his son 50,000 yuan to study in the United States, and never took care of it since, Wang Yu stayed in the United States for 7 years, went to school during the day, and had to work two jobs in the morning and evening.

After returning to China after graduation, he and two other senior executives of the company shared an office with simple office facilities, with three desks side by side, not at all like a boss.

When asked why he was so rich and still "picked" himself and his family so much, Wang Zhenghua said:

"It's not about money, it's about resources. The earth's resources belong to the entire human race, and it doesn't mean that you can squander it if you have money. ”

I pick so much, but I am very generous to my employees.

For the Spring and Autumn International Travel Service, which he founded single-handedly, he only took 20% of the shares, and most of the rest were distributed to employees; He also only takes 30% of the shares of Spring Airlines, and the rest is also distributed to employees, which is comparable to "Yu Donglai" in the aircraft industry.

The pilots under him are generally paid 20% higher than their peers, and the average employees are more than 10% higher than their peers.

All because Wang Zhenghua knows very well that if he wants to take the people's line, no matter what he does, it is not as practical as giving money.

Just like low-cost tickets get passengers, so do employees, only by winning the hearts of the people first, the "Spring and Autumn Dream" can become the "Spring and Autumn Cause".

From Zong Qinghou to Wang Zhenghua,

Behind the "picking" is the right thing to smash the money

An entrepreneur like Wang Zhenghua who "picks" himself to the point of being strange is not an exception.

The last one was Zong Qinghou, the founder of Wahaha, who took the high-speed train to be a second-class seat, often wore a pair of cloth shoes, and the most expensive thing on the body was a domestic watch that had been worn for decades.

Someone once calculated that Zong Qinghou's annual personal expenses were about 50,000 yuan. But his Wahaha, in 2022, the revenue will be as high as 51.2 billion.

Compared with Zong Qinghou, Wang Zhenghua's efforts to pick the door have increased unabated. Many people are curious, why can a seemingly blood-losing model like Spring and Autumn still make money?

The answer is: Wang Zhenghua is very conscientious about the price set by passengers, but he is also very picky.

For example, the model is single, and all of the 124 aircraft of the Spring and Autumn Company use the narrow-body version, because the maintenance and maintenance go through the same process, saving money for the enterprise.

There are also strict restrictions on the weight that can be carried on airplanes, and even magazines have to be replaced with thin ones in an effort to reduce the weight in the air.

Even in order to save money, the pervert is so perverted that there are requirements for the detail of flight altitude, and on the premise of ensuring safety, let the plane fly higher, because the high-altitude air is thin and the flight resistance is small, and the amount of fuel consumed will naturally be reduced accordingly.

In addition, Wang Zhenghua also cut off all unnecessary services, so that the plane completely returned to the most authentic transportation attributes.

The business class, galley and dining car are removed, and free meals are provided on regular flights, but Spring Airlines has 10 pieces of mineral water, 12 blankets and 15 sandwiches.

Generally, the plane provides free consignment, not only in the spring and autumn period, but also the seats are the same seats in the passenger station, the spacing is so small that people can return to the green train in seconds, adding more than 30 seats to the cabin, apportioning it to everyone's head, and the cost has dropped by 14%~15%, focusing on a small profit but quick turnover.

No matter what industry, the practical pain points of users cannot be ignored, let alone just trying to save money. For the beverage industry, it is quality, "the most important thing is that the product quality must be passed." ”

For aircraft, it is undoubtedly passenger safety. On February 8, 2024, Spring Airlines was awarded the "Three-Star Flight Safety Award" by the Civil Aviation Administration of China for 3 million consecutive hours of safe flight, becoming the only private airline in China to receive this honor.

Wang Zhenghua said, "In the aviation industry, safety is above all else, so I strictly stated that I want the best in the selection of models, hardware, captains, engines, etc., to ensure the absolute safety of the journey." ”

Behind the 20 years of establishment, 20 years of safe operation, and a total of hundreds of millions of passengers safely delivered to their destinations, there is another detail:

Spring Airlines' daily operating data will be updated at 4 a.m. the next day, and Wang Zhenghua will wake up on time to check the data and give instructions as soon as possible.

Because "low price does not mean that the service can be bad".

It seems to be a slam on the door, but in fact, it is to smash all the money on the blade - people's travel needs that people care about most: safety, low price, and punctuality.

In fact, sometimes, the simpler it is, the harder it is to do it well.

Just like Wang Zhenghua has always believed in the vernacular that his mother used when he was a child: "Half of the money is earned, and half is saved." ”

It sounds very simple, but for an entrepreneur with a net worth of hundreds of millions, the difficulty is actually thousands of times that of ordinary people, after all, it is human nature to be poor and extravagant.

Many people only saw the pick of Spring Airlines, but in fact, it was able to put forward a low-price strategy against human nature, and insisted on it for 20 years, preferring to make less money by himself.

It is not so much that Spring Airlines is more profitable, but that it is more altruistic and profitable, and it is also worth learning from many peers.

Altruism is the ultimate rule of entrepreneurs.

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