Text | Professional catering network is charming
1,500 new ones were added in half a year, and the frenzy of small hot pots continued.
And after Nancheng Xiang, Yoshinoya, Banu and other companies got together.
Recently, another fast food tycoon "Yonghe King" joined the "card game", and launched a 29 yuan one-pot "one-person small hot pot" in 300 stores in 7 cities including Beijing and Shanghai.
On the one hand, dark horse enterprises strive to create the "king" of the category; On the one hand, fast food companies are vying to increase this "new dish";
This can't help but remind us of the "Yellow Braised Chicken" that has faded out of sight for a long time, and its development path at that time seems to be the same as today's small hot pot.
So what is the future direction of small hot pot? And what will be the endgame?
Momentum:
Good quality, cheap and easy to copy, stores are all over the streets and alleys
Small hot pot can spread throughout the country and become a favorite category of customers everywhere, so it naturally has its shining points.
When we compare the rise of yellow braised chicken rice and small hot pot, it is not difficult to see that they have captured customers with the two advantages of "good quality" and "low price".
Yellow stewed chicken traces its history, originating from a signature dish of Jinan's time-honored restaurant "Fuquanju" in the 30s of the last century, with its unique Shandong cuisine flavor and wide acceptance of chicken, as well as the balanced combination of "meat, vegetables and rice", it quickly became popular.
And taking the express train of rational consumption, a batch of affordable small hot pots of "29.9 yuan for a small hot pot" and "no more than 40 yuan per person to eat" have unconsciously become the protagonists of today's catering track, and are blooming all over the country with a rapid trend.
There are meat, vegetables and rice, so that customers who eat yellow braised chicken and rice feel very satisfied with a meal;
There are meat, vegetables and staple foods, rich categories, and low prices, making small hot pot the first choice for many people.
The categories of the two have strong universal taste, fast delivery, high standardization, easy copying, low entry threshold, and low cost of opening a store, which has caused a large number of entrepreneurs to compete to enter the game.
Way out:
Towards two sets of "scripts": branding or dishmanization
Due to similar categories, advantages and market demand, yellow braised chicken and small hot pot have also gone to a similar "way out".
Whether it is yellow stewed chicken, or small hot pot, or it is branded, a number of chain restaurant companies have been run; or be "co-opted" by popular fast food and become a dish.
1. "Branding"
Rush to the "first place" and create a catering giant with a scale of 10 billion
Slowly, with the development of the category, brands have sprung up, and more and more companies are moving towards chaining.
Everyone is eyeing the throne of "first", you chase me, and you would rather be a chicken head than a phoenix tail.
Looking back at the yellow stewed chicken, as a Shandong dish, almost every family in Shandong can make it, but when it was on the rise, it did not run out of many influential "brands".
But there are always people who want to be one step ahead, in 2011, Yang Xiaolu, a descendant of "Fuquanju", improved the yellow stewed chicken, got rid of the limitations of the main meal, integrated into the fast food culture, and gave birth to the fast food brand "Yang Mingyu Yellow Braised Chicken Rice".
Driven by him, there are also many brands vying for stakes.
For example, at its peak, there were 592 stores of Huang Braised Chicken, 427 stores of Runqianxiang, and the number of stores of many other brands such as Peng Dekai, Shibisi, Yang Ji, Rongfuju, and Sanrenzhong was between 100 and 300.
According to 2020 statistics, Yang Mingyu's Yellow Braised Chicken Rice ranks first among the fast-food stores in operation in the country, with 3,293 stores. By 2021, it has doubled its stores to more than 6,000, more than 500 franchise cities, and its daily sales will be 30 million, creating a catering giant with a scale of 10 billion.
Looking back at today's small hot pot track, there is also a scene of Huang Braised Chicken "fighting with heroes" at that time, but a giant like Yang Mingyu has not yet run.
According to Tianyancha data, in the first half of this year, there were more than 1,500 new "small hot pot" related enterprises.
A number of small hot pot brands have also emerged all over the country: Henan's "Wei La", Shenyang's "Xijia", Changsha's "Shengxiangting Zhuan Zhuan Hot Pot" and the "Yiwei Fat Cow Small Hot Pot" specializing in direct sales, Shandong's "Longge", Xi'an's "String Shiduo", and Beijing's "Nongxiao Pot...... There are even many brands with more than 100 or 1,000 stores.
And they are no longer limited to being regional kings, many of them have spread to the whole country, and they are blooming everywhere and grabbing the top spot.
In the future, it may really run out of the "Haidilao" in the small hot pot industry.
2. Yimai was "co-opted" by fast food
"Settled" fast food restaurants have become the standard "signature dishes" in the store
At the peak of the yellow stewed chicken, it is roughly estimated that the number of franchised stores in the country has reached tens of thousands, and the head brand has gone to other countries around the world.
However, with the dissipation of the category bonus period, the yellow braised chicken rice has suffered a major reshuffle, or even Waterloo.
The number of category-related store closures has been increasing, and the scale of leading stores has also been greatly reduced, slowly turning from prosperity to decline.
The voice of the head brand is getting smaller and smaller, and even if there are franchised stores, the taste and quality of the products are not much different and differentiated from those of any fast food restaurant.
For example, fast food restaurants such as casserole rice noodle shops, spicy hot restaurants, ramen shops, and even Shaxian snacks also include yellow braised chicken as a substitute dish in the menu for customers to choose from.
With the increase of such entrants, the customer flow of yellow braised chicken has been gradually diverted and slowly reduced to a "supporting role" in fast food restaurants.
And the small hot pot that is now regaining popularity has taken two sets of "scripts" from the beginning.
The first pulse is to prepare thousands of stores and thousands of store brands, and the first pulse is to be targeted by fast food bigwigs, using this dish to create a new increment of stores.
For example, Nancheng Xiang's dinner doubling plan uses the dish of small hot pot to increase dinner customer flow and revenue.
There is also Yonghe Dawang, who launched a 29 yuan fresh beef one-person hot pot, and ordered beef bean curd pot with "staple food + soybean milk + side dishes" to increase full-time operation.
It is no longer the "protagonist", but has become the "standard" of fast food restaurants, a dish, taking root in fast food restaurants across the country.
Dilemma:
They have all fallen into chaos such as "low quality, food safety, and homogeneity".
After the outlet, whether it was the yellow braised chicken rice at that time or the small hot pot today, they all encountered similar "problems".
In order to speed up the pace of opening stores and improve efficiency, many yellow braised chicken entrepreneurs have begun to take a variety of measures to reduce the difficulty of serving meals and the cost of ingredients.
Fight low price and efficiency, resulting in squeezed profit margins.
In order to keep profits, some companies began to use low-quality products full of "science and technology and hard work", chaos is frequent, loss of characteristics, serious homogenization, dividends fade, yellow stewed chicken rice is also eclipsed.
Today's small hot pot is also trapped in chaos such as low price, low quality, food safety, and service.
As reported some time ago, the disorderly low-price competition has ushered in an overwhelming "bad review" for the small hot pot.
On the Dianping platform, there are as many as 4.08 million + notes on the topic of "whether the rotating hot pot is dirty or not", and nearly 20,000 notes under the topic of "small hot pot stepping on thunder dishes" and "small hot pot synthetic meat".
In order to quickly gain momentum, the "low price" is used to attract customer flow, and under the low price, the quality cannot be guaranteed, forming a vicious circle, which also affects the reputation of the entire category.
Summary of Professional Catering Network:
The small hot pot seems to be re-taking the road of "yellow stewed chicken".
Yimai rushed to the Wandian brand, and Yimai entered the fast food restaurant to become the "standard".
But the two have different destinies.
Compared with the yellow stewed chicken, the entrants in today's small hot pot track are different.
There are not only entrepreneurial whites, but also a brand army with hard power, they have a strong and mature supply chain, operation team, and can withstand the test of wind and waves.
As a catering company, I also hope that the small hot pot will not repeat the mistakes of yellow stewed chicken, and will really continue to be cultivated as a category with long-term development.
Do you think the small hot pot is re-taking the road of yellow stewed chicken? Feel free to comment and share your views.
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Editor-in-Chief丨Chen Qing Co-ordinator| Yang Yang Ed. | Yang Yang