On April 13, 2016, in Guangzhou, Qianmu Lingzhi was located at a sales point near Yangji Subway Station, and the staff was eating. (Southern Weekend reporter Weng Huan/photo)
The cashback mode promoted by Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum to the outside world is "consumption return cash award", and anyone who purchases 10,000 yuan of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum products can apply to become a Member of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum. You can get a cash dividend of more than 2,000 yuan every month until the cumulative amount of dividends reaches 3 times the investment amount.
If calculated with 100,000 members and each member investing 10,000 yuan, according to the business model explained by Guilin, the company will have to pay dividends of at least 200 million yuan per month, which means that the total annual dividend is 2.4 billion yuan, exceeding the total annual sales of 2 billion yuan claimed by Guilin.
In the propaganda system of Senki Reishi, the "theory of consumer capital" is the guiding ideology of its "business ideology" - let the consumption of consumers participate in the distribution of profits of enterprises, and turn consumption into a kind of capital, since it is a kind of capital, it will produce profits.
After visiting the workshop with the group, Wei Jian, an 80-year-old grandmother in Wuhan, took out 20,000 yuan of savings and decided to invest additionally.
"Ganoderma lucidum can cure cancer, and the factory can't be moved, it will be fine." Wei Jian's lips trembled slightly, his arms waved frequently, and he walked through the crowd with small steps, constantly extending his neck to ask left and right.
At the end of 2015, a neighbor walking together in the community introduced to her that the Ganoderma lucidum produced by a company in Xianning not only has the effect of prolonging life and treating cancer, but also buys the company's 10,000 yuan of goods, and can return up to 30,000 yuan in cash in batches. If you can introduce a member, you can also get a reward of 2500 yuan.
Neighbors tried their best to persuade Weijian to participate in the investment, took her to lectures, and tried products for free, claiming that the project was strictly in line with national policies. In order to dispel the last doubts, the group used a bus to pull her to a factory building in Xiangyanghu Town, Xian'an District, Xianning City.
Since 2015, this "investment and consumption" model called "Qianmu Lingzhi" has rapidly spread in Hubei, Guangdong, Sichuan, Jiangxi and other places. On April 9, 2016, at the "Investment Promotion Conference" held at the headquarters of Qianmu Lingzhi in Xianning City, Hubei Province, Quan Guilin, the chairman of the company, publicly announced that the "direct consumers" (members) of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum have reached more than 100,000 people.
Southern Weekend reporters inquired from the "National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System" website and found that Hubei Qianmu Lingzhi Science and Technology Development Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Qianmu Lingzhi") was administratively punished by the Xianning Municipal Bureau of Industry and Commerce in November 2015 for its involvement in "pyramid schemes".
The strange thing is that as early as 2014, in the same venue in Xiangyanghu Town, a company called Kinte Tongbao also "developed offline" in the same model.
<h3>Spend 10,000 and return 30,000</h3>
The high cashback is the place that most makes Grandma Wei Jian's heart move.
The cashback mode promoted by Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum to the outside world is "consumption return cash award", and anyone who purchases 10,000 yuan of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum products can apply to become a member of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum. With 10,000 yuan as a "number of distribution units", each "number of distribution units" can receive a cash dividend of more than 2,000 yuan per month until the cumulative amount of dividends reaches 3 times the investment amount.
According to this theory, Weijian has purchased 30,000 yuan of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum products, then you can get 3 "distribution units", and from the 6th to the 10th of each month, the bank card automatically receives a cash dividend of more than 6,000 yuan until the dividend amount reaches 90,000 yuan.
"You've gained both health and wealth here, so wouldn't you recommend this opportunity to friends and family?" Feng Meiling, a lecturer at the marketing department of Qianmu Lingzhi, particularly stressed that the reason for setting the upper limit of 3 times is to strictly comply with the laws and regulations of the country. However, the referral salary reward received by the member who recommends others to purchase Sengoku products is not subject to this limit.
On the basis of the "Consumption Return Cash Award", old members can get a "referral salary" of 2500 yuan for each new member recommended. "Whether you buy 100,000 products or 1 million products, the recommended salary is 2,500 yuan." Feng Meiling explained.
Compared to the 3 times the cashback, the reward of 2500 yuan is not much attractive. However, after the member consumes or recommends others to spend 400,000 yuan, he can apply for the establishment of a regional service center, and 5% of the total consumption derived from the service center will be rewarded to the person in charge of the center in the name of "Market Service Award".
Bonus returns make the Service Center the basic unit for developing new members. "The role of the store (service center) is to expand the market, if the existing membership is not enough, you must expand the membership yourself." Xianning local He Shan, who claims to be an early classmate of the big boss Quan Guilin, has developed nearly 300 members in the physical store of the service center next to the Xianning Hope Bridge, and the consumption amount of each member ranges from as little as 30,000 to 30,000 yuan to hundreds of thousands of yuan.
He Shan introduced that if you want to get rich, you must mainly develop new members. Through strong encouragement, his own sister is applying for a mortgage loan and is preparing to scrape together enough 1 million yuan to invest in Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum. "How to attract members depends on your own skills, whether it is to go into the community to give lectures, to introduce acquaintances, mainly to see the ability."
Han Xin, a member of He Shankai's service center, has his own understanding of the business model of Qianmu Lingzhi. "The product is actually worthless, the company takes the money of 1 member, makes 5 products, and sells them to 5 members." Hanshin believes that if new members are not developed, this model will be difficult to sustain.
The Xianning Municipal Bureau of Industry and Commerce pointed out in the administrative penalty statement against Qianmu Lingzhi that Qianmu Lingzhi requires the on-line personnel to form a team relationship through continuous development of the downline, and to calculate and pay remuneration based on the sales performance of the downline personnel, which is a typical pyramid scheme.
Born in 1968 in Tongshan County, Xianning City, Quan Guilin has been engaged in the cultivation and cultivation of mushrooms, Ganoderma lucidum and other fungal crops in Dongguan City, Guangdong Province. Until 2013, a Ganoderma lucidum products company was established - Dongguan Zhihe Biotechnology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Dongguan Zhihe"). The company's registered place is Times Square, Guantai Road, Nancheng District, Dongguan City, which is a commercial complex, and Dongguan Zhihe was only one of the shops at that time.
According to Feng Meiling, a publicist of the company's marketing department, in the initial development stage of Dongguan Zhihe, investors can get 30 yuan of cash income per day for every 10,000 yuan invested in funds, and a cycle of 210 yuan per week (210 yuan is issued on Wednesdays), a total of one year. In other words, invest 10,000 yuan and double it in one year. If you invest 40,000 yuan or more, such income can be issued for 2 consecutive years. This model has a strong financial nature.
At the "Investment Promotion Conference" on April 9, 2016, members lined up to pay in the large conference room on the 2nd floor, and did not sign a contract, and Senki Lingzhi only issued a white receipt. After the member paid the money, he did not receive the relevant products, and there was no product shelf of Senki Reishi on the spot. After separating from physical products, the financial characteristics of Senki Reishi mushroom are more distinct.
"Some people invest hundreds of thousands, hundreds of thousands, if it is to buy products, when can they be used up?" Han Xin said that under this model, the product is no longer important. "Don't ask about the product, if you only focus on the product, you don't understand this model."
<h3>It claims that the annual sales are 2 billion yuan, but the annual dividend is at least 2.4 billion yuan</h3>
"Consumption can make money, and the process of consumption is the process of making money, and the more money is spent, the more money is spent." Quan Guilin explained at the "China Merchants Association" on April 9 that Qianmu Lingzhi uses a new "consumer capital theory" theory to allow consumers' consumption to participate in the profit distribution of enterprises, "turning consumption into a kind of capital, since it is a kind of capital, it will produce profits."
Then 23% of each month's sales are returned to consumers as a dividend bonus.
For a long time, Senki Reishi has publicly denied that this model is pyramid schemes or illegal fund-raising. In order to attract new members, it is necessary to theoretically answer the two questions of "where does the money come from" and "why should it be distributed to consumers". In the propaganda system of Senki Reishi, the "theory of consumer capital" is the guiding ideology of its "business ideology".
"The company's annual sales are 2 billion, and we will go public in 2016." Quan Guilin explained that due to the high added value of Ganoderma lucidum and the good operating condition of the company, there are sufficient funds to distribute dividends to members.
Excellent performance support stems from the company's strong planting base. Feng Meiling introduced that Qianmu Lingzhi has large-scale planting bases in Hainan, Dabie Mountain in Anhui Province, and Mount Emei in Sichuan.
In addition, in the promotional materials of Senki Reishi, great attention is paid to the citation of video resources. A local television station in Hainan reported the purchase of 100,000 yuan of Ganoderma lucidum from farmers in Guilin as a typical example of poverty alleviation. In He Shan's physical store, a screenshot of this report was posted.
In the propaganda of Senki Reishi, Reishi can even treat cancer. "A lymphoma patient in Panyu has eaten our products and recovered, I don't believe you can go to check."
"You can see it on TV, how can it be fake?" Wei Jian firmly told the Southern Weekend reporter.
In fact, The So-called Annual Sales of 2 Billion Yuan, Qianmu Reishi mushroom was just established in 2015. In the "List of Enterprises Applying for Listing" on the official website of the Csrc, the declaration materials of Qianmu Reishi were not found.
On the company's website, you can only see that the address of the Hainan planting base is Haikou Meilan District, but the two bases of Dabie Mountain in Anhui and Emei Mountain in Sichuan, the staff can not say which city and county it is, and no member has visited the two places.
Feng Meiling said that the whole of Guilin is a native of Tongshan County, Xianning City, and after the business of Dongguan Zhihe Company he founded developed and grew, as an investment project, he returned to his hometown of Xianning to establish a new company.
A new company established in Xianning City, Qianmu Lingzhi, is located in Xiangyanghu Town, Xian'an District, within a company called Huaqi Group. According to the official information released by Qianmu Lingzhi, quan Guilin, the chairman of the company, is also the vice chairman of Hubei Huaqi Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Huaqi Group").
"Why is Hua Qi the vice president?" Because our boss is working with them in the form of shares. When introducing the organizational structure of Qianmu Lingzhi, Feng Meiling explained the relationship between Qianmu Lingzhi and Huaqi Group alone.
In addition, on the bulletin board of the "Investment Conference", Quan Guilin also listed the chairman titles of Hainan Quanxianhe, Hubei Wanchun, Hubei Jingchun and other companies.
Southern Weekend reporters searched the "National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System" website and found that the registered capital of Qianmu Lingzhi Company was 10 million yuan, but because the company was only established in 2015, there was no information such as tax payment and revenue.
The registered capital of Hainan Quanxianhe is 10 million yuan, and the paid-up capital contribution is 0. The registered capital of Dongguan Zhihe Company is 500,000 yuan, and the natural shareholder Quan Guilin subscribes to the capital contribution of 300,000 yuan, and the paid-up capital contribution is still 0.
According to the 2013 annual report, Dongguan Zhihe's operating income was 71,700 yuan, total liabilities were 34,600 yuan, net profit was 0.189 million yuan, and total tax payment was 0.278 million yuan.
If calculated by 100,000 members and each member investing 10,000 yuan, according to the business model explained by the whole Guilin, the company will have to pay dividends of at least 200 million yuan per month, which means that the total dividend of the year is 2.4 billion yuan, exceeding the total annual sales of 2 billion yuan claimed by the whole Guilin.
On April 9, 2016, at the "Investment Promotion Conference" held by Senki Reishi, members lined up to pay money. (Lee Jae-lei/Photo)
<h3>The same routine is done again</h3>
When the Southern Weekend reporter checked the public file of the Xian'an District Industrial and Commercial Branch of Xianning City, he found that Xianning Huimeida Company had signed a housing lease contract with Qianmu Lingzhi and leased a five-story office building to Qianmu Lingzhi as a whole since January 28, 2015.
According to the official information of Huaqi Group, Xianning Huimeida, Ruiren Biological, Hubei Wanchun and Hubei Jingchun are all its subsidiaries.
The information displayed on the property right certificate revealed that the office building was the office building of Huaqi Group in Xiangyanghu Town, Xian'an District. That is to say, there is a lease relationship between Qianmu Lingzhi and Huaqi Group.
Surprisingly, the same title deed was leased to two companies for overlapping periods of time.
According to the industrial and commercial archives, the office space of Huaqi Group was already leased to Hubei Qingtian Tongbao Biotechnology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Kinte Tongbao") on August 1, 2014, with a lease period of two years, and officially expired on July 31, 2016. When Senki Reishi began to lease in January 2015, the previous lease had not yet expired.
According to the official website of Kinte Tongbao, Kinte Tongbao was founded by two companies in Taiwan and Hubei Huaqi Group, and its main business is the production and sales of cosmetics and daily chemicals.
Wang Qing, who works in direct sales media in Wuhan, told Southern Weekend that the state's control over the direct selling industry is very strict, and there are only 72 companies with direct selling qualifications in the country. Kinte Tongbao does not have a direct sales license issued by the state, but it has been carrying out business under the banner of direct sales, which is actually a serious suspicion of pyramid schemes.
"Kinte Tongbao has made a lot of noise in Wuhan, and everyone in the industry knows about this company." Wang Qing said that Kinte Tongbao advertised that it had a Taiwanese background, but in fact the two shareholders were hubei people.
According to an industry media website in Wuhan, since the second half of 2015, Kinte Tongbao has been investigated and punished in Hubei Province, Sichuan Province, Hunan Province and other places for suspected pyramid schemes. "The boss has also run away, I don't know how it is now?" Wang Qing said.
According to the website of the "National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System", Kinte Tongbao is currently in a state of "closure". In the publicly accessible corporate files of the Xian'an District Industrial and Commercial Branch, it was found that Kinte Tongbao made a resolution at the shareholders' meeting held on June 8, 2015 to dissolve Kinte Tongbao Company and liquidate the company's assets.
Mention of Qingtian Tongbao, Ji Shuilian of Huangshi, Hubei Province, has a bitter stomach. In August 2015, a junior high school classmate who had not been seen for many years found Ji Shuilian and introduced a laundry detergent and shower gel called Qingtian Tongbao. And promised her that if you spend 12,000 yuan on the product, you can become a member, and you can recover up to 100,000 yuan in cash. If you pull two people to "join the club", you can get a reward of 6,000 yuan. This pattern is much the same as that of Senki Reishi mushroom.
In the promotional materials of Kinte Tongbao, the theory of "consumer capital" is also repeatedly mentioned - consumers only need one-time consumption, and they can have the opportunity to participate in the profit distribution in the process of product circulation.
After several rounds of ideological indoctrination in the company, Ji Shuilian invested 30,000 yuan to become a member of Kinte Tongbao, and also successively pulled his relatives and friends to join. Unexpectedly, the "drumming and flowering game" soon became unsustainable, and the investment of several people was all "adrift".
"My friend's family is broken, it hurts people too much, and I won't see anyone in the future." Sun Xiaoqian of Xianning was also deeply affected by Qingtian Tongbao. She told Southern Weekend reporters that because the injury was too deep, she would never again make a move to introduce blind investment from friends around her. However, at the end of last year, another friend introduced her to participate in the Qianmu Lingzhi project, and she was surprised to find that Qianmu Lingzhi, like Qingtian Tongbao, used the venue of Huaqi Group.
Ji Shuilian told the Southern Weekend reporter that in order to increase the authenticity, the company organized many studies, lectures, and tours, and she was also pulled by a free bus to visit the Xianning headquarters.
Aunt Li, who went to Wuhan with Wei Jian to visit Huaqi, said that the reason why she decided to invest in becoming a member of Qianmu Lingzhi was that she saw the high rate of return, and there were solid workshops and equipment, "seeing the factory heart is solid."
<h3>Two strange equity changes</h3>
Although Kinte Tongbao publicly claims that Huaqi Group is one of the initiators of the company, there is no record of the equity relationship between the two in the archives of the Industrial and Commercial Bureau. From a legal point of view, Kinte Tongbao and Huaqi Group only have a lease relationship.
At the same time, the official website of Huaqi Group did not find information about Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum and Kinte Tongbao. In the archival materials that can be queried by the Industrial and Commercial Bureau, it is found that Qianmu Lingzhi and Huaqi Group have "entangled" with the equity.
On December 22, 2014, before the establishment of Qianmu Lingzhi, Zou Zhonghua and Fang Xinlian, shareholders of Huaqi Group, transferred 29% and 20% of the equity held by them to Quan Guilin respectively. After the completion of the equity transfer, the shareholding ratio of Huaqi Group Company in Guilin reached 49%.
The new shareholders' meeting held on the same day made a resolution to remove Zou Zhonghua from the position of legal representative of the company and appoint Quan Guilin as the general manager and legal representative of the company.
In Xianning, Zou Zhonghua was a self-made star entrepreneur and was elected as a deputy to the Municipal People's Congress. According to a 2013 biography in Xianning Daily, he was engaged in the production of enamel, printing, tempered glass and found his first pot of gold in his early years.
In 2009, Zou Zhonghua's enterprises began to transform, investing heavily in the construction of production lines and carrying out research and development and production of collagen, health food and biomedicine. These projects are the workshops and factories behind the office building of Huaqi Group.
The position of vice chairman of Huaqi Group, which quan guilin claimed to the outside world, is based on this equity transfer on December 22. Qianmu Lingzhi also organized members to visit the factory building behind Huaqi's office building as an important part of the headquarters display.
"The factory building behind it is all ours, and it is the world's largest Ganoderma lucidum extraction workshop." Feng Meiling introduced the visiting members.
On March 16, 2015, Quan Guilin transferred 29% of the 49% equity of Huaqi Group to Zou Zhonghua and 20% of the 49% equity to Fang Xinlian.
As early as December 22, 2014, after the completion of the equity change, the new articles of association stipulated that the actual capital contribution of 4.9 million yuan of the 49% equity of Guilin was December 1, 2016 and December 1, 2020. This means that Quan Guilin did not take out real money and silver in the two equity changes.
After the completion of the second equity transfer, Quan Guilin no longer holds the shares of Huaqi Group, and the new shareholders' meeting on the same day made a resolution to remove the general manager and legal representative of quan guilin.
At this point, Qianmu Lingzhi and Huaqi Group have no equity relationship, only the lease relationship of the office building. The workshop, plant and equipment behind the office building are not within the scope of the lease.
On September 1, 2015, a leader of Xianning City visited the workshop behind the office of Huaqi Group, accompanied by the leader to visit the whole guilin of Qianmu Lingzhi. The information published on the official website of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum is that the municipal leaders visited the production workshop of Qianmu Ganoderma lucidum.
At the same time, the network of Qianye Reishi has gone out of Hubei and extended to Guangdong and other places. On the morning of April 8, 2016, Southern Weekend reporters came to an office of Qianye Lingzhi in Yangji Village, Yuexiu District, Guangzhou City, where more than a dozen elderly people came and went.
When a Southern Weekend reporter asked a big mother where the company's profits came from, the big mother said a little impatiently: "You are a good person when this boss is a good person, let you eat products, and give you money back." ”
(At the request of the interviewee, "Ji Shuilian" in the text is a pseudonym)