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reporter: zhou xinyue editor: jiang yuyin

with the rise of mass-market snack stores, the "high-end snack" giants are facing a big test.

at the end of august,bestoreit was announced that the revenue in the first six months was 3.886 billion yuan, and the net profit was 23.89 million yuan, a decrease of 87.38%. the estimated full-year volume is to remain at around 8 billion yuan.

“it's not just that life is difficult, it's that you can't live” chairman yang yinfen wrote in an open letter to all employees.

in november 2023, after taking office, he took the initiative to lower prices, claiming it to be "the biggest price reduction in 17 years" in an effort to survive better.

bestore has reduced the prices of more than 500 products, and "the ultimate goal is 80% of the total products," tang li, the company's brand manager, told 21cbr.

during the phase of adjusting its business strategy, this snack giant headquartered in wuhan is expected to remain dormant for a period of time.

cutting oneself with a knife

liangpin puzi has a meager profit margin, and the official explanation is that it has “implemented price reduction measures.”

as soon as yang yinfen took office, the first thing he did was to fix the price.the largest price cut since its establishment。

the discounted goods include 300 items with high repurchase rates, such as nuts, meat snacks, dried tofu and spicy strips, with an average price reduction of 22% and the highest reduction of 45%.

among them, the price reduction of nut products was as high as 40%; after the price reduction of a 60-gram bag of hand-torn meat jerky, the member price was only 5.9 yuan, a price reduction of about 40%; the price of crispy winter dates dropped from 7.9 yuan to 5.9 yuan, a reduction of about 25%.

"the price reduction has had a certain impact on gross profit." yang yinfen said frankly that from january to june, its gross profit margin was 26.4%, a decrease of more than 1 percentage point from the previous two years.

“high-end snacks” have to lower their profile, which is a last resort。

bulk snacks are on the rise, and convenience stores and snack discount stores that serve community users have attracted a large number of consumers with their rich merchandise and high cost-effectiveness.

chinese food industry analyst zhu danpeng analyzed that the way mass-market snack shops make money is to cooperate directly with factories, bypass the layers of markups by middlemen, and push product prices down to a lower level.

as of october last year, the number of snack collection stores in china exceeded 22,000, which have eroded a large share of bestore.

last year, revenues of all five product categories under yang yinfen’s management declined.

among them, the decline in "dried fruits", "meat snacks" and "vegetarian delicacies" was around 20%, dragging down the overall revenue by 14.76%.

in a cruel situation,boss yang is determined to reduce prices and promote sales, giving the market confidence。

in early july, the list of price-reduced products expanded again.

"(from 300) to more than 500 products." tang li told the "21cbr" reporter.

as of the close of september 6, the market value of bestore was approximately 4 billion yuan, a decrease of nearly 90% from its peak.

reduce costs and increase efficiency

from the supply chain, production efficiency, operating costs, etc., yang yinfen strives to find room for price reduction.

"in 2020, the company conducted a cost audit and found that procurement costs fell by 42.13 million yuan in two years, providing a reference for cost pricing.the company established a cost database and a digital management system to manage supply chain costs。”

for example, raw materials such as nuts used to be purchased on a targeted basis after specifying specifications, and the cost of high-grade raw materials remained high.

yang's team has incorporated the purchase of bulk nut raw materials into the supplier direct purchase system, and operates them in a graded manner after unified market procurement, that is, using raw materials of different models and grades to make different types of products.

from january to june, the number of average customer orders increased while operating costs remained stable.

as online traffic is accelerating its differentiation, liangpin puzi is facing channel challenges, and yang yinfen’s team is also trying out new channels.

last year, liangpin puzi spent 45 million yuan to acquire 3% of zhao yiming's equity and set up offline mass-market snack stores. half a year later, it sold all the equity for 105 million yuan.

with this investment, he made 60 million yuan.。

regarding offline store formats, bestore told reporters that it is still in the exploratory stage.

last year, in her hometown of wuhan, yang yinfen’s team opened the largest store in the country, the “snack kingdom store.”

the store covers an area of ​​over 1,000 square meters and has more than 3,000 skus, covering products of the main brand of bestore, its sub-brands and incubated snack chain brands.

liangpin puzi has about 3,000 offline stores. in the first half of the year, it increased the number of customer orders by reducing product prices, introduced freshly baked and seasonal snacks, and enhanced seasonal sales capabilities.

online side,last year's revenue fell by more than 30%, and boss yang decisively adjusted his strategy。

bestore has created several popular products such as finger-licking duck collarbones and nut wheel bread, which were launched online, driving new product sales growth by 421%.

its simultaneous expansionmeituan, yonghui, pupu and other instant retail platforms.

"on the interest e-commerce platform, the company simultaneously develops dabo and dianbo, which complement each other."

tang li explained that new products will be given priority to replenish dabo’s inventory to attract consumers; dianbo will promote signature and best-selling products through professional introductions to increase the repurchase rate.

the reporter of 21cbr noticed that on september 7, the official flagship store of bestore douyin,1.68 million fans, sales of 15.78 million yuan, there are only 19 products on sale in the live broadcast room.

more energy is put into shelf e-commerce. in the live broadcast room of the tmall flagship store, there are more than 340 products.

fully entrusted

yang yinfen is the co-founder of bestore. he took over the reins from founder yang hongchun at the end of last year.

"no one can entrust me with billions of dollars in assets and let me manage it all. under no circumstances will i let down this trust that goes beyond brotherhood!" yang yinfen said frankly.

both yang hongchun and yang yinfen had worked at kelon electrical appliances. in 2006, yang hongchun founded bestore in wuhan, and the latter joined the entrepreneurial group and served as general manager for a long time.

for more than ten years, yang hongchun has been leading the business, while yang yinfen is good at building the supply chain system.passionate about new technology and product research。

with the cooperation of the two, the "first stock of high-end snacks" was listed on the shanghai stock exchange in 2020.

qichacha shows that the ultimate beneficial shares of yang hongchun and yang yinfen are 23.26% and 8.94% respectively.

currently, the performance of bestore is weak and shareholders have dispersed.

at the beginning of this year, both today capital and hillhouse capital reduced their holdings.

in mid-may, the company issued two announcements on shareholder share reduction. ningbo hanyi and dayong planned to reduce their holdings by no more than 24.06 million shares due to their own financial needs, accounting for about 6% of the total share capital.

qichacha shows thatningbo hanyi is the largest shareholder of bestoreits partners are yang hongchun, yang yinfen and other members of the founding team.

in early july, bestore announced that "based on confidence in the company and recognition of its stock," ningbo hanyi decided to terminate its share reduction plan ahead of schedule.

this move has a great impact on people's morale.

ningbo hanyi's shareholding ratio decreased slightly from 35.38% to 35.23%, but it is still the largest shareholder.

at present, yang yinfen is concentrating on increasing sales. he proposed "natural health new retail"a new proposition.

in the first half of the year, he tried ip collaboration, cooperating with pingu and beijing zoo to launch 60 new healthy snacks.

among them, the "menglansun" family achieved sales of over 4 million in a single week, and the monthly sales of the crispy pancake seaweed flavored product exceeded 10 million.

boss yang knows very well that to regain confidence, he must rely on performance.

image source: bestore, except where noted