Family, do you remember the show of eating hot pot before? There was a long queue at the door of Haidilao, and the waiter was holding snacks and handing hot towels; as soon as Banu tripe was served, it was "high-end, elegant and up-to-date". But now looking at the hot pot circle is simply "terrible" - the average customer price of Haidilao has been cut from 103 yuan to 97.5 yuan, Nan hot pot has been raised to 70 yuan per person, and Banu has even lowered the price twice in a row, from 150 yuan to 138 yuan, which really makes "high-end hot pot" a "affordable fast food". But even so, the performance is still a mess: Haidilao's revenue and profit rate has declined, and the stock price is only one-fifth of its high point; it closed 73 stores in a year, Xiabu Xiabu closed 138 stores, and its stock price fell to HK$80 million, almost becoming a "specially poor household" in the "sincere stocks"; Nan Hotpot is even more outrageous, closing 57 stores in the first five months of this year, with a daily turnover of 1,800 yuan per store. How can this be opened a hot pot restaurant? It's simply opening a "charity canteen"!
The hot pot industry used to be the "top" in the Chinese catering industry. Whether it is a party of friends, a family dinner, or a date with a couple, it is absolutely right to shout "go to eat hot pot". At that time, as long as the taste was not bad, you could basically make a fortune. Haidilao has become popular all over the country with "perverted service". Banu plays high-end brands with "dust hot pot". Xiabu Xiabu accurately grasps the single consumer market with "little hot pot". Even the rising Xiunan Hot Pot has gained a wave of fans with "old Chongqing flavor". But who would have thought that in just a few years, the direction of the wind has changed, and the once "hot cake" has become a "hot potato".
Let's talk about this "price war" first, it's so much that I have no friends. In the past, I had a meal at Haidilao, and the average per capita was worth more than 100, but the service was there; now the average customer price has dropped by almost 6 yuan, but consumers still don’t buy it. Why? Because everyone found that while the price is reduced, the "service" is also quietly shrinking. In the past, the waiter took the initiative to help you peel shrimps and serve food, but now I can't get someone over for a long time. In the past, I used to eat snacks and fruits casually when I was waiting, but now there are very few varieties. Some netizens complained: "Haidilao regards 'price reduction' as a reason for 'reducing distribution'? It's better to eat Nan hot pot with a per capita of 70!" But Nan hot pot is not easy. 70 yuan per capita seems cheap, but a single store's daily turnover is 1,800 yuan. Apart from rent, water, electricity, and food costs, it is estimated that even the employee's salary cannot be paid. This is like "If you surrender, I will surrender too, and finally everyone will drink the northwest wind together."
When looking at the store closure trend again, it is even more shocking. Xiabu Xiabu closes 138 stores a year, and one store is closed on average in three days, which is faster than "cutting leeks". A former Xiabu employee revealed: "Many stores have a business that is so bad that they can't sell a few orders a day. They open in the morning and close in the evening. The store is deserted. Instead of holding on, it is better to close the store and stop the loss." As a high-end brand under Xiabu, Qucuo failed to escape the disaster. It closed 73 stores a year. The former "Internet celebrity hotpot" has now become a "professional store closure". What’s even worse is that Xiabu Xiabu’s stock price fell to HK$80 million, and it doesn’t cost much to buy one hand. Netizens joked: “This stock price is not as expensive as a pound of pork in the vegetable market. It’s better to buy meat than to buy stocks!”
Why did the hot pot industry come to this point? To put it bluntly, it means "blind expansion + serious homogeneity". When the hot pot industry was popular in the past few years, no matter whether you have any experience or not, you would want to come in and get a share of the pie. If you open a hot pot restaurant, I will only open two; if you sell tripe, I will also sell tripe; if you provide services, I will also provide services. In the end, the hot pot restaurants on the market all looked similar and the taste was similar, and consumers had long been aesthetically exhausted. Moreover, many brands are opening stores in a crazily manner in order to expand. Regardless of whether the location is good or the operational ability is good, they will open the store first. The result is that there are more and more stores, but the customer flow has not kept up. In the end, they can only attract customers by reducing prices, and fall into a vicious cycle of "price reduction - profit decline - service allocation reduction - customer loss".
An additional important reason is that consumers have "the wallet is tight". In the past, people were generous in spending and didn’t feel bad about eating hot pot for a few hundred yuan. Now people pay more attention to cost-effectiveness and would rather cook hot pot at home than spend money outside. Data shows that in the first half of this year, the sales of homemade hot pot ingredients increased by 30% year-on-year. Behind this is the change in consumer consumption concepts. The hot pot restaurant has not yet reacted and is still thinking about attracting customers by relying on the labels of "high-end" and "Internet celebrity", but the result is naturally "reliable".
More ironic is that some hot pot brands are still engaged in "fancy" marketing while shouting "difficult". Today we will launch a "Internet celebrity dessert" and tomorrow we will hold a "cross-border joint brand" but we will not work hard on "taste" and "cost-performance ratio". Just like Banu, even though the average customer price has dropped, some people still complain that "the tripe is not as fresh as before" and "the portion is less." Consumers are not fools. They can deceive for a while by relying solely on marketing gimmicks, but not for a lifetime.
The hot pot industry used to be the "pride" of Chinese catering, but now it is in the dilemma of "battle royale". In fact, it is not that the hot pot is not delicious, nor that consumers don’t like it, but that the industry itself “made”. If brands do not wake up and continue to expand blindly, compete homogeneously, and ignore consumer demand, they will sooner or later be eliminated by the market.
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