Brand-name chain restaurants are very strict with recipes. Catering enterprises and catering enterprises must sign confidentiality agreements from the beginning, and those who violate the regulations will be punished by law. Some large catering enterprises such as Japan and South Korea will apply for national patents for their recipes, and other catering brands will also deal with them through legal means. Many specialty restaurants will not disclose their ingredients in order to maintain their "characteristics". Although they opened many chain stores, they didn't join them. This is the same as fast fashion clothing stores opening chain stores in large shopping malls, just to protect themselves. Brands and business models have never been added.
For the hot pot on the market, the bottom material of the hot pot is the formula. The brand has its own central production plant. When they send the basic ingredients of hot pot to franchise stores or chain stores, they will handle all the ingredients and package them. You may know some flavors, but you know nothing about them. You don't know the proportion of ingredients and the preparation time, so it's hard to reveal the formula. Some small hot pot restaurants run by bosses will close once the boss wants to fry the materials at the bottom of the pot.
Cooking is nothing more than raw materials, equipment, handicrafts and spices. Seasoning is the most important thing. Some small restaurants will break the unique convention. The most important seasoning formula will be made by yourself or handed over to three parties. Factory production, but only in the case of signing a confidentiality agreement, can provide their own raw materials, so even if the factory wants to copy the formula, it is used as raw materials. Of course, the success of catering enterprises depends not only on the formula, but also on the operation mode, talent management, finance and many other aspects.