Last weekend, a couple was injured by a falling ceiling while dining at Xianhezhuang Hangzhou Store, which caused a hot search. Many fans said in the comment area that the hot pot restaurant had an accident, which had nothing to do with Michael Chen himself. However, stars attract business through traffic, and it is inevitable that they will be bitten by traffic. With the growing condemnation of netizens, Xianhezhuang and Michael Chen had to come forward and apologize sincerely.
In fact, it is nothing new for a star to open a hot pot restaurant. From Xianhezhuang in Michael Chen, Shangshangqian in Joker Xue, Huofengxiang in Ryan, and Lasancheng Hot Pot in Sha Yi recently, it has been countless which wave of stars "went to the sea" to run hot pot restaurants.
Every time a star hot pot restaurant opens, other stars will come to the store to promote it together. Usually, there is a flood of short video marketing co-produced by stars and online celebrity stores. Fans have been dreaming of meeting stars and online celebrity for a long time, so that visitors can spend money in the store out of curiosity, and stars can continuously enjoy the benefits of traffic business.
There are also franchisees who are eyeing this traffic business and trying to make quick money. After a lot of excitement, "Michael Chen" was in charge of publicity and promotion, while franchisees watched the store's business booming. online celebrity, who came to punch in, and his fans came in an endless stream, happily earning a monthly income.
But in fact, what the star hot pot restaurant really earns is not the hot pot income, but the joining fee. The real operator is the trader behind it, using the star traffic to make money. For example, Michael Chen, Huang Xiaoming, Guan Xiaotong and other star restaurants are all run by Zhi Shan, while Sha Yi Hotpot Restaurant is run by Brother Chuan. This traffic business is booming enough in the short term, but when the heat gradually cools down, negative news such as a sharp decline in word of mouth and repeated stepping on the food safety red line surfaced.
As a result, the stars can escape the blame without any effort, and fans take the initiative to excuse them. Traders earn enough franchise fees by operating traffic marketing, leaving only fans and franchisees to face the endgame and feel dejected.
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Batch manufacturing star catering
Another star has joined the craze of opening hot pot restaurants. Recently, Sha Yi opened a spicy 30% cooking hot pot in Chongqing, which was promoted by celebrities on social media one after another, and then Sha Yi shouted hard and went to the store platform. The opening of this new store was very popular. On the opening day, there were too many people at the scene, which once caused serious traffic congestion nearby. Some netizens even queued for more than six or seven hours.
There are not a few stars who take catering as a sideline. Last year, the shutdown of the catering industry failed to stop this "shop opening tide", and Sean and Huang Xiaoming still launched their own catering brands. Among many star restaurants, the most successful model is Xianhezhuang in Michael Chen.
At first, Michael Chen's star aura with singer Ye Yixi and host Zhu Zhen did not bring good benefits to Xianhezhuang. After opening the store for 4 years, it not only gained a general reputation, but also lost a lot of money, and fell into a crisis of losing money even when three new stores were opened.
At that time, the publicity route of Xianhezhuang was still a signboard with three partners 1: 1 at the door, and photos of the three partners could be seen casually in the store. Michael Chen and Ye Yixi often went to the store for tasting and taking photos with consumers. In order to attract consumers, Xianhezhuang also launched a snap-up activity at the bottom of 9.9 yuan pot, which is in sharp contrast with the current "sky-high price" menu.
Until the second half of 20 19, the appearance of Zhiban made Xianhezhuang turn losses into profits and embarked on the rapid expansion of Zhang Zhilu by opening 500 stores in 1 year. According to Zhishan, "Around August 20 19, almost all Michael Chen's stores in Fujian were closed, and then it was taken over and operated by Zhishan Group".
Under the marketing of catering operation mode, Xianhezhuang suddenly began to be active in short videos of various platforms around 2020. The contents of these videos are mostly interesting co-productions of Michael Chen and Tik Tok's various road networks in Xianhezhuang stores. The punch-in video released by online celebrity has brought huge traffic to Xianhezhuang. More than 20,000 videos have been uploaded on the topic of "You eat hot pot together" in Tik Tok. Many consumers claim that it takes up to five hours to queue up at the store.
Screenshot of short video co-produced by Michael Chen and online celebrity
"Can I see Michael Chen?" This is the most frequently asked question in the topic video of Tik Tok # Xianhezhuang. In addition to wooing online celebrity from all walks of life, Michael Chen often makes the trend of eating Xianhezhuang with stars from all walks of life. An ugly picture of a trio of "running men" eating hot pot once rushed to the first place in hot search. In order to increase the exposure, Chen He will praise and comment on netizens who send hot pot from time to time.
The success of Xianhezhuang provides a sample for many star hot pot restaurants. As a result, more and more stars "go to the sea" to open hot pot restaurants, taking "meeting" stars and online celebrity as gimmicks, and turning the stores into a punching resort for young people through online marketing, so as to realize the commercial realization of personal flow.
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The business of "lying down and earning nothing"
In essence, star restaurants are an open plan of stars and traders. "Michael Chen" are responsible for publicity and promotion in the front, and traders are responsible for the specific process of opening stores and joining in the back to create the greatest benefits together.
Not only Xianhezhuang hot pot in Michael Chen, but also Jiangnan barbecue in Huang Xiaoming, Zaomenkan barbecue in Sean, natural to stay milk tea in Guan Xiaotong and Mr. Huang Yu in Andrew are all written by Sichuan Zhishan Brand Management Co., Ltd. Sha Yi's spicy 30% cooking hotpot in Chongqing is said to be "opening a shop", but in fact, his public identity is the brand officer of this restaurant, and the operator of this hotpot restaurant is Brother Chuan.
The industrial chain of star catering has gradually become clear.
There are many overlapping projects between Zhishan and Brother Chuan, for example, they have jointly launched catering brands with Huang Xiaoming and Guan Xiaotong. The two are equivalent to MCN in star catering brands. By copying the standardized catering development model and combining the blessing of star traffic, the assembly line of star catering brands is hatched.
Sichuan Zhishan's brand
In order to join quickly, all the catering categories with high standardization, batch reproduction and low threshold are selected, such as hot pot, barbecue and milk tea. Based on the standardization of the hot pot industry, the stars don't have to invest too much energy in the production, processing and distribution of raw materials, and the gross interest rate and net interest rate of hot pot are higher than other catering categories.
Taking Xianhezhuang as an example, Zhishan will give site selection suggestions in the early stage of opening the store, and provide personnel training and decoration support. After the opening of the store, the publicity and promotion, hot pot bottom materials and ingredients, and business analysis are all under the unified responsibility of Zhishan.
With the appeal of stars, Zhishan uses Internet marketing routines to continuously drain. Not only did you greet the various road networks to shoot short videos in Honglai Store, but also invited well-known bloggers to the hot pot restaurant to conduct live food broadcasts from time to time, covering platforms such as Xiaohongshu and public comments. Stars only need to hang their own stories in the store, cooperate with online celebrity bloggers to appear in the mirror from time to time, and have new works released or participate in variety shows to advertise, which saves money and effort.
In fact, the star hot pot restaurant can make a profit not by selling hot pot, but by earning the franchise fee.
For example, Xianhezhuang in Michael Chen has been exposed that the initial fee needs 480,000 yuan, and a deposit of 50,000 yuan is needed. If the account is calculated, Xianhe Zhuangguang, which has more than 700 franchise stores in China, can earn more than RMB 300 million by earning the franchise fee.
Number of all kinds of star restaurants Source: Ruiyide
More importantly, if the restaurant brand has an accident, the stars will hardly have to bear the responsibility, and fans will rush to support themselves. Ryan's Huofengxiang Hot Pot was once found to be suspected of copying the decoration style of Houtang Hot Pot, but the number of fans who came to join in the consumption only increased, and Kaijia explained to Ryan: Ryan was the shopkeeper, only personally participated in the decoration supervision, but not personally participated in the design. When Hou Tang saw it, he could only admit that he was unlucky.
Money comes quickly, you only need to show your face, and you don't have to take responsibility. This business has become the best choice for stars to engage in sideline business.
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Who was harvested?
The blind pursuit of fans has largely contributed to the traffic buying and selling of leeks-fans are willing to pay for the stars, and franchisees have paid for it after seeing the fanaticism, which has helped the brand to scale up rapidly, and traders and stars are happy to see it.
However, the gold-lettered signboard of the star is not always useful. The problems of star catering's own operation, low cost performance and food safety are frequent, and it may be difficult to pay the bill for the fans in idolize for a while.
Opening a bad review area in Xianhezhuang at will is basically a complaint about inadequate service and stale ingredients. Many customers who come to the store to spend money say that "the weight is so small that it is touching". The amount of food is only 7 pieces of potatoes and 6 pieces of frozen tofu, and a 58 yuan snowflake fat beef is only 7 pieces thin. When the service, ingredients and dishes can't reach the level of customer unit price, it is of course difficult for consumers to accept such pricing. Some people even said that because the price/performance ratio is too low, they won't want to come again after punching in once.
Compared with other hot pot brands, Xianhezhuang, which has fans' support, can only maintain its score on the passing line.
Comparison of scores between Haidilao and Xianhezhuang in Beijing area
Not only has word-of-mouth fallen sharply, but the food safety of star hot pot restaurants has also repeatedly stepped on the red line. The fake duck blood in Bao Beier Hotpot Restaurant was once heated, and the tableware of Shangshangqian Hotpot Restaurant under Joker Xue was repeatedly detected with coliform bacteria.
The seemingly lively star hot pot restaurant has not been widely recognized in the consumer market. After the popularity of traffic, the consequences of consumers not buying it were directly grafted on the franchisees. Many star shops have closed down, and some places in Huang Xiaoming and Michael Chen have not been spared. The "Huangliang Yimeng" hotpot restaurant opened by Huang Lei and Morphy also closed down in less than two years.
Among the leeks harvested by star catering, franchisees are the most "strong".
"People who are serious in catering business will join star restaurants." In the eyes of real catering people, the brand that promises "60% gross profit margin" and "return to the original within X months" is the "leek project".
In Beijing, franchisees who want to open a Xianhezhuang usually have to pay an initial fee of 550,000 yuan. This is not enough. The decoration of the whole store also needs to be done by a dedicated person, and it will cost nearly 800,000 bits and pieces. Not only that, core ingredients such as hot pot bottom materials and marinades, and even tableware such as pots and pans need to be purchased from headquarters. Total * * * down, franchisees before opening the start-up cost is about 2 million.
Xianhezhuang Investment Budget Table Source: City Boundary
Xianhezhuang once claimed that the investment return period is 9 months, which means that if a Xianhezhuang is opened in Beijing, the net profit must reach 20% before it can be returned within 1 year. However, the so-called "returning to the original business" is simply an illusion. Before the epidemic, the net profit of Haidilao in 20 19 was 2.346 billion yuan, the gross profit margin of restaurants was only 18.6%, and the net profit rate was only 8.8%.
The boss of the industry is still like this, not to mention the star hot pot restaurant that eats temporary traffic?
In addition, another big stunt of star catering, the so-called star-to-store publicity, is actually another way to save money from franchisees' pockets. It is reported that a franchisee asked the project manager whether Michael Chen would come to the store to help promote the event, and he got the answers that the store should pay a part of the appearance fee and reception fee, and that the fee would be/kloc-0.00 million yuan if the banquet was held separately.
In other words, this is a business that is naked in the guise of a star and double harvests fans and franchisees.
The blessing of star traffic can not continuously bring traffic and customers to catering brands. After the heat dissipates, the factors that consumers consider are still taste, freshness of ingredients, food safety and service attitude. After a temporary traffic carnival, it will eventually be dull.
Perhaps many people will be attracted by the star's gold-lettered signboard, but the franchisees who spend the most effort will eventually bite back.