Fresh food can be said to be the last category that offline supermarkets are still competitive, and the fresh processing sector such as cooked food is a powerful tool to attract consumers to the store.
In the current situation of declining passenger flow and low sales of physical supermarkets, supermarkets have changed their self-operated cooked food to joint operation or sales of prefabricated dishes, which is a helpless choice between cost and operation.
However, in the long run, cooked food should still be self-operated, assisted by brand co-operation, in order to truly establish its own core category advantages.
Supermarkets have closed their delicatessen processing rooms on a large scale
Recently, the reporter of Longshang.com Supermarket Weekly learned that at present, many supermarket companies across the country, including industry giants such as China Resources, Yonghui, RT-Mart, and some regional retail enterprises, have cut off the original self-operated cooked food sector and turned to associate business outsourcing or processing semi-finished prefabricated dishes.
According to a businessman who has cooperated with China Resources Vanguard, more than 450 fresh food operation rooms such as ready-made and ready-to-sell, cooked food and lo-mei in China Resources Vanguard across the country have all given up the self-operated model and sold prefabricated dishes instead. Similarly, the situation is similar for the national supermarket chains Yonghui and RT-Mart, where most of the cooked food operated by the stores has been transferred to contractors or supplied by outside companies, that is, cooperative enterprises distribute pre-made dishes to the store, and then sell them after simply heating them.
Even in the Sichuan-Chongqing region, where Yonghui has a better run and a relatively competitive advantage, cooked food has changed its self-management model to a more economical joint operation model.
There are also many regional retailers, such as a supermarket chain in Guangxi, at the beginning of the fresh processing area to store self-operated, after a period of operation sales are not ideal, customer feedback is poor, the introduction of more experienced associates, but also failed to continue, and finally adopt the prefabricated food enterprise supply, store simple processing, to ensure that this key category continues to file, not out of stock.
For a long time, cooked food has been a relatively difficult bone for domestic retail enterprises. The vast majority of enterprises adopt the mode of "self-management + joint operation", and self-operation accounts for a certain proportion. For the current phenomenon that many supermarket enterprises are unsustainable in their own operations, combined with multiple interviews, Longshang.com Supermarket Weekly believes that there are four main reasons: First, the decline in customer flow to the store;Second, the operating cost of cooked food is relatively large;Third, there is a lack of professionalsFourth, on-site marketing is not in place.
In the current situation of declining supermarket traffic and sluggish sales, in fact, changing self-operation to joint operation or selling prefabricated dishes is a last resort and no way to do it, and in the long run, supermarkets still have to do it in a self-operated way. A veteran who has worked in Yonghui for many years said that with the improvement of enterprise management capabilities and the improvement of the market environment, cooked food should still be based on self-management, supplemented by brand co-operation, so as to establish the competitive advantage of the store's core products.
Not only cooked food, pastry, baking and light food and other fresh processed goods are the key categories of supermarkets, in the case of abundant funds and controllable operating costs, even if the cost of trial and error in the early stage is relatively high, we must resist the pressure to adhere to self-management, only in this way can we establish the differentiated advantages of enterprises, and truly compete with online e-commerce and offline entities.
However, when companies are facing the pressure to survive, outsourcing joint ventures or pre-made food sales methods for more asset-light operations are also an option. Most importantly, these categories cannot be missing.
What's the difficulty in self-operated cooked food?
Fundamentally, the decline in customer traffic is the main reason why many supermarkets are closing their fresh food rooms. Once sales decline, sales of processed products, including cooked foods, pastries, breads, etc., will be severely affected.
Fresh food experts believe that there are two reasons for the current decline in supermarket store traffic: on the one hand, due to the economic environment, people's income expectations have decreased, and consumption has become more rational and cautious;On the other hand, it is related to the development of the enterprise itself, the overall store commodity strength is not strong, the management ability is weak, and the number of customers coming to the store will naturally become fewer and fewer.
In addition, the customer base of traditional hypermarkets is aging, and the existing product structure, service experience and store atmosphere are difficult to attract young people, resulting in the difficulty of increasing the unit price of store customers.
Elderly customers are more frugal and have more time than young people, so the categories with a higher markup rate are not the products they choose to buy, and they are more willing to buy back the raw materials and process them themselves. Chen Jinping, who has worked at Carrefour for many years, said.
According to the reporter's recent concentrated field visits and observations, a conclusion can be basically drawn: at present, the customer flow and customer unit price of most physical retail stores, especially hypermarkets, have declined to varying degrees, and even during the peak period, they are not optimistic. Originally, the processing department was the most prominent sector with the "sense of scene", but it is obvious that supermarket stores, as a "big environment", can no longer provide matching customer flow support.
At the same time as the passenger flow is declining, the operating costs of cooked food processing have always been high, and under the superposition of double pressures, it is not difficult to understand the actions of China Resources, Yonghui, RT-Mart and other companies to adjust the processing sector. Different from the standard products and basic fresh products, the investment in fresh processed products is larger, and professional technicians are needed, and their salaries are much higher than those of ordinary salesmen, which is a large amount of expenditure. There are also the cost of procurement of related cooking facilities and equipment, and the cost of loss caused by poor management, which should not be underestimated.
Although there are hundreds or thousands of stores in the country, there are not many regions in a single province (city) that have reached hundreds of stores, such as Yonghui, which only has more stores in Fujian, Chongqing and Sichuan, and there are basically a few or dozens in other regions, and the regional concentration is not high.
Chain it must be focused, focus in a region, realize resource sharing, dilute costs through marginal effects, and like them, the development of Tiannu scattered in the country, behind the operating costs, especially the store processing costs, such as manpower investment must be huge. Ye Yaoting, a retail expert and former chairman of Zhejiang Supply and Marketing Supermarket, said that especially in the current economic downturn and reduced passenger flow, national chain retail giants such as China Resources and RT-Mart are facing greater operating pressure.
In addition, the reason why cooked food cannot be sold is closely related to the taste and appearance of the product, which is directly related to the professional level of the technician. Limited by the gross profit, net profit and cost control and other assessment indicators set by the enterprise, the professional level of the processing master hired by the supermarket is often not too high, and there is often an unstable performance, which will cause the unstable taste of cooked food processed products, and the phenomenon of good and bad appearance, which is not easy to stimulate customers' desire to shop.
Another point that is very important to do a good job in the ready-made and sold processed products is to create an atmosphere to create a lively scene of fireworks in the world for consumers and strengthen the shopability of the store.
However, due to the bad business of the store, the scene presented is relatively bleak, and it lasts for a long time, and the atmosphere of the store will definitely not be good, lacking vitality and lifeless, and the impact of this piece is also quite large. "* said.
Long-termism: the combination of self-management and brand association
With the development of e-commerce and live streaming, the impact of online on physical supermarkets is getting bigger and bigger, the boundaries of business formats are getting wider and wider, and the moats of physical supermarkets are getting smaller and smaller. Fresh food can be said to be the last category that offline supermarkets are still competitive, and the fresh processing sector such as cooked food is a powerful tool to attract consumers to the store. In addition, processed fresh products are more profitable than basic fresh products.
Therefore, although it is a huge challenge to make fresh processed products, retail enterprises must also do their best, not give up, but also achieve improvement. In this regard, Hubei Yasi has done very well.
Combined with the current pressure on supermarket operation, ** believes that changing self-operation to joint operation or selling prefabricated dishes is an acceptable way in the short term, at least to maintain the operation of cooked food products, so as not to lose a large number of customers in the core category.
From the perspective of actual consumption, consumers still recognize the simple processing and sales of prefabricated dishes. * Citing the example of a supermarket chain in Guangxi that he was directing the adjustment, the supermarket initially made cooked food in its own way, and then outsourced it when the results were not good, but the joint venture failed to do so and eventually withdrew. Now the supermarket cooperates with a factory specializing in the production of prefabricated food, and the prefabricated food company distributes the semi-finished cooked food to the store, and then the store matches two marketers to heat the semi-finished products for sale, and the sales are not much different from the previous self-operation.
He said that the taste of the goods produced through the processing of semi-finished prefabricated dishes is relatively stable and the appearance is better, and the enterprises need to worry much less, and the gross profit is higher than that of the previous self-operation, which can reach nearly 30 points. "The specific operation is very simple, the semi-finished products have been prepared with seasonings, as long as the staff add some water, boil or simmer for a few minutes can be put out of the pot and sold, there is no requirement for the processing skills of employees, the taste is more stable than the self-employed, and the appearance is better. ”
However, there are also hidden dangers in the processing of prefabricated vegetables for cooked food management, if the management cannot keep up, preservation, sales and other methods are not in place, the resulting loss will be relatively large. At the same time, it is necessary to speed up the turnover of goods and achieve "diligent and fast sales", otherwise the freshness of goods will be affected, and the taste will be greatly discounted, which will affect the sales of goods.
In the long run, with the improvement of organizational construction and the improvement of management capabilities, it is necessary to do it in the form of a combination of "self-management + brand association", so as to truly establish its own core category advantages and build a competitive barrier and a moat for enterprises.
Self-operation is the foundation, and brand association is the auxiliary. A considerable proportion of fresh processed products, including cooked food, should be self-operated, and only a few single products need to be introduced to associates, such as Beijing Daoxiangcun, Qianxi chestnut and other brands with very high consumer awareness in subdivided categories. Liang Hao, a senior expert in retail consulting, said that at present, retail companies that are doing better than Yasi, Fat Donglai, Sam, etc., have a larger and larger proportion of processing plates, and the proportion of sales is getting higher and higher, which shows that although it is difficult to do a good job in self-management, as long as you work hard, you can still do a good job and produce performance.
It's just that there is not only a relatively large investment of capital and manpower behind it, but also a relatively strong management ability and the pursuit and persistence of quality.