Ten sides of Zong Qinghou

Text|Daily People Club Wang Xiao.

Edit|Yi Fangxing.

Operations|Killer whale.

Zong Qinghou was last seen in public in December last year. Although he was ill, he still insisted on participating in Wahaha's "2024 National Sales Work Conference". Before being admitted to the hospital due to illness during the Spring Festival, he also issued an open letter to all employees, calling on everyone to "be down-to-earth and work hard". And these eight words are also a portrayal of his life.

As a member of the "Flowers" generation of entrepreneurs, Zong Qinghou's life is closely linked to Wahaha. In 1987, he led two retired teachers to borrow 140,000 yuan to start by selling soda and popsicles, and founded Wahaha, which gradually built it into a food and beverage empire, and once won the top of the industry. For ordinary people, what is more important is that the Wahaha he created has been used as a symbol to accompany many people's growth memories.

As many people said in mourning: "Wahaha is my childhood." He also has the most sincere emotions for Wahaha, he once said: "There will be a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand people, but for me there is only one Wahaha, which is the proof of my existence in the world." ”

365 days a year, 200 days in the market, Zong Qinghou does not often appear in the company.

An employee at Wahaha's headquarters said that he "hasn't been to the company for a long time" and that he refused to retire, but it was not easy to meet him in the company. Because he is either running the market, or on the way to the market.

According to Southern People Weekly, Zong Qinghou may be the most diligent of all the entrepreneurs in China. What he is most busy with is inspecting various markets across the country, 365 days a year, maybe 200 days a year. In 2002, Zong Qinghou also set a record of running most of China in 12 days.

Even, from Zhejiang to Beijing to attend the two sessions, Zong Qinghou had to squeeze out time in the meetings that were full all day long to conduct various market surveys in Beijing. Every time he walked to a market, Zong Qinghou would go to the dealers and vendors to chat about the latest sales situation. "Red Star News" also reported that a few years ago, Zong Qinghou underwent surgery for lung cancer, and he still insisted on working after surgery.

Zong Qinghou's bookshelf can confirm this from the side. On the shelves, the most placed are maps. The sheer number of maps shocked a reporter who wrote a biography of him – from provinces, municipalities, autonomous regions, and municipalities to highways and urban and rural road networks, all kinds of maps were marked with markers, and some were torn.

Zong Qinghou has always adhered to the principle of "asking for instructions not overnight", and Zong Qinghou will complete the approval of the request on the same day, even if it is a business trip. In the era of underdeveloped communications, it was not easy to get approval on the same day, and Zong Qinghou had to carry a printer, ink cartridge and printing paper with him. The accompanying staff should first print the documents to be approved, and then send them back in the form of fax after Zong Qinghou approves the opinions, and when the business is busiest, more than 30 ink cartridges and 4 packs of printer paper can be used up on a business trip.

On days when he is not running to the market, Zong Qinghou will show up at No. 160 Qingtai Street in Hangzhou at 7 a.m., start a 16-hour day, and leave until 11 a.m., day after day, all year round.

The family culture of giving jobs to employees is a word that Wahaha can't avoid, and Zong Qinghou is like a patriarch of this giant enterprise.

In the 90s, Wahaha's "home" had a more tangible carrier - rice bowls. In 1991, Zong Qinghou posted a recruitment advertisement on "Hangzhou**", saying that Wahaha's annual output value exceeded 100 million yuan and it needed to recruit talents from the society. This recruitment brought more than 20 college students to Wahaha, and when the newcomers registered, Zong Qinghou gave the newcomers a meal ticket, and each person also received a rice bowl, for Wahaha, the meaning of this rice bowl is that Wahaha "is the home where they eat together".

A deeper manifestation of "home" is the binding of interests. As early as 1999, Wahaha implemented an employee stock ownership incentive system, and by 2003, the number of shareholders once exceeded 150,000 people, and finally realize full shareholding.

Sometimes, "home" also represents "** Zong Qinghou himself once said frankly to "Chinese Entrepreneur": "They all say that I am more '** In the past, I was really too detailed, causing employees to rely on me. "In Wahaha, everything related to market choice and the future, Zong Qinghou has to grasp everything in his own hands. The procurement of all materials in the company must be signed and approved by Zong Qinghou, even if it is a rice bowl received by the newcomer and a broom of 15 yuan purchased by the office.

*"The advantage is that everything has become very efficient under the leadership of the eldest patriarch Zong Qinghou, and he can make decisions directly in everything. Xiao Zhuqing, the former planning director of Wahaha Group, was deeply touched by this, taking the distribution of goods as an example, it only takes one day to complete, the first day the decision-making level issued the document, the next day the terminal of the country can be implemented, if there is a need to adjust, the third day can overturn, improve and modify the original document.

Under such a family culture system, Zong Qinghou became the only most important person. Zong Qinghou's daughter Zong Fuli even said in an interview with ** that if Wahaha subtracted Zong Qinghou, it would be "equal to zero".

Wahaha's "Pingjin Campaign" started a middle-aged business, pedaling a tricycle to sell door-to-door, and then quickly completing the original capital accumulation with the "Wahaha Children's Nutrient Solution" - this is a common narrative framework for Zongqinghou's entrepreneurial road.

However, it is not difficult to have a hit, but the difficult thing is to sell the water to the whole country.

Looking back on the development history of Wahaha, there is a battle that determines the transformation of Wahaha from a local brand to a national brand. And the turning point is what Zong Qinghou said about Wahaha's "Pingjin Campaign". At that time, Wahaha entered Shanghai in one fell swoop and "captured" East China with the best all-round advertising bombardment, but if it wanted to have a place in the whole of China, the most important thing was to go north.

Wahaha's Pingjin Campaign began in the summer of 1990.

Zong Qinghou attaches great importance to the grassroots market, and the strategy he formulated is to first take Tianjin as a test field, and then enter the Beijing market. He went to Tianjin alone and chose a local guest house, which was also Zong Qinghou's strategy, which was not only cheap, but also the closest to the citizens.

Every day, he had to go to the front desk to borrow the guest house's ** to give Hangzhou's subordinates a "command strategy": buy a large layout in Tianjin** to advertise, with the help of radio waves and analog technology, on the radio, station signs and other media carriers to place advertisements, this strategy was called "three-dimensional bombing" by Zong Qinghou.

With the blessing of advertising and the background of the times, Wahaha expanded nationwide at a speed beyond Zong Qinghou's imagination. And this victory was completed by Zong Qinghou in a "down-to-earth" and simple way, and it also deepened his attention to the first-line consumer market, which ran through Zong Qinghou's life.

In the early days of entrepreneurship, Zong Qinghou pedaled a tricycle to deliver the school book. Figure Wahaha WeChat***

There was a period of time to avoid capital, if Wahaha was to go to the whole country with the "Battle of Pingjin", then the next "Dawa Dispute", known as the most influential international business war in the past 30 years of reform and opening up, is a matter of life and death, and it has also had a more profound impact on Zong Qinghou's business concept.

Before this, Wahaha had also embraced capital. In 1995, Wahaha competed head-on with Robust Group in the fruit milk market, and Zong Qinghou realized that Wahaha needed to expand and introduce investment from the world's leading food and beverage companies. Coincidentally, at this time, Danone, a multinational food and beverage company, threw an olive branch to Wahaha.

But this transnational marriage, from the very beginning, Zong Qinghou "suffered the loss of capital operation". Zong Qinghou's bottom line is not to give up his "children" to others to control. At that time, Hong Kong's Peregrine Company and Danone came together to discuss a joint venture, and the two companies sent their own representatives, and their opinions sometimes differed, so Zong Qinghou always thought that it was a joint venture between the three companies.

At that time, Danone and Peregrine accounted for a total of 51% of the shares, Wahaha was 49%, and Zong Qinghou was still the largest shareholder in total, so he agreed to the marriage. It stands to reason that the joint venture should calculate Wahaha's price-earnings ratio, but at that time, Zong Qinghou did not understand the capital operation, calculated Wahaha's net assets, and finally Danone and Peregrine only contributed less than 36 million, and took 51% of Wahaha's shares, a full 27 million less capital.

By 1998, Zong Qinghou suffered even greater losses. Danone and Peregrine initially invested through an investment company, which established a new company in Singapore, which owns 51% of Wahaha's shares. After the outbreak of the Asian financial crisis, Peregrine went bankrupt, and Danone acquired Peregrine and became the largest shareholder of Wahaha.

Zong Qinghou is also becoming more and more passive. Because Danone seems to be deliberately restricting Wahaha's development, at first it was a fund report, and the rule that "expenses exceeding 10,000 yuan must be reported to the board of directors" alone made it almost difficult for Zong Qinghou to move an inch.

Wahaha has annual sales of one billion yuan, and after a year, Zong Qinghou "has to run 100,000 times". Later, Zong Qinghou wanted to roll out production lines such as instant noodles and puffed food, but almost all his ideas were rejected by Dahaha, and in the end, Danone even acquired Wahaha's competitors such as Robust to restrict Wahaha.

Danone's ambition to take full control of Wahaha has been revealed in a series of lawsuits. The cohesion of "family culture" also reached its peak in this "Dawa dispute", before responding to the lawsuit, all employees and dealers of Wahaha spontaneously wrote a joint letter, "You (Zongzong) are not fighting alone".

In the end, the "Dawa Battle" was won, but it also came at a cost. Since then, Zong Qinghou has avoided capital for a while. And, for a long time, Wahaha has had a "never go public" attitude.

After preparing for his departure, he took a back seat, and Zong Qinghou began to prepare in 2018.

The outside world regards Zong Fuli's promotion route to Wahaha as a clue to Zong Qing's retreat. In 2018, Zong Fuli served as the head of the brand public relations department of Wahaha Group, which seems to be a landmark step for Zong Fuli to enter the management team.

Since then, Zong Fuli's promotion path has been accelerating, and in 2020, Zong Fuli will also serve as the deputy general manager of Wahaha Group Sales Company. A year later, Zong Fuli officially served as the vice chairman and general manager of Wahaha Group, responsible for daily work.

But in fact, in addition to promoting her daughter Zong Fuli, Zong Qinghou has also been building a second-generation management to prepare for his departure. In 2019, Zhang Honghui, the general manager of Wahaha, was replaced by Cai Lei, and some people speculated at that time that this was the second-generation leadership team of Wahaha. The signal that Zong Fuli will become the core figure of Wahaha may be earlier. In 2018, Zong Fuli, who is still the head of the public relations department, directly replaced Wang Leehom, who has been the spokesperson for more than 20 years, and bluntly said in the interview: He (Wang Leehom) is old.

Zong Qinghou also seems to realize that if he wants to really take a back seat, the first thing to prepare for is to take off his role as the "patriarch" in the hearts of employees. In 2021, Zong Qinghou revealed to "Chinese Entrepreneur" that Wahaha is moving step by step from the original family culture to institutionalization, "I now require every employee to manage himself, what to do, what to do, and what not to do." So that there is no problem for anyone to lead (the enterprise). Zong Qinghou said.

Zong Qinghou is no longer as before"** The "power" in his hands began to decrease, and a source once said that after Zong Fuli became the general manager, Zong Qinghou's guidance and participation in the company was gradually reduced, focusing on the core area of sales.

Zong Qinghou and daughter Zong Fuli. Figure Wahaha WeChat***

Regarding his daughter, Zong Qinghou publicly admitted that he and his daughter had disagreements about the management of the company.

For example, if some employees do not do a good job, Zong Fuli will dismiss them, which is contrary to Zong Qinghou's philosophy. There was also an incident in which an employee was dismissed by Zong Fuli and was invited back to Wahaha by Zong Qinghou.

But at the same time, he also expressed considerable support and tolerance for his daughter.

Someone once asked what the biggest difference between Zong Qinghou and her daughter was, and Zong Qinghou laughed, "It's no different, she is my daughter." Zong Fuli and Zong Qinghou are like thousands of traditional Chinese father-daughter patterns of getting along - a little estranged but tacit. When they were at home, although the father and daughter could see each other every day, they rarely exchanged work, and the communication between the two was limited to speeches, and sometimes Zong Fuli would give the speeches to Zong Qinghou to see, and "she rarely looked for me for other things, because she was also smarter", Zong Qinghou revealed.

Zong Qinghou knew that his daughter was very hard and strong. With the help of his father, Zong Fuli, who returned from studying abroad, took over Hongsheng Beverage Group in China, when he first took over, Hongsheng still only had one beverage filling line, and now, Hongsheng has developed more than 40 subsidiaries and more than 100 production lines. In an interview with "Chinese Entrepreneur", Zong Qinghou once said frankly, "Now her (Hongsheng) profit margin is higher than mine (Wahaha)."

Zong Fuli and Wahaha had a run-in period of time. In 2016, Zong Fuli launched a drink named after her English name "kellyone", for which millions were invested, but even in first-tier cities, few people bought it, Zong Fuli also entered the real estate industry, planning to build an Ouwa shopping mall to sell children's clothing, and finally lost 1.7 billion.

Judging from the development of Wahaha, Zong Fuli is indeed trying to find ways to continue to prove herself. After 2021, Wahaha's performance will return to more than 50 billion, which is also the largest since 2013. That year was also the year when Zong Fuli took office as general manager, and in 2023, Wahaha's main business revenue and profit will achieve "double growth", and continue to stabilize revenue**.

Zong Qinghou rarely praised her daughter directly in person, for fear that she would be "fluttering", but in an interview, Zong Qinghou would be proud, "She (Zong Fuli) is better than me."

I like to keep my money in the bank, and Zong Qinghou likes to keep my money in the bank. In an interview, Zong Qinghou said many times that Wahaha has tens of billions of cash just by depositing money in the bank, and the interest alone is enough for Wahaha to start a new business.

Keeping money in a bank is a more stable way than a model of expanding your business by borrowing a lot of money. For the avoidance of instability, it seems that Zong Qinghou's childhood experience can be glimpsed one or two.

"Poverty" ran through almost the entire youth of Zong Qinghou. When he was in elementary school, the school often organized movies, but Zong Qinghou's family couldn't afford the movie, so he and his younger brother could only find various excuses to "escape". After graduating from middle school, 16-year-old Zong Qinghou began to break into society, like a drifting bottle, learning auto repair for a period of time, selling sweet potatoes for a period of time, and frying popcorn for a period of time.

For a person who has been "poor and afraid" since childhood, hard work and down-to-earth seem to be the only things he can really do. In this oldest industry, Zong Qinghou has taken every step of the way, such as not defaulting on others, not bullying others, dealing fairly, unwilling to fire employees, and so on.

Even if he has long been out of that hard time, and even climbed to the peak of wealth, in Zong Qinghou's body, you can still see the traces of that hard time.

Zong Qinghou has a barber shop that he often visits, and every time the barber shop owner sees him, he is wearing Wahaha overalls and stepping on a pair of 30 yuan cloth shoes, which is "very simple".

The proof of a lifetime of existence For Zong Qinghou, Wahaha is an almost obsessive existence. In his biography, he said: "It (Wahaha) is my whole life, all my dreams, all my meanings, values, labels and symbols. It is a testament to my existence in this world. ”

In order to protect this "dream", Zong Qinghou began to become cautious. He described his generation of entrepreneurs: there is no time to enjoy, for fear that once they enjoy it, they will covet comfort, and the enterprise will collapse.

Zong Qinghou has always practiced this principle. In 2016, there was a ** circulating Internet, on a seat in the aisle of the second-class seat of the high-speed rail, an old man in plain clothes was teasing the child, and this old man was Zong Qinghou. For Zong Qinghou, it is very common to travel in the second-class seat of the high-speed rail.

Zong Qinghou teased the child in the second-class seat of the high-speed rail.

It's also common to dress modestly. The year's outfit can be summed up in two formulas: when it's cold, jacket with cloth shoes; When it's hot, wear a T-shirt with sandals.

I don't really care about eating. Three meals a day are solved in the company's canteen, rice and vegetables, and a few bites can be solved. When a reporter came, the chef steamed the crabs, and Zong Qinghou would smile and mutter, "It's a little more luxurious, it's a little more luxurious."

Zong Qinghou does not have any hobbies, "work is the biggest hobby in this life", and more relevant people said that Zong Qinghou's annual expenses do not exceed 50,000 yuan.

The feelings behind the data Judging from the countless miracles created by Wahaha, Zong Qinghou seems to have fully responded to his thoughts.

From the perspective of revenue, Wahaha has created a lot of miracles, according to the first report, founded in 1987, the output value exceeded 100 million yuan in 1990, the output value exceeded 10 billion in 2003, and the revenue in 2013 reached 782800 million.

Taking Wahaha AD calcium milk drink as an example, although its sales have declined, in the past two years, it has returned to the scale of a single product with annual sales of 10 billion, although it is not as good as Coca-Cola, Trensu and other 30 billion products, but it still exceeds Baisui Mountain, six walnuts and Assam milk tea, ranking in the forefront of drinks, which can be called "national drinks".

An interesting episode is that in March 2023, AD calcium milk will be on the hot search again with the help of "Hurricane". At that time, the most widely spread sentence in the mouths of young people was: "AD calcium milk is fragrant, and the Jinghai boss is called Xu Jiang." ”

At that time, many people thought that the screen full of AD calcium milk was Wahaha's ingenious advertising placement. But Zong Qinghou himself denied this: "We didn't take the initiative to do this brand placement. He also said: "I went to see it, he was doing a memorial service for the son of the gangster, and I said that heroes and martyrs should be mourned, so I think it is better." ”

This also shows from the side that Wahaha, a brand founded in the eighties of the last century, still does not lag behind the times. This year will be the 37th year of Wahaha's establishment, and it has become a giant enterprise with a cumulative revenue of more than 900 billion yuan.

Three tears in the Zheshang Museum of Zhejiang Gongshang University There are three ** about Zong Qinghou, which is his three tears in public:

One is that in 1992, Zong Qinghou won the "Hangzhou Shangcheng District Economic Development Hero" bonus of 100,000 yuan; The second is that in 2002, Zong Qinghou won the Hangzhou ** Major Contribution Award of 3 million yuan; The third is Zong Qinghou in 2008 at the scene of the "Earthquake Relief Special Program".

Zong Qinghou's "three tears". Figure Zheshang Museum.

The first time I shed tears may be the excitement of Zong Qinghou to take advantage of the east wind, when Wahaha was only founded for four years, and its sales exceeded 400 million yuan. By 2002, Wahaha had become a veritable "boss" in China's beverage industry, with annual sales doubling to 6 billion. The third time reflects Zong Qinghou's human touch, after all, he still says that he is reluctant to lay off any employees.

The desire to build Wahaha into a century-old enterprise is still there, but the times have not left him more time. In 2021, Zong Qinghou said in an interview, "I also want to take a back seat, but retirement is impossible", at that time he predicted that Wahaha would really complete the reform, "It will take three or five years, (because) some of the previous habits are deeply ingrained in everyone's minds."

In 2022, on the question of when to give way, Zong Qinghou replied with a smile, "Let's wait a while." How long it will take, there is no answer at that time. And today, unfortunately, the question has to be answered.

Many years ago, in his biography, Zong Qinghou took the initiative to say that he hoped that when he was old, he could say to everyone: "My life is not extraordinary, but I have done a career and changed the fate of some people." ”

He also hoped that everyone would answer him: "Don't worry, we don't have a far apart opinion. ”

References: 1 "Zong Qinghou: Hold Your Ground, Toss and Turn" 36 Krypton.

2 "Zong Qinghou and Zong Fuli Father and Daughter: Wahaha "Inheritance" Cover Story" Chinese entrepreneur.

3 "Sitting on the second-class seat of the high-speed rail, Zong Qinghou became an Internet celebrity", Zhejiang**.

4 "Industrialist Zong Qinghou Never Retired", Southern People Weekly.

5 "Wahaha Dragon Chinese New Year's Eve Dinner Opens Lively, Issuing 600 Million Year-end Bonus and Sharing Development Achievements with Employees" Qianjiang Evening News.

6 "Zong Qinghou: The Principle of Gravitation", Hongqi Publishing House.

7 "Wahaha 36 Years, 900 Billion Transcript" Food Entrepreneur.