Chapter 196: Chapter 196: Convenience store chain
After the excitement died down, those who had work to do went about their business. Auntie Xiaomei also had to take her young cousin to the store.
Only Feng Yiping stayed at home. Leaning back on the sofa, he flipped through the plan he had written, looking for areas that needed improvement and revision. As he looked, he fell asleep without knowing when.
It's hard to say what happened. Later, no matter how old he got, whenever he returned to his parents' side, he always felt particularly at ease and relaxed, sometimes even better than sleeping at his own home.
When he woke up, he wiped his mouth with his hand and found that a blanket was draped over him. Feng Zhenchang had returned home without him knowing and was sitting on the other end of the sofa, reading the plan he had written.
Seeing his son wake up, he waved the plan. 'Did you write this?'
'Yes,' Feng Yiping rubbed his face with his hands to wake up a little. 'This has always been my idea. I spent a lot of time understanding and learning during the year in Hong Kong. Once the prototype of the software for Zhitong Company is ready, I want to try it out in the city first.'
'Is it really as promising as you say?' Feng Zhenchang still had some doubts.
Feng Yiping wrote in the plan that it was a chain convenience store, which is similar in nature to the few stores in front of the community. He doesn't quite understand why his son is so optimistic about this kind of business. If Feng Yiping said he wanted to open a warehouse-style hypermarket, which is very popular now, he would also think it's not bad. How much can such a small store sell in a day? Can it make back its capital?
This is actually a misunderstanding that many people have. They always think that the small stores downstairs don't make much money, but that's actually not the case at all.
Without discussing the specific market and profit margins, we just want to point out that these small shops are all owned by individuals, not state-owned enterprises, so it doesn't matter if they lose a bit or make a bit.
If a shop owned by an individual loses money, or if there is no profit apart from the rent, utilities and other expenses, then it will definitely close within three months to six months at most.
But if you think about it, we see barber shops, restaurants and clothing stores closing around us all the time, but we never see a small shop like this one close. This shows that it is at least making a profit.
As for hypermarkets, to be honest, Feng Yiping would of course love to do it, but there is a harsh reality: of the large domestic chain supermarkets, apart from a very few that are still going strong, the rest have fallen at the feet of Wal-Mart and Carrefour.
Although China has very strict entry approval procedures for foreign-funded retail businesses, Carrefour and Wal-Mart entered the country in 1995 and 1996 respectively by making changes, such as setting up commercial management companies in joint ventures with Chinese companies.
With his current capital and even less talent, it would be unwise to try to compete with those two.
Moreover, more than twenty years later, with the rapid development of online shopping, these traditional large supermarket chains have also been hit hard. Store sales are shrinking, and the originally optimistic and ambitious expansion plans have been forced to slow down. In some places, stores are even closing.
At that time, if you look around, convenience store chains with different brands have sprung up like mushrooms after rain. Although they are all only regional chains, there are basically none that can go out of the province. Even so, many of them have gone public.
Therefore, in 1998, this was definitely a blue ocean.
Feng Yiping probably told his father a few things, and Feng Zhenchang thought, that's really the case. He also owns a store, and if a store doesn't make money for three months, he will definitely close it. If a store doesn't lose money, but doesn't make much money after six months, he will also consider closing it.
'So this can be done?'
'Really, if you do a good job, you might even go public!' Feng Yiping said.
There is another reason for choosing a convenience store. Once it has reached a certain scale, it can also sell its own brand in the store. For example, some of the produce from his hometown can be deep-processed and put on the shelves, which will better drive his hometown to prosperity.
With just a few people in his hometown, as long as there is one or two factories with good benefits, it will definitely drive everyone to get rich.
Of course, he is not that great, and he did not come up with this plan specifically to benefit his hometown. However, while making money himself, driving the development and prosperity of his hometown is indeed what he pursues.
I can't make myself great, but I can make myself noble. This is a small belief of the reborn Feng Yiping.
'Why not open one in the province?' Feng Zhenchang asked again.
'Don't look at it as just a small shop, it's much more complicated than our noodle shop. Just think, there are so many products, don't you agree?'
Feng Zhenchang nodded. Only by doing the work did he realise how difficult it was. If the noodle shop were to sell a few more varieties of noodles, his workload would increase several times over.
'I want to open a few stores in the city first to try them out for a while, mainly to identify problems in the operation process, and then improve both the software and hardware at the same time to develop a reasonable process. Just relying on wishful thinking, no matter how perfect the plan is, many problems will still go undetected.
At the same time, those stores can also reserve talent for later stores. As long as all the work is streamlined, then opening a few stores a month in the future will mainly be a matter of store location.'
'I'll take a good look at the plan.'
At dinner, everyone learned about Feng Yiping's new idea. At first, they all thought it was nonsense, but after listening to Feng Zhenchang's explanation, they began to think that it might actually work.
'We still need more people. You're still in school, so you can't do everything yourself. And for sourcing, you'll need to find someone to go to the manufacturers, won't you?' Feng Yiping's sister-in-law said.
'I've already placed an advertisement in the Shanghai job market for a high-salaried operations director,' Feng Yiping said.
His aunt used a spoon to scrape a piece of fish into fine floss and fed it to her son in small bites, 'Whatever Yiping has to do, it must be well planned. Just tell me what we can do to help.'
It was still the same things: the shop's counters and decorations. However, convenience stores are different from noodle shops in that not many wooden products are used, and the shelves must all be metal shelves that are easy to assemble.
As for the rest, it's a matter of people. This is not difficult either. Feng Yiping thought, let Feng Zhenchang go back to the county once, liaise with the secondary vocational school and technical school, and give priority to recruiting more than 20 people.
This should be easy. The secondary vocational school and technical school in the county, on the one hand, have to find ways to recruit students, and on the other hand, they have to find a good place for their graduates to go, otherwise, who will pay for their studies in the future?
Feng Zhenchang only needs to talk about the prospects, and I'm afraid the school leaders will beg him instead.
In addition, this time, it happens to be the perfect opportunity to bring Li Jiali over, let her take charge of the finances, and also be his personal assistant. She has already been working for more than a year and is no longer a rookie.
If Li Jiali is brought over, Gao Zhiyi will most likely follow. Through them, it is possible to attract some universities over here as a talent pool!ƒгeeweɓn૦vel.com