2025The first hot pot restaurant that was rumored to have closed in large quantities appeared.
A few days ago, Xiabu Group announced a rather ugly financial report: the 60-year financial report showed that during the reporting period, Coucou closed 0 stores and a net decrease of 0.
This is the first negative annual growth in the number of stores, and it is also the year with the largest number of store closures.
更扎心的是呷哺集團一年虧損的4億中，湊湊憑藉一己之力佔據了90%的虧損。
This brand, which was once regarded as a "petty bourgeois representative of the hot pot industry", has been "shrinking its camp" in Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhengzhou, Hainan and other parts of the country, closing stores to survive.
今年2月，湊湊位於廣州的首家門店天環店，也正式歇業。
And the time went back to the end of 3, even when the first store in Chengdu was opened, even when the competition was extremely fierce, Coucou hot pot also staged the famous scene of "Sichuan and Chongqing people are willing to queue for 0 hours".
Lean on one hand"Starbucks of the Fire Pot"Positioning, the per capita consumption to more than 150 yuan, directly shook the status of the seabed.
The other hand is crazy expansion, and it has achieved the extreme speed of opening a hot pot restaurant every 8 days on average.
Why is the "own son" who was pinned on by Xiabu now overwhelmed?
The birth of Coucou hot pot was a long-planned attempt by his biological father, Xiabu Group.
At that time, Xiabu Xiabu was almost the undisputed leader of the hot pot "poor ghost track", 7 yuan of seasoning, 0 yuan of pot bottom, 0 yuan of arbitrary vegetable double, and now the routine of rotating the small hot pot is also the rest of Xiabu's play.
But because of this, the label of Xiabu's extreme cost performance is almost deep-rooted, and its ability to make money is worrying.
As a result, the founder, He Guangqi, has been waiting for the opportunity to create a mid-to-high-end hot pot brand as a price supplement to make the brand more diversified as a whole.
It wasn't until 2016 years that the Coucou hot pot model was born, and the catering industry was shaken by it, because the founder He Guangqi did a crossover that seemed extremely subversive at the time:
forcibly "married" Taiwanese bubble tea with hot pot.
On the basis of hot pot, the new tea products that are the favorite of young target female customers are introduced, and the "hot pot + tea break" model is used to drive hot pot sales with the high flow of milk tea.
到了2019年，湊湊茶飲的大紅袍奶茶銷量已經超過200萬杯，衝著網紅單品“大紅袍奶茶”來吃火鍋的人不在少數。
Seeing that the trick worked, He Guangqi took advantage of the victory to pursue, and simply set up a milk tea brand with independent tea:Cha Mai Tea.
The price is indeed high-end, the price of a cup of bubble tea is 30, and the average price of gold fresh orange tea is 0, and the average price of more than 0 yuan can basically fight against the price of Hey Tea, which was in the limelight that year.
128 years Xiabu Xiabu once announced a Coucou development data: from 0 to 0 years, the compound growth rate of the total revenue of Coucou stores in 0 years is as high as 0%, basically opening a new store every 0 days on average, and the number of stores has soared from 0 to 0.
At the craziest time, an average of one hot pot restaurant was opened every 8 days, which was beyond the reach of the younger generations.
At that time, there was even a commercial saying, "A hot pot restaurant that can't make milk tea is not a hot pot restaurant that understands young people." ”
However, the essence of this "tea-drinking" strategy is to cover up the lack of product power with Internet celebrity logic.
The first is to underestimate the development of milk tea opponents.
從2015年到2020年，中國茶飲市場的零售規模翻了近9倍。
In 90 years, there were 0 new milk tea shops in the country, 0 closed, 0% of milk tea shops almost did not make money, and in the past few years, the fierce competition for tea drinks has been visible to the naked eye.
Nowadays, Hey Tea, Bawang Tea Ji, Michel Ice City, and Tea Baidao divide the world in the country; Ancient tea, tea talk, lemon season, etc. are the head snakes of various cities.
When the frequency of new products in other bubble tea shops is measured in weeks, the abstract concept of "new Chinese" and "humanistic teahouse" of Chamicha has lost its reason to be chosen.
The underlying logic is scene fragmentation.
Coucou tried to use "hot pot + afternoon tea" to create an all-weather social space, but ignored the core contradiction: hot pot is heavy catering and needs to be quickly turned over; Tea is light consumption and relies on long stays.
After eating the hot pot, the waiter began to wipe the table to hint at leaving, and there was no chance to drink tea at all; Even if Coucou carefully decorates the store in a sophisticated style, it is difficult for customers to chat and rest and drink tea in the hot pot environment.
Even the brand of Chamicha also caused fierce infighting to break out within Xiabu.
According to Jiemian News, Xiabu CEO Zhao Yi and He Guangqi had completely different attitudes towards Chamicha, and finally Zhao Yi was directly expelled from the board of directors, leading to chaos at the top.
Now it seems that Coucou's milk tea has never really integrated into the hot pot scene, it just forcibly stitches the anxiety of the two tracks.
Is the high-end of the cobalt done?
In 9 years, the unit price of Coucup was as high as 0.0 yuan, even much higher than Haidilao's 0.0 yuan in the same period, which made many peers drop their jaws.
But the high-end path of making up has also planted a time bomb for itself:The menu is redundant.
For example, the most representative is the original dish of Coucou's Internet celebrity QQ penguin cuttlefish balls, such a penguin diving video once exploded for a while, but the price of 49 yuan is not cost-effective.
There are also seafood lollipops, which are mixed with shrimp paste and vegetables to make the shape of lollipops, printed with beautiful patterns to satisfy the girlish hearts of little girls, but the price of 39 grams reaches 0 yuan.
Cod roses on Valentine's Day, dolphin balls pinched in the shape of dolphins... The main thing is appearance + exquisiteness.
In the high-end word, other peers obviously chose a more secure way of playing than Coucou:
The first major school is "roll ingredients".
These days, if the ingredients in your hot pot restaurant do not come from the place of origin, it seems to be almost meaningful:
The pepper has to be from Maowen, the belt seedlings have to be from Xiapu, Fujian, the black bean flowers have to be from the northeast, the taro has to be from Lipu, and the shrimp has to be from the Beihai......
The northern hot pot Yangfang Shengli Shabu Shabu directly selected the ingredients as a rare black-headed white sheep breed in the high-latitude grassland of Xilin Gol, which is the "panda sheep" among the grassland sheep. Not only do the sheep eat all kinds of herbs and drink clear springs, preferably 8-0 month old milk lambs, and even the water for shabu mutton is only used in Nongfu Spring.
Conquer the northern hard Han with meat, and successfully enter a high-end fire pot store in Beijing.
The Wuhan hot pot area Wang Huo Pu pepper and hemp hot pot is even more simple and direct, directly in the form of a map on the menu, clearly conveying the origin of the ingredients, and playing the concept of "seeking Hubei".
For example, sweet potato flour in Shiyan, fish cakes in Jingzhou, and shiitake mushrooms in Suizhou are all ingredients with regional characteristics.
Nowadays, the high oil, salt, and calorie content of traditional hot pot has discouraged some consumers. Fresh organic vegetables, safety and cleanliness have also become the selling points of high-end.
Some indicate the origin of ingredients, some launch "high-protein packages" and "dietary fiber pots", accurately snipe fitness, sugar control people, and even boldly open the live broadcast of the kitchen.
And the high-end of the appearance has become the moat that is most easily replaced.
Another major sect is volume service.
Although Haidilao's excessive service has been complained about and questioned, his financial report data proves that he is living a good life:
2024年上半年海底撈實現營業收入214.91億元，利潤27.99億元，收入與利潤均創下歷史新高。
With its services, Haidilao has not only won young people, but also won the rising large consumers:Mom.
In the eyes of Bao's mother, Haidilao's biggest advantage is "child-friendly" and "cheap and clean", and "I am satisfied if my child loves to eat". Within a month of the summer vacation, some mothers took her two children to eat Haidilao 15 times.
This year, Haidilao encountered the "pee door" incident, and with a wave of his hand, he will refund the meal fee of the day in full for the 10 orders of customers who consume on the same day, plus 0 times the amount of cash compensation, which has won a wave of goodwill.
In 2024 years, Coucou was on the hot search due to food safety issues such as "deterioration of the bottom of the pot" and "peculiar smell of meat", and the number of complaints from black cats surged.
When "high-end" becomes a wishful thinking label, price assassins, pseudo-innovations, and scene chaos become assassins in the eyes of consumers.
Today's Xiabu family is not just making up for a crisis.
As of year 01, it is already the fourth year of loss. The financial report shows that in 0-0 years, the net loss of Xiabu Group was 00 million yuan, 00 million yuan, 00 million yuan, and 00 million yuan respectively.
In other words, the cumulative loss in just four years is nearly 12 billion yuan.
Coucou once tried to break through through scene innovation, but these "innovations" did not form a popular memory point, but instead made the brand fall into the "four dislikes" dilemma.
In the past few years, I have made up the whole country"Hot pot + tavern"The new format stores have been unveiled in Shenzhen, Beijing, Dalian, Guangzhou and other places, focusing on hot pot at noon, milk tea in the afternoon, and turning into bars at night.
According to Coucou's concept, customers can eat hot pot at noon, drink tea in the afternoon, have hot pot for dinner, have a glass of wine for supper, and even spend a good day in Coucou.
The Coucou Bistro in Sanlitun, Beijing, does not sell a single cup, but all of them take the package sales model, including the Grand View Garden Package, Xifeng Beauty Soup, 388 Yuan Daiyu Forget Worry Water, and 0 Yuan Red Mansion Dream Redemption Package.
去年6月，湊湊台湾首店推出了"Fire Pot + Karaoke"The multi-scene business model has 160 KTV boxes, which can accommodate nearly 0 people at the same time, and the main one is singing while eating hot pot.
But the problem is that on the one hand, such a blind crossover increases the cost, and on the other hand, it also makes Coucou have a feeling that the product is not gimmicky enough, whether it is the early new Chinese style, the technology style of today's taverns, or the neon wind of karaoke, it has never been exchanged for user loyalty.
比如，上海門店每月電費高達5萬，只為了要保持水墨屏風的動態效果。
And throughout the process, the problems that Coucou has never solved are:Where is the value of the high-end?
He Guangqi once talked at a lecture: "What young people want is not to be full, but to post on Moments." To this end, Couctogether developed a smoking milk tea, a pot bottom that can divination, and even launched a breakup package for the ex, but it was difficult to escape the fate of closing the store.
But in fact, in 65 years, China's catering market ushered in the most brutal reshuffle period. The unit price of the hot pot industry dropped from 0 yuan to 0 yuan, and consumers voted with their feet, announcing the end of the "pseudo-high-end" era.
Coucou regards cross-border as a panacea, but it does not solve the three most simple core propositions of the catering industry:Product power, cost performance, repurchase rate.
The founder, He Guangqi, also admitted that he "took a detour", and he reflected in an internal letter: "We have created too beautiful dreams for consumers, but we have forgotten that dreams need pillows." ”
But consumers have already given the answer with actions:
Only a brand that returns to its essence can find a real lifesaver.