Chapter 292: Discovering Advantages and Preparation

After separating from Zhao Chengguang, Yang Wendong immediately asked his assistant to call Liu Huayu, Qin Zhiye and Zheng Zhijie.

"Come, have a seat." Yang Wendong greeted a few people and said, "I have something to tell you. I just got the news that Zhidi is going to open a supermarket like us."

The three of them looked at each other, and then Liu Huayu said: “On my side, several of my men have indeed been poached. I have asked before, but they didn’t tell me which big company wanted to build a supermarket;

I don’t know if it’s because they signed a confidentiality agreement, or if they themselves don’t know which company it is?”

"I haven't received any news of senior executives leaving. Are there any senior executives who left?" Yang Wendong asked again.

The head office holds personnel authority over each subsidiary, but this only applies to senior management. It does not interfere with matters of middle-level and lower-level employees; each subsidiary is responsible for its own affairs.

Liu Huayu said: “Yes, the highest position is a deputy store manager in Causeway Bay, or the head of the warehouse or purchasing department;
Some people at the store manager level were also contacted, but they ignored them.”

"Yeah, very good." Yang Wendong was a little curious: "Logically speaking, if the company wants to poach people, it should be willing to pay them high salaries. Since we are not poached, it seems that our management model is still good."

Liu Huayu smiled and said, "It is also because we are the number one supermarket in Hong Kong. It is not necessarily a good thing for them to leave. Those who can become store managers also have to look forward to the future.

Another thing is that Mr. Yang, your good employee benefits are well known to everyone in Hong Kong. They must have thought about it for a long time before deciding not to do anything. After all, it is impossible for Chinese people to reach the top in British companies. "

"Well, this is also the benefit of high welfare. It can recruit more talents and has a greater probability of retaining people." Yang Wendong nodded and said.

The high welfare of Changxing Group is partly because he himself wants to give the lower-class people some conditions to live a slightly better life;

The second is the company of the time traveler. Once it gets on the right track, it will basically develop very fast. There will be basically no problem with the strategic direction. The rest is execution, which urgently depends on everyone in the company.

In this case, retaining talent with high salaries and good benefits is of utmost importance. In addition, wages in Hong Kong itself are not high, so the additional expenses will not be much, but if the company can develop stably, the overall return will be higher.

Liu Huayu said: "Yes, although Jardine Matheson has money, it is impossible for them to pay unlimited money to recruit people. However, with their resources, it is no problem for them to recruit people from overseas like we did in the early days."

Yang Wendong smiled and said, "If they go overseas to recruit people, they will most likely be white people. Jardine Matheson will never let Chinese people control the subsidiaries. And if they choose the wrong place to recruit people, it will be useless."

Including Hong Kong now and the mainland in the future, foreign capital rarely leaves its investment industries to the Chinese. Most of them are managed by foreigners.

And most importantly, even if Jardine Matheson went out to look for professionals, it is highly unlikely that Wal-Mart would be hired. Although Wal-Mart's model may not be suitable for Hong Kong, other supermarkets' models may not even be able to maintain their own home markets in the future.
Zheng Zhijie said: "Mr. Yang and Mr. Liu, in terms of operational capabilities and experience, Hong Kong Properties is definitely not as good as ours, but they have too many properties, which is an innate advantage;

Although Changxing Real Estate has developed rapidly in the past two years, it is still far behind Hong Kong Land in terms of property, especially on Hong Kong Island.”

Yang Wendong nodded and said, "Yes, this is also the advantage of the land, so I need your departments to cooperate with each other to deal with this future competitor."

"Please speak, Mr. Yang." Liu Huayu said.

Yang Wendong said: "The first thing is publicity. We need to let people know about Carrefour first. This is an advantage.
So, Lao Qin, in your news interviews, you can look for topics within Carrefour, so that when people read the news, they will remember Carrefour supermarket, especially some interesting things, try to focus on the supermarket. In addition, you should also put more ads on the discount page. Lao Liu, please cooperate well. "

"Okay/Understood." Liu and Qin agreed.

Yang Wendong added: "It's the same with the radio station. We can also invite Rediffusion Television to do more news. People will see it on TV. Watching it is the most memorable thing."

"Okay." Qin Zhiye replied, "It's just a pity that Rediffusion Television has too few customers, less than 10,000. If Hong Kong were like European and American cities, where most families had televisions, our promotion would be much easier."

"Ten thousand household customers actually means tens of thousands of people, and they are all high-income people, which is not bad." Yang Wendong said: "But if more families have TVs, it would be good indeed."

Hong Kong TVB is only three years away from launching the project, and if it is appropriate, he would like to try to push the project forward in advance;
With my current resources, I can also participate in the competition.

Qin Zhiye said, "Yes, but the price of a TV is indeed very expensive. The cheapest one costs four or five hundred yuan, and it consumes a lot of electricity. Add to that the cost of cable TV, and it is indeed not something that an average family can afford."

"It is also a problem that televisions need to be imported." Yang Wendong nodded, and then said: "Let's not talk about this for now, let's discuss the property management."

Although black and white televisions were only heard of as "antiques" by many people born in the 90s in the past, they are still considered an industry with high technological content in this era. Samsung and many Japanese electronics giants all made their fortunes by making black and white televisions.

The radio industry in Hong Kong had just started, so it was naturally impossible to have the ability to produce televisions, so all of them were imported.

When his and Hong Kong's electronics industry becomes more developed in the future, he will also get involved, which will just meet the base needs of TVB.

Zheng Zhijie said: "In terms of properties, I have been acquiring various properties that are suitable for supermarkets in Hong Kong Island over the past year. However, the real estate market has been very hot recently, and many of the properties I am interested in are not willing to be sold;
Even when I tried to raise the price, they were even less willing to sell. I couldn’t raise the price indefinitely, so so far, I only have six properties that meet supermarket requirements, all of which are ready to be used as supermarkets.”

Yang Wendong said: "Then change the policy. Don't buy first, change to leasing, sign a 10-15 year agreement, and expand the supermarket as soon as possible. However, avoid properties owned by Hong Kong Land or some British companies, otherwise it will be troublesome if you get cheated in the future."

"Okay." Zheng Zhijie nodded and said, "Since Landmark is going to build a supermarket, it will definitely give priority to preparing the property. It is unlikely that this kind of property will be rented to us."

Yang Wendong asked again, "There's no Carrefour in the town over in Kowloon, right?"

"No." Liu Huayu replied: "Because of the limited manpower team and the consideration of logistics and transportation, we operated in Hong Kong Island in the early stage."

Yang Wendong thought for a while and said, "Then let Changxing Real Estate go to the town in Kowloon first, buy land directly, and build the building by itself; the land there is also cheap, so try to buy a bigger one, and even consider the parking space.

Starting today, we have also begun to gradually build a transportation chain in Kowloon Peninsula. Although the cost is definitely higher than that of Hong Kong Island, it can also increase our total purchase volume. "

It is actually only a matter of time before Carrefour enters Kowloon. If there is no external pressure, it will definitely go there next year or the year after.

"Okay, leave this matter to me." Zheng Zhijie agreed.

All the properties that sister companies want to use are managed by Changxing Real Estate. After they are built or rented and transferred, the fees also need to be settled, but usually at cost price or a small profit.

Yang Wendong added: "The third aspect is to develop the supermarket's own characteristics." "Characteristics?" Liu, Qin and Zheng were a little puzzled.

Yang Wendong said: "Before there were no competitors, we could just operate normally. Now that there are competitors, we must have our own advantages.
Let me explain the simplest way. There are hundreds of products in the supermarket, but not every one of them needs to be profitable. So we can make concessions on some high-demand products, sell them at cost price or even at a slight loss, to attract customers.

As long as customers are attracted by this, some people will definitely not just buy this, right? They are buying something else, and we can still make a profit. The most important thing is to attract people. "

From a business perspective, as a capitalist, Yang Wendong would not desperately offer discounts when there are no competitors.

As long as Carrefour supermarkets can surpass their department stores and small grocery stores in price control, that will be enough.

Now that we are facing possible powerful enemies, we naturally have to use some of the management ideas from our previous life’s supermarket.

"This is indeed a good idea." Liu Huayu nodded and said, "When he was at Walmart, Sam Walton actually had a similar idea, offering discounts on some products that people often buy to attract customers."

Yang Wendong nodded and said, “Yes, we also need this, so I plan to promote rice, which is a necessity that every Hong Kong person needs to buy frequently.
Changxing Shipping has also taken over China Resources' grain import business. If we bring some back ourselves, our cost will be even lower than China Resources, and it will definitely be the lowest rice price in Hong Kong."

Many of Hong Kong's staple foods are imported from the mainland, but now the mainland itself needs to import food, so the food in Hong Kong is actually imported from overseas.

We have our own ship returning on the way back, and we can also purchase overseas grain along with China Resources' large order. This price is definitely the highest for imported grain in Hong Kong.

Liu Huayu's eyes lit up and he said, "That's true. As long as we can keep the price of rice to the lowest, we will definitely be able to attract more people to come to Carrefour regularly."

Zheng Zhijie also laughed and said, "Yes, I didn't expect that Changxing Shipping, which helps the mainland transport grain, can also help Carrefour."

Qin Zhiye smiled and said, "Leave the publicity to me. I will put a sensational headline in the Oriental Daily News. Food prices in Hong Kong are getting more and more expensive, which has indeed become a headache for the citizens."

"Yeah, it would be good if prices could be lowered." Yang Wendong nodded: "Water is already a big problem now, it would be good if food could be cheaper."

This can be said to kill two birds with one stone. Attracting people with low food prices and then guiding them to consume at Carrefour for a long time is a good thing for everyone.

However, this is also thanks to a large order from China Resources for buying snacks in bulk. Otherwise, if I went to the United States to buy them alone, the price would not be so low.

Liu Huayu added: "In addition to rice, I will go back and think about which other necessities can be operated in this way. After all, not everyone cares about slightly cheaper rice. We need to operate in this way on multiple products."

"Usually it's food." Yang Wendong paused and said, "In addition to rice and noodles, there are also some common vegetables and fruits. Pick a few that can control the cost;
We import meat, so we can’t do anything about it, but we can try eggs, which are in high demand.”

"Eggs?" Liu Huayu thought for a moment and said, "If we purchase eggs directly from the countryside, we can give it a try. Perhaps we can provide financial support for some people to expand their chicken farms."

"Well, you can do it yourself. Offer some special products so that any competitor's cost cannot be lower than ours. That is our advantage." Yang Wendong nodded and said.

Many foods in Hong Kong are not actually from the mainland, but are imported from Southeast Asia, including meat;
It can be said that the Hong Kong government deliberately controls the situation to achieve a balance between the two sides.

Similarly, Hong Kong currently has agriculture, which naturally includes raising chickens and producing eggs.

The main reason is that under the current transportation conditions, eggs are particularly easy to be damaged during transportation and the cost is extremely high. It would be better to raise chickens in Hong Kong and import easily transportable feed.

"Okay." Liu Huayu paused and said, "Mr. Yang, there is actually one more thing that is unique to us."

Yang Wendong asked back: "Are you talking about plastic bags?"

"Yes." Liu Huayu said with a smile: "It seems that Mr. Yang has also thought of this. Plastic bags are of great significance to supermarkets. At present, we are the only ones in Hong Kong and even in Asia that have them.
As long as we control this, any competitor will be constrained by this.”

"Well, I know, and I'm going to do that." Yang Wendong nodded and said, "But don't count on this too much, it can only be effective in the short term;

Our plastic bags are selling so well, so others will surely make them. Even if I control the raw materials through Formosa Plastics, other large companies will have people researching them. At most, someone will be able to make them in a year.”

There is no doubt that plastic bags are a hot-selling product. Not to mention that there is no patent. Even if there is, it is highly likely that it cannot be protected. Once the materials are available, even a small workshop can make it.

Therefore, the initial pricing of Changxing Industrial's plastic bags was not very high, in order to sweep the market first and reduce the profit margins of others entering the market.

But no matter what we do, it is impossible to have an exclusive monopoly. This is impossible. We can only slow down for a while.

Liu Huayu nodded and said, "It's not bad to have a year or two."

"Okay, let's do this for now." Yang Wendong added, "In this kind of service industry, there will definitely be competitors. There are no competitors in Hong Kong, but there will be competitors abroad. In fact, only with competitors can we learn and grow in the process of competition, so this is actually a good thing."

Carrefour’s ambition is naturally not to be the same as Li Huanggua’s in his previous life, which was only to monopolize Hong Kong and then desperately suck blood from this city.

Going international is also a must. At the very least, we will also enter the mainland after the reform and opening up and some Southeast Asian countries in the future.

Therefore, competition will be inevitable.

"I understand." Liu Huayu said: "When we were in the United States, there was also a lot of competition, and Walmart also grew step by step."

Yang Wendong nodded and said, “Yes, it is better to gain experience in Hong Kong before going abroad than to encounter problems abroad.

In addition, you need to send people to Walmart occasionally to see their operating model and see if there is anything worth learning.”

Liu Huayu agreed and said, "Okay."

PS: Please give me a monthly ticket
(End of this chapter)

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