HEMA changed its thinking and began to pursue profitability, which is closely related to Alibaba’s business strategy adjustment. Last year, after a huge crisis, the giant fully implemented the business responsibility system, that is to say, all business sectors should consider the problem of supporting themselves, and can no longer expect the group to continue blood transfusion as in the past.

Author / author of Caijing Tianxia weekly Liu Dongxue

As Alibaba’s “real son”, when HEMA opened its first store in 2016, its peers who were afraid of missing the outlet attracted countless eyes, scrambled to learn from this new retail benchmark and opened similar stores one after another. Now, six years later, these projects have not lived satisfactorily. Meituan baby elephant fresh food has been stopped, Yonghui super species has closed its stores successively after huge losses, Jingdong seven fresh food stores have expanded slowly, and Su fresh food is unknown.

The leader’s life is also difficult. On March 1, five more HEMA fresh food stores were closed at the same time, including two in Nanjing and one in Qingdao, Chengdu and Guangzhou.

This is not the first time that HEMA reported the news of closing its stores. Previously, HEMA had closed its stores in many places. Without exception, the reason given was the adjustment of business strategy.

This seems to mean that after more than a dozen trial and error adjustments, the business essence of making money has to be considered. In an internal letter in January this year, Hou Yi, CEO of HEMA, set comprehensive profitability as a new goal. Previously, Alibaba implemented a business responsibility system for its business lines, requiring all business segments to support themselves.

In this context, some long-term profit hopeless HEMA stores were finally included in the stop loss list.

On the other side of closing the store and stopping the loss, HEMA, which can’t burn money, recently came out the news that the layout of fresh olai store is low. This business format can not only reduce the cost of opening the store, but also help HEMA solve the problem of commodity loss and reduce the cost pressure.

I can’t burn the money

“Here comes the outlets of the fresh world!” This is written in the publicity poster of HEMA fresh Olay store.

This is a new type of business. Last October, the first fresh olai store in HEMA opened low-key on the first floor of Pudong shopping mall, 333 Changli Road, Pudong New Area, Shanghai. This shop is transformed from “HEMA Mini shop”, with an area of about 480 square meters. Since then, HEMA fresh olai stores in Hangzhou, Beijing, Chengdu, Wuhan, Nanjing, Xi’an and Qingdao have opened one after another.

On March 2, Caijing Tianxia weekly came to Beijing Tongzhou HEMA fresh olai store, which also has a small area of only more than 200 square meters. You can see it at a glance from the door. The simple layout, simplified categories and “fracture like” price are in great contrast to the high-end HEMA fresh.

It is understood that most of the products sold by HEMA fresh olai store are temporary “daily fresh” products, which was once the trump card used by HEMA to attract users. However, since the launch of HEMA, the “daily fresh” products have been questioned continuously, calling them “daily throw”. They are on the shelves during the day and on the schedule at night. With the expansion of the number of HEMA stores, this loss is huge. In fact, many goods themselves have not deteriorated. It is a pity to throw them away for nothing. Finally, HEMA came up with a way to open Aolai store.

Figure / visual China

Hou Yi, CEO of HEMA, once explained to the media that the purpose of opening fresh olai store is to help HEMA reduce the loss of stores and processing centers, so the price is basically less than half of the surrounding fresh supermarkets. For example, the selling price of daily fresh milk that has expired for two days has been directly reduced from 7.5 yuan to 3 yuan per bottle.

HEMA told Caijing Tianxia weekly that olai is a supplement to the three main business formats of HEMA fresh food store, HEMA x member store and HEMA linli. On the one hand, it can reduce the loss of goods, on the other hand, it can enter the sinking market and play a new role.

In terms of the cost of opening a store, HEMA fresh olai store is low in the HEMA system because of its small area. It is understood that there are seven HEMA x member stores, covering an area of about 16000 to 18000 square meters; Next, HEMA fresh has 300 stores, covering an area of 2500 to 5000 square meters; The area of HEMA Mini store is 500 to 1000 square meters. The fresh olai store, which is being vigorously expanded, has a much smaller area, only 200 to 500 square meters.

Small size means that the cost of rent and labor will be much lower. According to the Huaxia times, the cost of opening a HEMA fresh food store is about 30 million yuan, the cost of opening a HEMA Mini store is about 2 million yuan, and the cost of opening a HEMA fresh food olai store is only about one million yuan.

While opening a lower cost fresh olai store, HEMA is closing the poorly operated HEMA fresh store. On March 1, the Oriental fuleide store and Jiqing store in Xinjiekou, Nanjing, as well as Qingdao Taishan Road store, Guangzhou jianhuahui store and Chengdu Tianfu Great Wall store were closed at the same time. The announcement posted at the door of the store said that the closure was due to the adjustment of business strategy.

Among them, HEMA fresh Qingdao Taishan Road store covers an area of more than 4000 square meters, which is its sixth store opened locally. However, it was closed within two years.

This is similar to the business of group buying and group buying in the neighborhood. According to media reports, in order to reduce costs and refine operations, HEMA closed its neighborhood stores in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Suzhou at the end of 2021. After the contraction, there are only neighborhood pick-up stores in 7 cities.

In fact, the box horse can’t burn money. There has been a signal before. Like other loss making business lines of Alibaba, HEMA, which has lost money for six years, has reached a critical moment when profitability must be considered. In an internal letter at the beginning of this year, Hou Yi said that the development goal of HEMA is to make full profits. Therefore, HEMA has to follow the essence of retail operation and management in 2022 and temporarily “tighten the belt” and “lean production and lean management”.

From sacrificing one’s life to saving one’s life

The story of HEMA began in 2015, when Hou Yi, a senior executive of jd.com and former general manager of o2o division, left jd.com due to disagreement. It is said that his envisaged online and offline integrated retail model could not be used in JD and resigned angrily. After leaving Beijing and returning to his hometown in Shanghai, Hou Yi had a coffee with Zhang Yong, a fellow countryman and then CEO of Alibaba, before he had a later story.

This meeting, the two talked happily and hit it off.

HEMA changed its thinking and began to pursue profitability, which is closely related to Alibaba’s business strategy adjustment. Last year, after a huge crisis, the giant fully implemented the business responsibility system, that is to say, all business sectors should consider the problem of supporting themselves, and can no longer expect the group to continue blood transfusion as in the past.

Author / author of Caijing Tianxia weekly Liu Dongxue

As Alibaba’s “real son”, when HEMA opened its first store in 2016, its peers who were afraid of missing the outlet attracted countless eyes, scrambled to learn from this new retail benchmark and opened similar stores one after another. Now, six years later, these projects have not lived satisfactorily. Meituan baby elephant fresh food has been stopped, Yonghui super species has closed its stores successively after huge losses, Jingdong seven fresh food stores have expanded slowly, and Su fresh food is unknown.

The leader’s life is also difficult. On March 1, five more HEMA fresh food stores were closed at the same time, including two in Nanjing and one in Qingdao, Chengdu and Guangzhou.

This is not the first time that HEMA reported the news of closing its stores. Previously, HEMA had closed its stores in many places. Without exception, the reason given was the adjustment of business strategy.

This seems to mean that after more than a dozen trial and error adjustments, the business essence of making money has to be considered. In an internal letter in January this year, Hou Yi, CEO of HEMA, set comprehensive profitability as a new goal. Previously, Alibaba implemented a business responsibility system for its business lines, requiring all business segments to support themselves.

In this context, some long-term profit hopeless HEMA stores were finally included in the stop loss list.

On the other side of closing the store and stopping the loss, HEMA, which can’t burn money, recently came out the news that the layout of fresh olai store is low. This business format can not only reduce the cost of opening the store, but also help HEMA solve the problem of commodity loss and reduce the cost pressure.

I can’t burn the money

“Here comes the outlets of the fresh world!” This is written in the publicity poster of HEMA fresh Olay store.

This is a new type of business. Last October, the first fresh olai store in HEMA opened low-key on the first floor of Pudong shopping mall, 333 Changli Road, Pudong New Area, Shanghai. This shop is transformed from “HEMA Mini shop”, with an area of about 480 square meters. Since then, HEMA fresh olai stores in Hangzhou, Beijing, Chengdu, Wuhan, Nanjing, Xi’an and Qingdao have opened one after another.

On March 2, Caijing Tianxia weekly came to Beijing Tongzhou HEMA fresh olai store, which also has a small area of only more than 200 square meters. You can see it at a glance from the door. The simple layout, simplified categories and “fracture like” price are in great contrast to the high-end HEMA fresh.

It is understood that most of the products sold by HEMA fresh olai store are temporary “daily fresh” products, which was once the trump card used by HEMA to attract users. However, since the launch of HEMA, the “daily fresh” products have been questioned continuously, calling them “daily throw”. They are on the shelves during the day and on the schedule at night. With the expansion of the number of HEMA stores, this loss is huge. In fact, many goods themselves have not deteriorated. It is a pity to throw them away for nothing. Finally, HEMA came up with a way to open Aolai store.

Figure / visual China

Hou Yi, CEO of HEMA, once explained to the media that the purpose of opening fresh olai store is to help HEMA reduce the loss of stores and processing centers, so the price is basically less than half of the surrounding fresh supermarkets. For example, the selling price of daily fresh milk that has expired for two days has been directly reduced from 7.5 yuan to 3 yuan per bottle.

HEMA told Caijing Tianxia weekly that olai is a supplement to the three main business formats of HEMA fresh food store, HEMA x member store and HEMA linli. On the one hand, it can reduce the loss of goods, on the other hand, it can enter the sinking market and play a new role.

In terms of the cost of opening a store, HEMA fresh olai store is low in the HEMA system because of its small area. It is understood that there are seven HEMA x member stores, covering an area of about 16000 to 18000 square meters; Next, HEMA fresh has 300 stores, covering an area of 2500 to 5000 square meters; The area of HEMA Mini store is 500 to 1000 square meters. The fresh olai store, which is being vigorously expanded, has a much smaller area, only 200 to 500 square meters.

Small size means that the cost of rent and labor will be much lower. According to the Huaxia times, the cost of opening a HEMA fresh food store is about 30 million yuan, the cost of opening a HEMA Mini store is about 2 million yuan, and the cost of opening a HEMA fresh food olai store is only about one million yuan.

While opening a lower cost fresh olai store, HEMA is closing the poorly operated HEMA fresh store. On March 1, the Oriental fuleide store and Jiqing store in Xinjiekou, Nanjing, as well as Qingdao Taishan Road store, Guangzhou jianhuahui store and Chengdu Tianfu Great Wall store were closed at the same time. The announcement posted at the door of the store said that the closure was due to the adjustment of business strategy.

Among them, HEMA fresh Qingdao Taishan Road store covers an area of more than 4000 square meters, which is its sixth store opened locally. However, it was closed within two years.

This is similar to the business of group buying and group buying in the neighborhood. According to media reports, in order to reduce costs and refine operations, HEMA closed its neighborhood stores in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Suzhou at the end of 2021. After the contraction, there are only neighborhood pick-up stores in 7 cities.

In fact, the box horse can’t burn money. There has been a signal before. Like other loss making business lines of Alibaba, HEMA, which has lost money for six years, has reached a critical moment when profitability must be considered. In an internal letter at the beginning of this year, Hou Yi said that the development goal of HEMA is to make full profits. Therefore, HEMA has to follow the essence of retail operation and management in 2022 and temporarily “tighten the belt” and “lean production and lean management”.

From sacrificing one’s life to saving one’s life

The story of HEMA began in 2015, when Hou Yi, a senior executive of jd.com and former general manager of o2o division, left jd.com due to disagreement. It is said that his envisaged online and offline integrated retail model could not be used in JD and resigned angrily. After leaving Beijing and returning to his hometown in Shanghai, Hou Yi had a coffee with Zhang Yong, a fellow countryman and then CEO of Alibaba, before he had a later story.

This meeting, the two talked happily and hit it off.