There will be no Auchan supermarket in China.
1 A few days ago, media reported that the integration of RT-Mart and Auchan is accelerating. 69 Auchan stores across the country will be renamed RT-Mart , and renovations are expected to be completed in the second half of this year.
Although brand integration is the most normal thing in the business world, the "love and kill each other" of RT-Mart and Auchan have attracted the attention of many people who are obsessing.
is different from the business rule of survival of the fittest. "Aushang's name is changed to RT-Mart" obviously has business strategy means , and the manipulator behind all this is Gao Xin Retail .
1
Rescue battle:
Gao Xin Retail reconstructs hypermarket
Gao Xin Retail, as the largest physical retailer in China, operates two well-known hypermarket brands: RT-Mart and Oushan .
It is understood that Auchan Supermarket was founded in northern France and entered China for the first time in 999; RT-Mart Supermarket was founded in Taiwan, China and entered mainland China for the first time in 997. In 2000, the story of the two supermarkets dependent on each other began.
000, Auchan Group entered into a joint venture agreement with RT-Mart parent company Runtai and cross-holding - Runtai holds 66.38% of RT-Mart's equity through a holding company, and Auchan holds 33.62% of RT-Mart's equity. At the same time, both parties established a holding company in Hong Kong - Gao Xin Retail , and promoted their store business in the mainland with the two major brands Auchan and RT-Mart.
After more than ten years of rapid development, In 2011, Gao Xin Retail jointly established by RT-Mart and Auchan was listed in Hong Kong .
Everything looks smooth and perfect, but under the calm waves, there has been undercurrents. In 2012, China's fresh food e-commerce entered the first year of development . After that, fresh food e-commerce has overwhelmed the physical hypermarkets faced a difficult situation of life and death.
After that, fresh food e-commerce platforms such as Daily Youxian, Hema Fresh, Dingdong Maicai, Suning Fresh and other fresh food e-commerce platforms have emerged like mushrooms after a rain. For consumers, fresh food e-commerce can meet consumers' needs to purchase food without leaving home, and is accepted and used by more and more people.
According to iResearch Consulting data, the scale of the fresh food e-commerce industry in 2020 reached 458.5 billion , an increase of 64.0% over 2019. It is expected that by , the scale of the fresh food e-commerce industry will exceed one trillion in 2023. For offline hypermarkets, the development speed of fresh food e-commerce is like cutting off bones and being difficult to resist.
If there are still middle-aged and elderly consumers who are not used to online shopping and are still paying for physical hypermarkets, then fresh food e-commerce will completely break the defense of offline hypermarkets when entering the community. Community group buying e-commerce companies such as Qian Auntie, Baiguoyuan, etc. are opened downstairs of residents, and cut off part of the passenger flow of the hypermarket at the doorstep .
In addition to fresh food e-commerce entering the community, Warehouse supermarket is also a major threat to traditional hypermarkets. Warehousing supermarkets can be roughly divided into two categories. One is the foreign brand costco and Sam, and the other is the local rookie represented by Hema X and fudi.
Warehouse supermarket, also known as Warehouse membership store , is a retail format based on the products operated by large comprehensive supermarkets, screening popular practical products for sales, implementing the integration of inventory and sales, both wholesale and retail, low prices, and providing limited services as the main characteristics, based on the membership system, and selling by self-selected methods.
Nowadays, Many domestic retail companies have entered the warehouse supermarket , pushing this supermarket form to a new trend of development and becoming a new force that squeezes the development space of traditional hypermarkets.
In fact, Gao Xin Retail took measures to deal with these threats a few years ago. at the end of 2018, and Auchan China released a "Announcement on Auchan and RT-Mart's Decision to Integrate Forces" , conveying the market signal that Auchan and RT-Mart officially merged . Subsequently, in 2019, Gao Xin Retail completed the integration of RT-Mart and Auchan's headquarters, supply chain, commodity structure and logistics center .
Immediately afterwards, the work of changing the door head is in an orderly manner. According to incomplete statistics, from May this year to the present, at least more than 10 Auchan has been renamed RT-Mart. After the renovation is completed, the RT-Mart unified logo will be adopted.
2
Transformation pain:
Highway to gain stake in Gaoxin Retail
When you are poor, you think, and you think change. Under the reality of the online market competing for customer flow, traditional hypermarkets have embarked on the road of transformation, striving to seek a space for survival, and the transformation path Gaoxin Retail chose is to develop online business .
At the same time, 016 , as a giant in the e-commerce industry, Alibaba proposed the concept of "new retail" . The purpose of new retail is to meet the diverse needs of consumers. By investing in , we will build multiple marketing systems such as stores, e-commerce, communities, private domain , and open up online and offline, breaking the limitations of time and space. Consumers can purchase any goods in any channel, any time, any place, any payment method, any pickup method.
Alibaba and Gao Xin Retail, one wants to develop online business and the other wants to open up the new retail market, the two hit it off, the following year Alibaba acquired a stake in Gao Xin Retail, and successfully acquired RT-Mart html for HK$22.4 billion. 1. Directly and indirectly hold 6.16% of Gao Xin Retail . In 2020, Alibaba spent HK$28 billion to increase its holdings in Gao Xin Retail , becoming the controlling shareholder , which holds about 172% of html.
This series of actions means that Gao Xin Retail joins the new retail revolution promoted by Alibaba from the dual channels on the business model and capital structure .
Alibaba said that all stores of Gaoxin Retail’s RT-Mart and Auchan Supermarket have been fully online and are connected to Ele.me, Taoxianda and Tmall Supermarket . All stores offer 1 hour delivery within 5 km.
Since this year, Alibaba has significantly increased its expectations for RT-Mart. It is understood that General Manager of Alibaba Retail Connect, Lin Xiaohai, , entered the management of RT-Mart and was also responsible for the retail Connect and RT-Mart businesses. Overall, whether it is Alibaba or Gao Xin Retail, focuses more energy on RT-Mart . It is not difficult to understand why Gao Xin Retail changed all "Aushang" to "RT-Mart".
Alibaba and Gao Xin Retail have been "married" for nearly 4 years, and the market has finally seen the gap between ideals and reality. According to Gao Xin's retail financial report, Gao Xin's revenue in 2020 was 95.486 billion , and his net profit was 2.872 billion yuan. Before that, between 2016 and 2019, Gao Xin's revenue scale had continuously exceeded 100 billion yuan.
In addition, according to Gao Xin's financial report data, in the first quarter of 2021, the company achieved revenue of 28.848 billion yuan, a year-on-year decline of 8.49% ; operating profit was 1.093 billion yuan, and fell by 49% year-on-year ; net profit was 700 million yuan, and fell by 49.6% year-on-year .
Investors can still accept the performance stagnation in the transformation period. Gao Xin Retail's continuous decline in performance will inevitably make people wonder: Are Alibaba and Gao Xin Retail really suitable for being together?
Gao Xin's retail performance reduction and revenue decline reflect from another aspect the fierce competition in the community group buying track . These factors not only had a negative impact on Gao Xin's physical hypermarket performance, but also affected the growth of its new retail.
Now it seems that Gao Xin Retail has a long way to go online.
3
Embrace changes:
Gao Xin Retail accelerates the new retail layout
Alibaba's original intention of investing in Gao Xin Retail was to achieve win-win results for both parties. Relying on a series of platforms of the "Ali Series", Gao Xin Retail also seems to be seeking a different path from other hypermarkets.
First of all, Gao Xin Retail cooperated with Cainiao Station to launch the "Yifagou " business, and develop Yisan community group buying in the big store + self-pickup store .
Yifa Purchase project is operated in the form of Alipay mini program and is provided by Cainiaoyi Station Community Life Account. is positioned from the nearest Cainiaoyi Station user to pick up . All products are provided by the entire cold chain of national chain supermarkets such as RT-Mart and Auchan.
The advantage of Cainiao Station and Gao Xin Retail cooperation is that it can not only increase the sales channels of existing goods , but also utilize Cainiao Station's layout in all levels of markets, and also make good use of to make a good layout of the sinking market .
Secondly, sells new categories and new brands , which is also an important step for Gao Xin to accelerate the layout of new retail.
For example, in the service " Taoxiandaoda one hour to get home ", the number of high-end fruits, vegetables, seafood and aquatic products has been greatly increased to meet the user group with higher consumption needs.
In addition, captures the market of young consumer groups and seizes the hearts of young people , which is another move taken by Gao Xin Retail. The " Meow Star Selection " in cooperation with Tmall Supermarket is one of the important measures.
"Meow Star Selection" will select the most popular "Internet celebrity" product on Tmall and Taobao through big data. Based on geographical location information, different offline supermarkets match different products to improve the turnover rate of products. At present, "Meow Star Selection" has successively entered more than 500 stores across the country such as offline supermarkets such as RT-Mart, Auchan, and Sanjiang.
In the new retail track, Gao Xin Retail is on the right track and is on the verge of speeding up its expansion.
Conclusion
In the rapid changes in the market, Only by transforming in time and embracing changes can you catch up with the ever-changing market trends and resist the turbulent business storms. But transformation is not an easy task. How to find the right direction and position is something that every enterprise needs to think about when it survives.
After Auchan changed his name to RT-Mart, how Gao Xin Retail will lay out the chess pieces in his hands depends on its chess skills...
