If you don't work in Zhongguancun, I don't know how many people still remember Convenience Bee?

In 2016, in his opening speech at the Yunqi Conference, Mr. Ma positioned "new retail" as one of the five major changes that will disrupt all industries in the future. Although many people love to spit on the matter of Ma's father to put the mouth cannon, but no one has ever underestimated this from the mouth of Ma's father to put out the prophecy of the cannon.

There is often a reaction time between the introduction of a new concept and the emergence of market behavior, and this time, the first to emerge is no longer the big bulls to support up the startups, but a little-known brand. A few months later, at the beginning of this year, this new retail, incorporating Internet elements of the convenience store, began to stir up the storm in the traditional convenience store industry in Beijing.

Once out of the gate, it drew the original practitioners to say something like, "They are typical disruptive talents, which is to subvert the business nature of convenience stores ah, too great!" Whether it's admiration or sarcasm, experience it for yourself. But at least it shows one thing, Convenience Bee really is nothing like traditional convenience stores.

1

Routine, is used to break

The opening of the store, it attracted crowds of spectators, no, it is to attract crowds of jokes. The lessons learned from years of operating traditional convenience stores, convenience bees have not learned at all. From an outsider's point of view, convenience bees look like poor students who have just transferred to a new school, and are letting themselves go on the wrong path, without a care in the world.

▌Store size

Traditional convenience stores cherish their acreage. Because the customer unit price and gross profit are not high, so the choice of store size is very careful, the goal is to make full use of every space.

Convenience stores, by contrast, are like a dandy rich kid. Several stores in Zhongguancun are large and "empty", with free food and drink areas on the second floor.

Peers have seen only two words of comment, "luxury, nonsense".

▌Shelf placement (goods + cashier)

The convenience store is very concerned about the ping effect, so you will find a lot of small convenience stores, hate to be full of goods, the aisle can only accommodate the two side by side.

It is said that the convenience bee is the rich second generation, the distance between the shelves to be large, and then larger, and then larger, can lie down side by side a few people can. What's more, as a "second generation of rich people" should have the grace, convenience bee removed the golden area of the convenience store - cashier display.

▌Shelf time

Take bread for example. General convenience stores, bread on the shelves before 7:30 am. However, a reporter observed convenience bee bread shelf time are in the afternoon around two or three o'clock. Automatically for the bread on the shelf to stay time is already very limited to reduce another half a day. Bread expressed aggrieved.

▌Internet gene

Convenience Bee's Internet gene is the APP, and provides an innovative four does not improve the efficiency of shopping: online payment, offline self-service shopping, online purchase and then self-pickup, home delivery.

It is because of a series of unconventional moves of the above, so that many people think that the investors and founders of the convenience bee is stupid money. Therefore, the recently established convenience bee by countless peers look at the joke, by countless laymen media analyze the feasibility of this road.

But when you think about it, the whole logic doesn't make sense.

Convenience Bee's investor and founder is Zhuang Chenchao, who set up the company Zebra Capital after leaving "Where to go". When even a layman in the media can make a good case for these changes, why is it still stubborn to move forward? What are Zhuang Chenchao and his Convenience Bee really up to?

People stared at Convenience Bee with questions, and then Convenience Bee disappeared from view. That is, until early September, when it was blown up by a report that said it was drastically laying off workers.

Not long ago, some media took the opportunity to interview Zhuang Chenchao, who had not been seen for a long time. From the interview, we can find some clues to the reasons for Convenience Bee's maverick behavior.

Convenience Bee said in its vision, "Convenience Bee will improve the existing retail model through the Internet. Using big data and intelligent software and hardware, it will break through the inherent convenience store shopping experience, and make it user-centered, with exclusive services centered around each individual user, so that the user can gain practical convenience."

In the interview, Zhuang Chenchao also explained that the convenience bee "disappearance" is to obtain "pure" data. The goal is to analyze the data and precipitation, so as to provide exclusive services to each user, and ultimately to achieve the goal of thousands of stores.

Is the model familiar?

Peeling back the layers of veneer, what you see down low is the nucleus of new retail.

"Enterprises based on the Internet, through the use of big data, artificial intelligence and other advanced technological means, the production, circulation and sales of goods process upgrading and transformation, and then reshape the structure of the industry and the ecosystem, and the online service, offline experience and modern logistics in-depth fusion of the new model of retail".

Compare the typical representative of the new retail "box horse fresh", you will find the essence of the same. The core of the box horse fresh model, is through big data to obtain more accurate target consumer positioning, improve the supply chain, personalized consumer demand, "thousands of people thousand faces".

In terms of store experience, Boxmart Fresh also chooses stores with large space, exquisite design, good service, and better functional configuration. And the way of consumption, the box horse fresh realization of consumers "think what you get", you can offline self-service shopping or online purchase after delivery.

Despite the similarity of the model, it is clear that we are more tolerant of the Box Office, and most of us have a wait-and-see attitude. This also has to do with the fact that there is no large-scale opening of specialized fresh food supermarkets in the market before this. It can be said that the emergence of the box horse fresh means a new attempt.

In contrast, the reason everyone is convinced of its failure is that there is already a mature convenience store market. Whether it's 7-11 or Full Time, they have already worked out the rules and successes of the industry through years of operation. People are accustomed to step by step, think step by step in the footsteps of the predecessor can never go wrong. At this time, the emergence of a person who does not go out of the ordinary, it is really unpleasant.

But in this era, the Internet and technology have brought people too many surprises and changes, the world's "impossible" is becoming less and less, and breaking the rules is the first step.

Theoretically, both Boxmart Fresh and Convenience Bee are experiments of new retail. Whether applying the concept of new retail to a traditional convenience store will be successful is still unknown. This is a challenge in itself.

Chuang Chenchao himself thinks so.

The difference is that he thinks he will succeed.