Ye Guofu: "The best retailers are manufacturing-development retailers; those with design and development capabilities are the ultimate future model." The renovated store: bakery, self-operated deli, DL products, Yonghui private labels, quality-price ratio, a return to the warmth and experience of supermarkets, and an experience gap that can shift wallet share compared to similar products in other channels. Ye Guofu: "Yonghui has a good foundation, a solid team, and sufficient scale. Today, with the right approach and a change in working methods, the results are different." The renovated store: after one month of self-renovation, it has addressed livelihood needs, quality, and younger product selection, proving its ability to pivot locally; the next milestone is 40-50 renovated stores around the Spring Festival, which is fully verifiable. Ye Guofu: "Yonghui plus Miniso perfectly combines discretionary and essential goods. Miniso is global, while Yonghui operates domestically with both discretionary and essential items, plus local and global elements, significantly reducing uncertainty and the risk of navigating economic cycles. It's 1+1 far greater than 2." Shareholders: We hear that. All strategies are open secrets. The core measures of Yonghui's renovation are largely accessible. Even at the current stage, you can occasionally encounter researchers comparing details with Pangdonglai in renovated stores. Still, we must repeatedly return to the stores, to the users' expressions and shopping carts, because first-hand expression is most penetrating, and data and details seen with your own eyes are most replicable.

Post-Renovation Store Performance and Customer Base

[Beijing Shijingshan Xilongduo Store] is the first self-renovated store. Before renovation, daily sales were around 300,000 yuan; after renovation, daily sales are 1.2-1.5 million yuan, with sales of 7.7 million yuan in the first five days. Preliminary judgment suggests the trend of increased foot traffic is sustainable for a certain period, with its products, assortment, and atmosphere clearly attractive to young users (couples, families with children). On November 1, from 4:00 to 6:30 PM, the majority were families with children, followed by young couples, and it was evident that many were there for research and shopping. There is no forced traffic flow (both entrances/exits allow entry and checkout, and one checkout area is adjacent to the bakery), aisles are widened (main aisle from 2.4 meters to 3.6 meters), spotlights are bright, and the fresh food area is visually rich. Hardware investment: dark background colors with spotlights to highlight products. Under the EDLP strategy, there is no need for end caps; shelves serve as end caps, and product information focuses on specifications, grades, origins, variety descriptions, and recipes rather than discount emphasis.

Assortment Optimization

The store removed 11,430 SKUs (79% removal rate), re-planned 12,765 SKUs, with new SKUs accounting for 76.2%. To address younger product selection and improve sales per square meter, the most critical changes are in bakery and deli (3R), with smaller touches like healthier product selection, and a greatly increased variety of yogurt and low-temperature products.

Bakery: Previously operated under joint venture, now self-operated. There is a workspace behind the bakery area; each store makes its own products with its own bakers. This is crucial because bakery is highly dependent on regional and demographic preferences, and self-operation and supply chain flexibility allow for rapid product adjustments. Critically, short-shelf-life bakery is a highly offensive category: young people are cooking less, and bakery covers breakfast, afternoon tea, snacks, office sharing, and picnics. In the industry, ultra-short-shelf-life bakery (1-3 days) is scarce supply. Expanding: 1. Currently, Xiaoxiang's bakery typically has a shelf life of 4-5 days, and requires a 39 yuan minimum for free delivery; even frequent users of front-warehouse platforms find it hard to order 10-20 times a month (but residents can visit a supermarket 10-20 times). 2. Wedome and Paris Baguette have two major limitations: they focus on Japanese-style sweets with less light texture, have fewer European-style breads, and are small but pricey (typically 15-20 yuan), with high delivery minimums. 3. Original Wheat Hill has larger sizes, but the products are similar; Yonghui's renovated products cover the most successful items from Sam's Club and Hema, including Swiss rolls, durian mille crepes, taro milk cakes, and other creamy cakes, as well as various sandwiches, and European-style breads like red velvet cranberry, croissant egg tarts, and walnut cream cheese, offering a wide and strong product design. 4. Yonghui's bakery sizes are more suitable for small families; for example, Sam's classic Swiss roll is 13.8 yuan for 4 pieces at Yonghui, vs. 37.9 yuan for 8 slices at Hema, and 59.8 yuan for 16 slices at Sam's, making Yonghui cheaper per unit.

Bakery area: 300g walnut cream cheese bread at 15.8 yuan; 450g durian mille crepe at 39.8 yuan. From a category role perspective, bakery can give the store color, aroma, taste, and warmth; however, it is also extremely difficult to operate. In recent years, supply chain difficulty has decreased (finding reliable local suppliers), but operational difficulty remains high, with key challenges in precise flavor development, sales forecasting, and clearance costs. Operational refinement is also necessary, such as clearly labeling the time of production on each item, which is a significant experience boost for ultra-short-shelf-life bakery.

From a supply chain perspective on Yonghui's renovation, several questions warrant deeper exploration, using bakery as an example. 1. Can bakery be replicated across regions? This requires more time and more stores to verify. For instance, from the experiences of Pupu and Bianlifeng, there are differences in taste, specifications, and price bands across regions. In the past two years, South China and East China have had certain bakery industry belts; Shandong and Henan have small factory workshops; the upstream bakery in West and Central China is relatively weak. The ultra-short-shelf-life approach may not fully adapt to other regions. 2. Who are Yonghui's core bakery suppliers? What are their food safety, market position, product quality, supply efficiency, R&D capabilities, and on-site management? Is the relationship like Sam's "one product, one supplier," or multiple products per supplier? How will supply chain be planned during multi-store renovation? Will third-party factories use R&D plans directly, or will there be exclusive formulas for dedicated products? The ratio for exclusive products cannot be delegated to other companies. 3. Minimum order quantities, gross margins, assessments, and waste.

Deli: There are joint-venture and self-operated areas. Joint-venture examples include Jiuduorouduo and Huangshanghuang. The joint-venture area is an island counter enclosed on four sides, with 10 employees responsible for on-site cutting or shredding and packing. Deli is a category where most young users (even price-sensitive ones) find it hard to form a price anchor; for example, no user can say what pig ears should cost per 500g. In reality, comparing with Meituan's cold dishes and Xiaoxiang Supermarket, the latter two sell pig ears at 60 yuan/500g, while Yonghui's five-spice pig ears are 53.8 yuan/500g. Huangshanghuang's hand-torn sauce duck is also more price-competitive than online, suggesting that joint-venture deli may be positioned for relatively lower gross margins, higher volume, and cross-selling with other categories.

(Figures 3 and 4 are self-operated; Figures 1, 2, 5, and 6 are joint-venture stalls)

(Healthier product selection: abundant zero-sugar yogurt, Greek yogurt, various low-calorie light meals, healthy teas, with prices on par with other platforms)

At the Xilongduo store, Donglai products account for a very small proportion. The prominent displays are mainly DL oatmeal, DL enzyme laundry detergent, DL sanitary wipes, DL facial towels, and DL liquor. DL enzyme laundry detergent is clearly positioned as high-value daily necessities: 19.9 yuan for 3kg, while Blue Moon and Omo of the same specification are 32.9-38.9 yuan. Sanitary wipes are 7.3 yuan for 80 wipes, lower than Vinda's 8 yuan for 80 wipes. DL products have a pure white style, and the aesthetics can evolve.

(DL daily necessities)

(The current Yonghui daily necessities area shows a state of effort and chaotic humor, such as placing a magnifying glass next to a 3499-yuan Dyson. The daily necessities area is Miniso's comfort zone, and there is indeed significant room for synergy and optimization in the future.)

Employee Well-being and Efficiency

Sustainability of frontline employee training Improving employee wages is a key focus of this reform. According to Beijing standards, the minimum wage for store employees has increased from 4,000 yuan to 6,000 yuan per month, with fresh food department wages higher at 6,300-6,500 yuan. Working hours are shortened, but work intensity has increased. The Xilongduo store now opens at 9:30 AM instead of 8:30 AM. Previously, with Yonghui's foot traffic, there was plenty of time to slack off; now there is no time to slack off at all.

Division of labor is more refined, and it is judged that many campus recruits can handle the work. For example, at the packing station, one cashier and one packer (putting disposable chopsticks, etc.) handle several times the workload with at least a 50% wage increase. In addition to base salary, there are commissions, bringing average wages to 8,000 yuan, and with social insurance, over 9,000 yuan. Indeed, any on-site employee will smile and respond, showing clear training. The number of employees in the fresh food and deli areas is estimated to be 4-5 times the previous level, with many borrowed from other stores in the northern region. Although details like employee rest areas could not be further explored, one checkout detail impressed me: my item was 15.8 yuan, but the barcode was missing a digit, so it couldn't be scanned. To fix the barcode would require going back to the bakery area and queuing. The cashier immediately decided to scan another item's barcode (12.8 yuan) to speed up checkout. Very flexible, showing competence.

Summary: Some key changes that need cognitive judgment; here we only raise questions, and answers vary by perspective. 1. Synergy between Donglai products and future Miniso collaboration. 2. Given the clustering effect of foot traffic (the nearby restaurants and milk tea shops have seen doubled traffic), how much room is there for rent reduction, and what impact does that have on the model? 3. Light and heavy renovations may occur simultaneously. If light renovation just involves bakery, deli, and non-food items, how many stores can be done within two years? What impact does this have on the existing warehousing and distribution system? 4. Changes in the performance structure of the procurement and sales team, and changes in the core team. How are product listing/delisting, display, and pricing managed, and how are responsibilities divided among headquarters, regions, and stores? 5. With high foot traffic, service attributes are relatively diluted. Will this be the future for more stores nationwide? Does product-driven renovation have long-term appeal, and what is the pace and position of other retailers? 6. How will the renovated Yonghui cooperate with online instant retail platforms?

When new retail is no longer mentioned, and when Pangdonglai leaves Xuchang without being questioned, perhaps we are already at the dawn of the manufacturing-development retail era.