Transforming Bubugao, transforming Yonghui Superstores, and there's a long queue of others waiting to be transformed... Moreover, according to reports, whether it's 'rescuing the urgent' or 'saving the dying,' it's all free help. Pangdonglai, once cursed to never expand nationwide, perhaps never imagined it would go national this way: being invited by peers who had long gone national and were once much more glamorous, to teach them how to do business across the country. From public information, Pangdonglai's transformations have indeed shown obvious results. For example, at Bubugao Meixi Lake store in Changsha, Hunan, before Pangdonglai's intervention, average daily sales were 150,000 yuan; after, daily sales exceeded one million yuan consecutively, and during May Day, it hit a peak of 2.4 million yuan in a single day. Although the sustainability of Pangdonglai's transformations remains to be seen, from the comparison before and after: The transformed ones are definitely better than the untransformed. For instance, if I had a choice, I would go to the transformed store rather than the original. Much online content about why Pangdonglai succeeds focuses on inspirational chicken soup and saintly sentiments. Various stories about treating employees and customers well, being hard on oneself, and forgoing profits, even concluding that others can't learn from it. That's not the core. The core is that Pangdonglai's success stems from its greater focus and professionalism, from practical exploration and summarization of its own 'kung fu manual'— operating standards and control systems far above industry peers. Whether it's Pangdonglai's own stores or those it helps transform, the essence is winning through professionalism. For example, in the Bubugao transformation, according to reports, the so-called 'radical makeover' first involved raising wages to motivate employees: staff salaries increased from 3,000 yuan to 4,000 yuan per month, and store managers from over 10,000 to 20,000. While changing people, also change operating standards. Supermarket hours were shortened by two hours, product structure was overhauled, eliminating low-quality cheap goods and adding major brands and high-value items, re-planning customer flow, and re-pricing. Also important, the store environment was redone, including improving and adding service facilities and programs. All these tasks are not just about preaching chicken soup, pumping up morale, or being a good person; they require long-term frontline investigation, analysis, and thinking, accumulating one's own standards and systems over time. Are these things Pangdonglai does mythical, mysterious, or high-barrier? Not at all. It simply starts from the essence and does what needs to be done. If you want employees to be more engaged, you should pay them more reasonably; if you want customers to trust and choose you, you should make products and services good. How to do it well cannot rely on slogans or banners, but on turning intentions into behavior and even discipline. Are these things Pangdonglai does impossible for other companies? Not necessarily. Most other companies either haven't done them seriously, or once did but not thoroughly or long-term, not with such persistence and consistency over the years. Why? The key difference might be that the boss's energy and mind are no longer there. One observation I've made is that for a company that relies on products and services rather than privileges or monopolies, the boss can delegate many things, but two things must be done personally: first, be the chief product manager, continuously improving products; second, be the chief HR officer, personally leading and developing the team. Pangdonglai's success is largely because boss Yu Donglai always keeps these two things firmly in his own hands. He spends years working alongside employees, always with eyes wide open in the store. Pangdonglai's standards and systems must have been accumulated through his hands-on experience, comparisons, repetition, learning, and reflection. As Ren Zhengfei would say: Seriously grind your own tofu. In contrast, what about some bosses who were once very successful but later fell into trouble? They might have built their businesses by being on the frontline, researching products, and leading people well, but once they reached a certain level, they were no longer there in person or in spirit. They started playing with capital, operations, and expansion, not focusing on the market but on winning over bank presidents and mayors. They had no time to ponder how to arrange products, design customer flow, or make the store aesthetic and stylish, or keep the restrooms from being so smelly. They also looked down on these tasks, even on other bosses who did them, thinking that a boss doing such things daily lacks vision and dreams, using tactical diligence to mask strategic laziness. To put it bluntly, there are a large number of such bosses. Many Chinese bosses love to talk about strategic planning, schemes, and stratagems—thirty-six stratagems aren't enough for them—and they love to do big things, keen on studying and exploiting the big direction, the big environment, and big shots, but they don't study their own products or their own small environment. If the superior likes something, subordinates will go even further. If the boss's mind isn't there, others' minds naturally won't be either. Some bosses, after leaving the frontline, do hire professionals, but they don't delegate authority or respect them, nor do they respect the work itself. Even if the hired people are capable, they end up just going through the motions. Behind the so-called collapse of offline retail is how many offline malls are so ugly, so low-class, so messy, and so 'come if you want,' that you don't even want to look at them, let alone spend money there. So, there's no Pangdonglai myth or genius Yu Donglai. Yu Donglai simply used the time that others spent on capital, operations, expansion, and winning over bank presidents and mayors, to grind his own tofu well. Now everyone talks about difficulties, and indeed it's hard, everyone is struggling, especially hard. But if you look closely, those who have consistently worked on products and services and done them well, and those who have seriously focused on the market rather than scheming to win over bank presidents and mayors, are actually doing relatively better. Pangdonglai is just one representative. On the contrary, those who don't adapt to the times should have been eliminated by consumers' wallets long ago. So, learning from Pangdonglai, the most important thing is for bosses to refocus, purify their minds, and return to the frontline to grind their own tofu. They must sincerely realize: Everything is fleeting except grinding tofu well. Open your eyes, open your mind, and look carefully. In the end, it's probably just that tofu and the skill to grind it that are truly yours. Seriously grinding tofu well is doing the biggest and most important thing. Even if you're determined to do something big, if you can make it as big as Apple, that's about enough. Apple got so big, but the biggest and most important thing was just Jobs doing one small thing well: creating the iPhone. Recommended Reading