---
title: "“Emergency Doctor” Pangdonglai Cannot Save China's Supermarket Retail Industry"
description: "Fang Yu traveled from Zhengzhou to Xuchang and noticed the change in consumption levels. Despite being a fourth-tier city, Xuchang is home to Pangdonglai, a retail phenomenon that has become a national sensation. While Pangdonglai's success is undeniable, its model may not be replicable, and its recent decision to step back from helping other retailers raises questions about the future of China's supermarket industry."
author: "房煜"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2024-09-14"
language: "en"
canonical: "https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/emergency-doctor-pangdonglai-cannot-save-china-s-supermarket-retail-indu-2eaa7d05/"
markdown: "https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/emergency-doctor-pangdonglai-cannot-save-china-s-supermarket-retail-indu-2eaa7d05.md"
original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/4YXjVv1AaBg42wMTgHskRg"
translation: "https://xinjignxiao.com/zh/articles/%E6%80%A5%E8%AF%8A%E5%8C%BB%E7%94%9F-%E8%83%96%E4%B8%9C%E6%9D%A5-%E6%95%91%E4%B8%8D%E4%BA%86%E4%B8%AD%E5%9B%BD%E8%B6%85%E5%B8%82%E9%9B%B6%E5%94%AE%E4%B8%9A-2eaa7d05.md"
attribution: "New Distribution — https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/emergency-doctor-pangdonglai-cannot-save-china-s-supermarket-retail-indu-2eaa7d05/"
usage_policy: "https://xinjignxiao.com/ai-policy.txt"
---

# “Emergency Doctor” Pangdonglai Cannot Save China's Supermarket Retail Industry

> Fang Yu traveled from Zhengzhou to Xuchang and noticed the change in consumption levels. Despite being a fourth-tier city, Xuchang is home to Pangdonglai, a retail phenomenon that has become a national sensation. While Pangdonglai's success is undeniable, its model may not be replicable, and its recent decision to step back from helping other retailers raises questions about the future of China's supermarket industry.

Fang Yu traveled from Zhengzhou to Xuchang and could feel the change in consumption levels even when taking a taxi. In Zhengzhou, the starting fare is 11 yuan, while in Xuchang it is 7 yuan. Locals say the city is not big, and it takes just over an hour to drive from one end of the urban area to the other. Yet despite its size, one company has single-handedly put Xuchang on the map: Pangdonglai, which has become incredibly popular over the past six months. How popular is Pangdonglai? It can be seen from both inside and outside. Internally, there are so many visitors that local taxi drivers in Xuchang say they are afraid to go near Pangdonglai because of the crowds. Moreover, Pangdonglai's own Dapang Xiaopang Business School has a dedicated team of lecturers to receive visitors from all over the country. It is no exaggeration to say that Pangdonglai is now the number one attraction in Xuchang, even though the city has historical sites like the Ancient City of Cao Wei. Externally, retail peers are flocking to learn from Pangdonglai. They have known about Pangdonglai for a long time, but only in the past year or so have they humbled themselves to "study under the master." Pangdonglai's transformation journey in 2024 has been most notably marked by its partnerships with Bubugao and Yonghui. Yonghui not only accepted store transformations but also proactively made extensive business adjustments based on Pangdonglai's suggestions. It closed several unprofitable stores in Zhengzhou, Beijing, and other places, and has already opened its first self-transformed store in Xi'an. Pangdonglai acts like an emergency doctor, helping its peers. With Pangdonglai's popularity and the acceptance of transformation by retail giants like Yonghui, Pangdonglai should have gained more disciples. However, recent signs suggest that Pangdonglai is determined to return to a low profile in the retail world. In June, according to Lianshang.com, the Liandong Donglai President Class issued a notice: it will gradually stop exporting Pangdonglai's private brand products to the Seed Class, Bubugao, Yonghui, and other companies. Each company must learn to optimize its own products and truly possess core product competitiveness. What will Pangdonglai do next? According to the latest news, on September 2, Yu Donglai, chairman of Pangdonglai Group, posted his latest business plan on his Douyin account: investing 5 billion yuan to build Pangdonglai's "City of Freedom." Why is Pangdonglai trying to return to a low profile? On one hand, it is due to Yu Donglai's personality. The transformations bring praise but also controversy. Can simply copying Pangdonglai's product assortment and overturning the original procurement system save a company? Some media have joked that Yonghui's store in Zhengzhou is a "Yonghui-branded Pangdonglai branch." Previously, media learned from local industry associations that 70% of a transformed store's daily sales came from Pangdonglai's private label products. This is a complete negation of the company's original product and supply chain system, and rebuilding the supply chain takes time and cannot be copied or transplanted. Money alone cannot achieve it. Meanwhile, there has been much discussion about whether Pangdonglai's model is universally replicable. In reality, attempts to imitate Pangdonglai often end up as "trying to draw a tiger but ending up with a dog." Yu Donglai, who has a purist attitude toward his philosophy, is clearly unhappy to see this. Yu Donglai seems to have finally decided to be himself again. But Yonghui is still on the road. According to Yonghui Superstores, it has confirmed that the first batch of self-transformed stores learning from Pangdonglai will be launched in ten cities. In addition to the first national store, the Xi'an Zhongmao Plaza store, which opened recently, transformations will also be carried out in Hefei, Hangzhou, Fuzhou, Chengdu, Guiyang, Chongqing, Beijing, Shenzhen, Shenyang, and other cities, totaling ten cities. Can Yu Donglai really save China's supermarket retail industry with his own strength? Or at least pull Yonghui ashore?

## **Xuchang and Pangdonglai**
Founded in 1995, Pangdonglai is a true representative of retail that has weathered cycles. In the past, Pangdonglai was content to stay in one corner, more like an independent kingdom. Many knew they were doing well, but never were they so eager to learn as today. A very important reason is that Pangdonglai is from Xuchang, Henan. According to general classification standards, Xuchang is a fourth-tier city. Pangdonglai grew up in Xuchang and has never tried to move away. To truly understand Pangdonglai, one cannot separate it from the city of Xuchang. Although it is a fourth-tier city, judging from recent economic and social development data, Xuchang is an economically strong city in Henan Province, sometimes ranking among the top three. In 2023, Xuchang's GDP ranked sixth in the province. However, local media, when reviewing Henan's economic development in 2023, generally highlighted "Xuchang fell to sixth place, overtaken by Nanyang" as the news point. In other words, at least in the impression of locals, Xuchang should rank higher. Despite the decline in ranking, Xuchang's economic development has been very stable in recent years, with GDP consistently above 300 billion yuan since 2020. It is worth noting that although its provincial ranking has declined, according to the Xuchang Municipal Bureau of Statistics, per capita disposable income in Xuchang still grew in 2023. Among them, the annual per capita disposable income of all residents was 31,685.0 yuan, an increase of 4.5% over the previous year. By place of residence, urban residents' per capita disposable income was 39,537.9 yuan, up 3.4%; rural residents' per capita disposable income was 24,228.2 yuan, up 6.7%. The per capita disposable income indicator has an important impact on the daily consumption capacity of a region. According to Xuchang statistics, at the end of 2023, the city's permanent population was 4.383 million, of which urban permanent residents were 2.46 million and rural permanent residents were 1.923 million. This is consistent with the feeling of TMTPost's on-site visit to Xuchang. Even on weekdays, the supermarket sections of Pangdonglai's Times Square store and the newly opened Angel City store are packed with customers, making one wonder: don't these people have jobs? Or at least it reflects the characteristics of local consumers: they have money and leisure. Pangdonglai (photo by Fang Yu at Times Square store) In the logic of China's consumption changes, third- and fourth-tier cities, the so-called sinking market, are prone to produce industry giants and forces of change. This includes e-commerce platform Pinduoduo and local convenience store king Meiyijia. Community group buying, which once attracted widespread social attention, also came from the sinking market. However, Pangdonglai is doing consumption upgrading in the sinking market, more like building a bridge between first- and second-tier brands and the sinking market. In all of Pangdonglai's transformation records, one can see a sentence: how many of the company's original products were removed and how many first- and second-tier brands were added, ultimately reaching 90% of Pangdonglai's product structure. From the perspective of product selection, Pangdonglai does not shy away from advocating first-tier brand products. In Pangdonglai's Angel City mall, a striking display is the wine section at the entrance. According to the explanation of Pangdonglai College lecturers, the price range and grade of these wines are very wide, including some expensive high-end wines. But these high-end wines actually do not sell well in Xuchang. Why does Pangdonglai display them? It is understood that Pangdonglai's approach is to introduce good things to local consumers, even if no one buys them now. When you one day want to drink a high-end wine, you will think of Pangdonglai. Pangdonglai (photo by Fang Yu at Angel City store) This basically reflects Yu Donglai's often-repeated saying: to provide a better life and enjoy a better life. What is "better"? Obviously, the enjoyment of consumption level is included. The praise for Pangdonglai on the internet is now overwhelming, mostly focusing on two aspects: one is product development; the other is humanized service and care, including for employees and customers. On the product level, Pangdonglai, as Yu Donglai said, only strictly demands on product quality. It emphasizes "common sense" or doing one's duty. But in the current era, this common sense and duty are indeed scarce. An example is that many people buy pens, but they often stop writing after a short time. Most consumers silently endure it. But Pangdonglai's pens are required to have the ink fully used, or at least 90% of it; otherwise, they are unqualified. In terms of people-oriented service, TMTPost found through visits that the core is to truly understand consumer needs and provide "localized solutions." An example is wedding products. Everyone knows that marriage is often a one-time deal, so related products are not easy to sell. But in Pangdonglai's mall, there is a wedding shopping list, divided into a groom's version and a bride's version, with recommended products fully considering local customs. Newlyweds or their families can follow the list. As a result, local newlyweds know they can achieve "one-stop shopping" for weddings at Pangdonglai (the mall). Another example is home appliances. Professional chains like Suning and Gome have developed for nearly 20 years, and JD.com has also been deeply involved in digital 3C home appliances for many years. Is there any room for a regional offline retailer? If you go to Pangdonglai to buy home appliances, Pangdonglai employees can confidently tell you that as long as you name a residential community in Xuchang, they can tell you the main apartment layouts and characteristics of that community, and thus what kind of appliances (such as air conditioners) you should choose and how to install them. You might suspect that Pangdonglai's appliance department employees have part-time jobs at local real estate agencies. The Pangdonglai that has been hotly discussed this year is mostly its supermarket section. In fact, Pangdonglai operates a mixed business, including supermarkets, department stores, and even specialty stores for jewelry and tea. Pangdonglai offers a complete set of life solutions in Xuchang. So living in Xuchang, as a consumer, you feel that Pangdonglai has woven a net that completely absorbs the high-quality consumption power of locals and even surrounding cities and counties. Of course, building this consumption net is not a day's work. From products to services to management to corporate culture, it is a complex system that has been consistently developed for many years to yield today's fruits. Objectively speaking, because of Pangdonglai, the daily happiness index of Xuchang residents has improved significantly. This net may not be large, but it is deep enough. It can also be said that Pangdonglai has tapped into the wallet share of Xuchang locals to near monopoly levels. Why can Pangdonglai do this? Perhaps because in the current business models popular in China's retail industry, the interest in making quick money far exceeds the interest in studying products. TMTPost believes that precisely because Pangdonglai operates a mixed business, relying on comprehensive shopping malls that include supermarkets and other formats, all of Pangdonglai's commercial entities have obvious "buyer characteristics." This is fundamentally different from the habit of acting as a landlord and charging various fees to brands. The supermarket-as-landlord model was easy money when the industry was growing, but the drawback is that the store's control over products weakens, even to the point of "pay and you're in." Thus, it gradually drifted away from consumers' real needs. When shopping in Pangdonglai's mall, the biggest feeling is that no matter how many first-tier brands Pangdonglai introduces, "Pangdonglai" (including the DL private label) is the biggest brand here. This strong binding with consumer perception and mind exceeds any brand it introduces. This is also the fundamental reason why Pangdonglai helps other companies and makes each one popular. What the helped companies can learn now is Yu Donglai's "three axes": raising wages, adjusting rest days, and changing products. But in fact, Pangdonglai's core value is consumers' high trust in its channel brand. Zhongtai Securities, in a research report ("Series Study on China-US E-commerce Industry Chain III"), once discussed the definition and value of channel brands. The report believes that behind consumer decisions there is information cost, and the bottom of information cost is mind cost. While product brands solve the problem of "what to buy," channel brands solve the problem of "where to buy." Therefore, becoming a channel brand is the retailer's biggest moat. Yu Donglai has never used the term "channel brand," but his approach "coincides with the art of war." Yu Donglai explained why Pangdonglai almost never allows manufacturers to promote: "If a brand needs to, it can do so directly at the counter, but no publicity is allowed. Distributing flyers in the hall or promoting on the street will put the company on the blacklist, and the contract will not be renewed when it expires next year. The purpose is to protect customers' rights and make them feel at ease. This gradually cultivates customers' consumption habits, making them more and more at ease and more dependent on consumption." So regarding Pangdonglai's transformations, famous retail expert and Lianshang.com consultant Li Ling pointed out that the first three months of a new store are a honeymoon period; the key is what happens after the honeymoon.

**Controversy over Scale Expansion** The recent popularity of Pangdonglai in the past six months essentially reflects a desire in the retail industry after years of wandering in depression: can this excellent consumption network be replicated to a larger market? This question has followed Yu Donglai for many years, and the answer lies with him. External descriptions of Yu Donglai mostly focus on his "feelings" and "great love" and other spiritual aspects. But in fact, Yu Donglai is also a very shrewd and experienced retail person. After all, in business history, there are too many people who have feelings but mess up their business. Shrewdness is not the antonym of feelings; it is more of a factual description. This time, Yu Donglai was put on a pedestal, ultimately starting from an exchange with a regional retail company last year. According to Lianshang.com, that company thought it was doing well and should have about 180 million yuan in assets. Yu Donglai, after a simple visit, judged based on experience that the company's accounts were wrong, so he invited two industry experts to help audit the accounts. After the audit, the founder found that he actually had only about 20 million yuan in net assets, and at the current loss rate, the company would go bankrupt within two years. So he begged Yu Donglai for help. This was the prelude to all subsequent assistance and transformations. But through this incident, it is clear that even though he rarely directly manages frontline business now, Yu Donglai's retail insight and business skills remain quite profound. Unlike many entrepreneurs' primitive impulse to grow bigger and stronger, Yu Donglai knows when to stop and then be settled. For example, regarding the Xuchang market, Yu Donglai once mentioned in a speech that if he went all out, Pangdonglai Supermarket could achieve 5 billion yuan in sales, but it would be too tiring. He would rather play while working and not give up a good life for the sake of career. This might be part of the answer. Another part of the answer might lie in the history of China's retail industry. Yu Donglai also often says he is unwilling to expand because he does not do things outside his circle of competence. Since China's reform and opening up, there have been many excellent retail companies. Even today, when hypermarkets are in decline, there are still many local benchmarks like Pangdonglai that develop regionally. Yashi Supermarket in Hubei, which is a fresh food and gourmet museum; Xinyu Lou in Hebei, which has been deeply rooted locally for over 40 years; Biyoute in Northeast China, which took over Carrefour's stores; and Sichuan Hongqi Chain and Shandong Jiajiayue, which are already listed, are all excellent. Yu Donglai himself has also praised another city legend: Chengdu Ito Yokado. As a foreign enterprise, Ito Yokado's existence for over 20 years has indeed provided a lifestyle that keeps pace with the times for a city's consumers. The founder of Chengdu Ito Yokado, President Mitsue Tomihiro, was affectionately called "Third Brother" by locals when he retired in 2017. According to data, in 2016, even under the impact of e-commerce, Chengdu Ito Yokado's 7 stores still achieved sales of 5 billion yuan. The media praised him for turning the essence of retail, "lean retail, people-oriented," from slogans into reality and leaving it in the Chinese market. How did Ito Yokado truly understand local consumer needs and provide localized supply? An example from Mitsue Tomihiro's biography is slippers. This most ordinary household item today—can it really be anything special? But in the 1990s, although material supply had greatly enriched with reform and opening up, some hidden needs for a better life, such as fashion and aesthetics, were not valued. He keenly felt that although slippers of various sizes were available in Chengdu at the time, the colors were very monotonous. In such a romantic city, didn't anyone love beauty? So Ito Yokado launched a "color offensive" for slippers in Chengdu, which was a great success. Later, they applied the same method to bedding. It is not an exaggeration to say that Chengdu Ito Yokado is one of the most successful foreign retailers since the reform and opening up. However, as is well known, Ito Yokado's development in Beijing failed. There may be many reasons for Ito's failure in Beijing. Yu Donglai must have noticed Ito's development history, so did it influence his decision not to leave Henan?

Pangdonglai (photo by Fang Yu in Xuchang)

At least from Yu Donglai's repeated statements, one can see some of his thinking. For example, he always emphasizes doing well in single-store revenue, opening one store and doing it well. His advice to Yonghui is to close stores that are not profitable and cannot be saved. And from the results, Pangdonglai indeed achieves the effect of one store being worth ten stores of other brands. TMTPost previously reported exclusively that according to China Chain Store & Franchise Association data, Pangdonglai Supermarket's average annual revenue is 383 million yuan. However, when Pangdonglai becomes an industry benchmark, it seems to have formed a certain misleading impression that companies wanting to expand are "blind" and not doing business steadily. From the development of the retail chain industry, the ultimate goal of enterprise scale expansion is to achieve standardization and digitalization, and through the improvement of the entire supply chain, achieve extreme efficiency. This concept is not only applicable to the retail industry but also to the catering industry, which is why international giants like McDonald's have emerged. In other words, from the development of the world's retail and chain service industries, chain expansion is the mainstream. Objectively speaking, Pangdonglai is not resistant to enterprise scale; otherwise, it would not have launched e-commerce and publicized that Beijingers can also buy Pangdonglai. It is just that Pangdonglai has always wanted to avoid the heavy-asset, heavy-operation approach of opening stores. Because Yu Donglai must also understand the simple truth that retail formats based on offline scenarios can only truly realize the maximum value of the enterprise by serving more users. Without expansion, the consumers an enterprise can serve are ultimately a small group. This is also why Pangdonglai has not been in the mainstream spotlight for many years. It can be said that it was right to ignore Pangdonglai in the past. It is also right to pay attention to it today. Through multiple investigations, TMTPost believes that the core of the questions about scale expansion surrounding the Pangdonglai phenomenon may lie in the existence of an "impossible triangle" in retail: (enterprise) scale, (product) richness, and localization (personalization) cannot all be achieved simultaneously. Even world-class retailers like Walmart and 7-ELEVEN have not escaped this; Pangdonglai just chose the latter two. Scale + richness is Walmart or Don Quijote. Scale + localization is 7-ELEVEN. Richness + localization is Pangdonglai, Chengdu Ito Yokado, etc. In China's consumer market, there is no shortage of enterprises with meticulous craftsmanship, but at least in the past nearly 20 years of development history, large-scale chains have been the industry trend, and stories of meticulous craftsmanship losing to large chains are common. The most typical example is in the home appliance chain sector. Many in Shanghai may remember a company called Best Buy that "once came," but both Best Buy and the local brand Yongle Electronics, which advocated refined operations, ultimately lost to Suning and Gome, which took the large chain route. Through the TV drama "Blossoms Shanghai," many young people today realize that department stores in the past really sold "general merchandise." The retreat of department stores in first- and second-tier cities, eventually only holding on to core categories like clothing, gold, and jewelry, is also due to the hypermarket trend led by Walmart. Compared with department stores, which have a relatively strong buyer logic, hypermarkets have a higher degree of standardization. Therefore, after their rapid rise in the 1990s, they basically turned the original department stores into what they are today. Today, the hypermarket model is declining, but Walmart's Sam's Club is developing well. Its essence is still to force the evolution of backend supply chain capabilities through the front-end chain scale effect, thereby forming a "full-category selection" model for members. It is just that Sam's Club gave up the "richness" dimension. The above history shows that scale development and chain operation have always been one of the themes of retail. Any adjustment, reflection, or reform of retail cannot completely avoid this issue. Pangdonglai, on the one hand, adheres to lean retail + people-oriented, and on the other hand, can remain independent. TMTPost believes this is largely related to Yu Donglai's personal ability and years of strategic determination. It is also closely related to Xuchang as a "field." Pangdonglai is still unreplicable, not only itself but also the "Xuchang" under Pangdonglai's feet. For Pangdonglai, Xuchang is not just a city but also a huge consumption testing ground. In this consumption scenario with over 2 million people, Pangdonglai has accumulated profound know-how over more than 20 years. This waiting time and the refined exploration of spatial scenarios require enormous costs.

**Pangdonglai's Fish and Fishing** Regarding Pangdonglai's assistance in recent years, some analysts believe it is a way to test the waters for alternative expansion. Because the most famous three targets Yu Donglai chose are: first, a third- and fourth-tier supermarket brand; then Changsha's Bubugao, a regional chain leader; and then Yonghui, the absolute leader in the supermarket industry that once approached 100 billion yuan in scale. So the hierarchy of these three targets is very clear. Analysts believe Yu Donglai wants to see how his survival system of product assortment (product structure) reacts in different market spaces through large, medium, and small enterprises. Therefore, all assistance announcements repeatedly mention that the product structure reaches 90% of Pangdonglai's. In addition, Yu Donglai himself has said he hopes to expand Pangdonglai's scale and influence. When talking about Pangdonglai's private brand craft beer, he said, "If we do the quality well, a single product, like DL beer, if we do it well, a single product could generate billions a year, and we would definitely increase production lines. Even a white liquor, with craftsmanship like Japanese sake or Western red wine, to develop our quality, the market is really too big." Furthermore, regarding the current hot membership stores, he does not hide his admiration for Sam's Club and Costco. On one hand, he says that currently only Sam's Club and Costco are teachers of China's retail industry; on the other hand, he says he hopes Pangdonglai can surpass them. It is undeniable that both Sam's Club and Costco follow the large chain route, and not just on a national basis but with the global market as the battlefield. In recent years, Sam's Club has also accelerated its store openings in mainland China. The latest news is that on September 5, Walmart's official recruitment WeChat account released "September New Store Recruitment Information," announcing that Sam's Club will open new stores in Dongguan, Shaoxing, Quanzhou, Wenzhou, Wuhan, and Jiaxing, and is actively recruiting relevant staff. Not to mention how to catch up with Sam's Club, when Yu Donglai is now put on a pedestal, many issues inevitably become complicated. TMTPost has learned that in fact, not all companies can digest Pangdonglai's entire approach. Some dissenting voices have emerged. A person close to Yu Donglai also posted on WeChat Moments: "Problems found in retail transformations across regions: 1. Just marketing gimmicks... 2. Symbolic minor changes for employees..." The teacher complains about the students, and the students also have their grievances. If they learn well, it is because Pangdonglai is powerful. If they learn poorly, it is because the students themselves learned it wrong and did not grasp the essence. As the old saying goes, "The master leads you to the door, but practice is up to you." Perhaps Yu Donglai is also worried that "overheating" will ultimately have a negative impact on Pangdonglai's own development, so Pangdonglai should reel in the net. However, this does not affect Yonghui Superstores' determination to continue learning from Pangdonglai. An industry leader's high praise for Pangdonglai is also the greatest recognition Pangdonglai has received from this wave of popularity.

Yonghui Zhengzhou store (photo by Fang Yu)

In this regard, some industry insiders have also given their views. A senior retail person believes that the essence of large supermarket chains is still the supply chain optimization capability brought by scale. Yonghui has indeed had many loss-making stores in recent years, but the reasons for the losses are partly operational management issues and partly backend supply chain issues. In some provinces and cities, Yonghui has opened many stores, but from the perspective of peers, it is clear that there is a lack of supply chain coordination between Yonghui's stores. Therefore, Yonghui's many stores should not be a burden, and losses are not necessarily the responsibility of the stores. Instead, it should truly go deep into regional markets, study local consumption habits, highlight more distinctive customized products, and increase the supply chain's collective procurement and customization capabilities through the coverage scale of existing stores. The suggestions given by the above senior person are different from Yu Donglai's approach. Who is right and who is wrong may be partially answered by Yonghui's next annual report. But the above analysis at least provides a different perspective. That is, the success of Pangdonglai's supermarket business and its dazzling single-store revenue are based on the deep cultivation of the Pangdonglai brand over many years and the support of the entire Pangdonglai business system, which can continuously self-adjust and self-correct. Therefore, the supermarket sector has formed a product assortment with strong Pangdonglai characteristics, tailored for the city of Xuchang. But for large chain enterprises like Yonghui, if they want to "Pangdonglai-ize" each regional market one by one, they would need at least a dozen people like Yu Donglai. Even Yu Donglai, who spent half his life studying only Xuchang, would find it "very tiring" if he went all out. Whether Yonghui can use such a product assortment to penetrate more regional markets can only be tested by time. Moreover, if the "impossible triangle" of retail holds, how to continue advancing Yonghui's digital projects, which have already received significant investment, in different regional markets is also a huge test. Compared with the new retail of eight years ago, Pangdonglai's popularity is more like an ideological enlightenment for the struggling retail industry, emphasizing returning to business, returning to consumers, returning to the original intention, and not seeking external solutions or believing there is a savior outside the door. In this sense, rather than learning from Pangdonglai, everyone is pointing at the moon with a finger, searching for themselves anew.

**Recommended Reading**


---

## Copyright and AI use

This article is sourced from New Distribution. Search, quotation, summarization, and model training are permitted, but every use must credit New Distribution and retain the canonical source URL.

Contact: zhaobo258@gmail.com · +86 158 5481 7671