---
title: "Why Are Hypermarkets Hard to Succeed In?"
description: "This article analyzes why suppliers often struggle in hypermarkets, focusing on the human factor at both the employee and boss levels. It identifies key issues such as lack of skills, inadequate training, negative mindsets, and poor management systems, and suggests that building a systematic KA management system is essential for success."
author: "黄静"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2016-08-02"
language: "en"
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# Why Are Hypermarkets Hard to Succeed In?

> This article analyzes why suppliers often struggle in hypermarkets, focusing on the human factor at both the employee and boss levels. It identifies key issues such as lack of skills, inadequate training, negative mindsets, and poor management systems, and suggests that building a systematic KA management system is essential for success.

壹
**Analysis of Why Hypermarkets Are Hard to Succeed In - Employee Level**
The business relationship between a company and hypermarkets is driven by people in various positions, and the actual work is carried out by sales representatives. Every day, thousands of sales reps shuttle between stores of all sizes, dealing with all kinds of buyers, facing a variety of problems, signing agreements of all sizes, and running promotions both new and old. It can be said that the quality of KA sales reps' work determines the company's progress in hypermarkets. The sales team can make a company shine in KA stores, or they can drag it down. The role of sales reps is crucial! Most problems a company encounters in KA stores are related to people, especially the KA sales team. The team's mindset, quality, skills, abilities, work attitude, and management systems all affect whether the company finds it easy or hard to do business in hypermarkets. In all management, managing people is the most complex and difficult because people are not machines; they cannot be unified with a single command. People are diverse, each with their own thoughts and personal considerations, making it hard to align them with the company's goals. In analyzing why hypermarkets are hard to succeed in, we will always focus on the "human" factor because all things are done by people, whether decisions or actions. I believe that if we thoroughly analyze the human factor, the essence of the problem will be exposed, and the direction for solutions will naturally emerge. When analyzing sales reps, we approach from the following angles:
**Not Knowing How to Do It Well**
This point assumes that sales reps are willing to do well in hypermarkets, but they lack the operational skills and capabilities. They want to do it but can't; it's a technical issue, not an ideological one. "Not knowing how" can be caused by the employee themselves or by the company. Let's first look at employee-caused reasons.
Not Knowing How - Employee-Caused Reasons
**\- Lack of awareness and understanding.** The modern hypermarket format originated in Europe. Over half a century since the first store appeared, hypermarkets have evolved to a high level, developing characteristics and models different from other retail formats. Domestic hypermarkets have only developed for about a decade, and rapid growth has led to indigestion. Many people are swept into it before they can digest it, not even knowing what it is or its characteristics, yet they are already doing business with it. They don't know the internal structure of the store, who to contact for what, what processes to follow, or how to handle common problems, so it's no wonder so many accidents and issues occur. With a blank mind and a tangled mess, can they do well in hypermarkets? Believing rumors and having wrong mindsets. There are many rumors about how hard and dark hypermarkets are. For ordinary sales reps, they may have heard some "inside stories" before even entering the field, forming subjective "understandings." For example, the rumor that you must spend money to win over buyers. Before they successfully use skills to win over buyers, they already have a preset mindset. When they need to solve problems with buyers, they think about using money, so they don't think about how to break through technically and win without spending. The right mindset is more important than the right method. Mindset determines direction. If the direction is wrong, no matter how hard you try or how much you spend, it's hard to achieve the goal. Correct thinking must come first, then correct action. Unfortunately, many of our sales reps fall into a dark pit from a blank slate. Supervisors and leaders play a guiding role in this. If even leaders have such mindsets, what can employees do? After all, they are often younger, more ignorant, and more naive. They learn from those around them. So, it's rare for young people to meet a mentor, but it's easy for misguided leaders to ruin a young person!
Lack of skills and confidence. Not everyone is born knowing how to do hypermarkets; it requires learning, practice, experience, and inner cultivation. It must be admitted that doing well in hypermarkets requires a considerable level of expertise. No store can be done well lying down; you have to invest thought and brainpower. Every supplier is selling goods and investing resources. How to make the store choose and support you requires skill. You need to know what the store is thinking, what it needs, how to connect, how to design benefits, how to unfold step by step, and how to get them to accept you. Without considerable experience and skills, it's obviously not easy. The lack of skills is a major issue for many KA sales reps, and it also affects their confidence in dealing with stores. The more experienced, the more confident; the more confident, the better the state; the stronger the opponent, the more desire to challenge. When experts compete, they improve their skills. Conversely, because they are not professional, they lack confidence, and when they go out and get crushed by the store, their fear of stores and buyers increases. Where does the fighting spirit come from when they are dejected? So, learning and accumulating skills is fundamental! Even for companies with ample budgets, they don't need employees who only know how to spend money. Spending less to do more makes employees more valuable to any company. Our KA sales reps must be clearly aware of this: your inner skills are your true asset. The greater your skills, the more space you have, not the petty gains in front of you.
Employee Not Knowing How - Company-Caused Reasons
**\- The company lacks a corresponding training system.** With so many KA sales reps in a company, and constant turnover, abilities are inevitably uneven. Everyone knows that KA requires learning to do well, but many companies don't value KA training, or they value it in words but ignore it in action. They either simply invite outside teachers for a few lectures, or have employees self-train, or simply don't manage it, leaving employees to find their own ways to learn, which obviously won't be effective. Doing well in KA stores involves multiple links and aspects, so it requires coordinated efforts in mindset guidance, skill education, tool application, and assessment management. This means KA training must be progressive, step-by-step, and continuous. KA training must be systematic to be effective. You can't rely on employee talent; there aren't that many capable people waiting for you. Only by teaching even the pigs can a company avoid dependence on individual heroes. There's a view now: training capability is a company's competitiveness. I think it makes sense. Many companies cry out: We lack people, we lack professional KA talent! Talent isn't found; it's trained. Only companies that can train their own talent have a future. Companies that can train talent can do well in hypermarkets! On the issue of training, some bosses have two common misconceptions. One: "I must recruit enough people before training." What does "enough" mean? Teams naturally have turnover, and in abnormal times or poor management, turnover is even higher. Sales reps are constantly being replaced, so training should be timely, alternating, and repeated, which is more realistic. Annual centralized training can bring everyone together, but daily business training should be timely and targeted based on level, position, and tenure. Don't wait until you have enough people! The second misconception: "You must have professional KA personnel to do KA work well." What does "professional" mean? Three, five, ten years? Or reaching manager or director level? Time and position don't equal professional operational skills. On one hand, a company's development can't rely on just a few "professional" people; on the other hand, there aren't that many "professional" people waiting for you to choose. The reliable way is for the company to have its own training system, so that any sales rep with a basic foundation can be trained into a capable employee. That is the real way for a company to have talent. The company lacks a complete system for dealing with hypermarkets, unable to provide backend support to employees. Many people say hypermarkets are strong, but it's not simply because they have many stores. Scale strength is superficial; the real strength lies in their core. The strength of backend systems, management, and models supports the rapid expansion and development of stores. But our suppliers still rely too much on individuals, on heroes, when dealing with stores. With a few capable heroes, KA stores are done well; without them, the company gets nervous. But when have you seen stores panic when they lose a few buyers or store managers? They play with systems. When the system is complete and strong, no individual matters. Where is the supplier's KA management system? Can a low-level human wave tactic counter a retail aircraft carrier and do well? Why do sales reps often feel so tired doing KA? Because many companies treat sales reps as mentors and all-rounders. A sales rep has to handle N departments and N specialized tasks in a store, but look at the buyers: they have multiple departments working together, supporting each other. Sales reps often fight alone. If a company falls into a meat grinder without technical content, with nothing to rely on and everything left to individual effort, employees naturally feel insecure. The bigger the company, the more standardized it should be. When small, you can dance freely, highlighting individual skills. When the scale grows, you need standardized movements, a group dance. Otherwise, a thousand people with a thousand moves will cause chaos! Establishing a standardized, scientific KA management system and standardizing KA work is the ultimate choice and way out for all companies that want to do well in hypermarkets.
**Not Wanting to Do It Well**
After analyzing the "not knowing how" aspect, let's look at "not wanting to do well." Hypermarkets are so important; are there people who don't want to do well? Of course there are. Do you think everyone is highly responsible and treats company development as their own mission? No. People are first selfish animals, always thinking about their own interests. When self-interest aligns with company interest, of course company interest comes first; when they conflict, after a struggle, they often lean toward self-interest. Doing hypermarkets involves cost investment, creating many loopholes in supervision, which become some people's gravy. People without ambition focus on short-term gains. To some extent, every employee challenges company rules and gambles with management. The mindset of not wanting to do well in hypermarkets is actually quite complex, such as:
**\- Negative escapism.** As analyzed earlier, we know that operating hypermarkets well is not simple. When efforts don't yield results, many say: "Hypermarkets are really hard. I've tried so long without big results. Look around, many others aren't doing well either. Forget it, I'll just go with the flow. As long as I'm not too bad, the company won't fire me." Drifting is so easy; doing hypermarkets well takes so much effort! So some sales reps without ambition or self-requirements find a reason to relax, because "hypermarkets are hard, can't do well," so they take it easy first—
**\- Personal gain.** Everyone knows hypermarkets have cost support. Where that money goes, many people start scheming. If hypermarkets are done well and management is streamlined, there are no loopholes to exploit. So why do well? They say hypermarkets are hard, they make them not so good, so the company approves more costs for hypermarkets, giving them more space to "operate." Thus, a group of short-sighted, greedy sales reps will shout all day: "Hypermarkets are hard, costs are high"—
**\- To secure so-called personal stability.** The harder something is to get, the more valuable it is; the harder something is to handle, the more it shows skill. If hypermarkets were easy, wouldn't the individual be less valuable to the company? If others can't do it, and only I can, then the company can't do without me, and leaders have to watch my face. So I can walk sideways in the company, and my position is as stable as Mount Tai. Thus, a group of malicious people deliberately magnify problems, even create problems, stir up complexity, and then step in to clean up, sacrificing company interests for personal gain. They cast the net and pull it in, controlling everything, like antivirus sellers who are the biggest virus creators—
**\- Lack of responsibility and unwillingness to take on.** Responsibility is needed to do things well. To do things, you must take responsibility. If things aren't done perfectly, you might be punished. So some people don't want to take responsibility, so they don't want to expose problems, make decisions, accept tasks, or carry the burden. They push problems to leaders. Whatever the leader says, they do. If something goes wrong, it's not their fault. They don't use their brains, stay idle, and avoid responsibility. How nice! Thus, a group of hollow people is born—
贰
**Analysis of Why Hypermarkets Are Hard to Succeed In - Boss Level**
Here, "boss" doesn't refer to the big bosses of large companies with clear responsibilities; we're more inclined to refer to the vice president or director in charge of sales, the actual "boss" of sales. Of course, for distributor companies that haven't developed into enterprises, the boss handles everything. For ease of understanding, we'll use "boss" as a stand-in.
If a company can't do well in hypermarkets, the boss has a part in it. Why? As the old saying goes: If the upper beam is not straight, the lower beams will be crooked. Even if the boss doesn't personally issue orders about hypermarkets, the boss's awareness, mindset, and even daily words play a guiding role, subtly influencing the team's operations. How the boss views hypermarkets, what the boss thinks should be done, and what path the boss thinks to take will directly or indirectly be reflected in the operational plans. So, our bosses must avoid misconceptions and establish a correct understanding of hypermarkets. Don't accidentally go astray. If you deviate by 1 meter, your subordinates will deviate by 10 or even 100 meters. The consequences are serious!
What mistakes do bosses tend to make in the matter of "hypermarkets are hard, can't do well"? Let's look:
**\- Not understanding hypermarkets.** Not understanding, or understanding a little, hearing a bit here and there, without a comprehensive and systematic understanding. If you don't understand, you don't know the key control points, and you're prone to wrong instructions. If the strategy is wrong, the execution team below can do nothing. The boss holds the direction, but correct direction requires a correct understanding of hypermarkets. If a company's boss has no concept of hypermarkets, with laymen leading professionals, or even everyone being laymen, it's almost unimaginable to operate hypermarkets well. There are many "kind" bosses who, due to "trust," listen to biased opinions and are led astray by subordinates with ulterior motives. If the boss's thinking is wrong, can you blame the team for going astray? A soldier is a coward, but a general is a coward for a whole nest. If hypermarkets aren't done well, leaders certainly have an unshirkable responsibility. So, I suggest our bosses take time to visit hypermarkets, go to the front lines, talk to store people, listen to industry opinions, and pay attention to changes in hypermarkets—. With today's highly developed media, there are so many ways to learn. If you're willing, how can you not understand the real hypermarket? **Fixed mindset.** Another trait is very obvious in some bosses: a fixed mindset. These bosses succeeded with a certain method once, and they cling to it, believing it's the ultimate solution that will work forever. They refuse to accept new developments and changes, refuse to research and try new methods, leading to the problem of old medicine not curing new diseases. We all know that hypermarkets are evolving, and the rules of the game adjust. As a supplier, to do well, you must adjust your thinking and strategies according to new changes. No matter how successful a method was before, when the background and conditions change, you must adapt to the situation, not stubbornly hold on to old ways. Many companies used human wave tactics and money-burning strategies in their early days and succeeded, but later when business grew, they couldn't continue because costs were unbearable. The sales team operating hypermarkets needs to flexibly respond to changes. If others don't have it, I have it; if others have it, I have something special. In the end, it's about innovation. Monotonous repetition bores anyone, let alone experienced hypermarkets. A fixed mindset leads to team rigidity, which leads to declining competitiveness. This is a very scary phenomenon. Some bosses, to secure their position and retreat safely, ignore the company's long-term development, don't build infrastructure, don't improve management standards or optimize the sales team's skills, and don't establish a KA management model systematically. Instead, they repeat old routines, even overdrawing the company's future in terms of brand, costs, and personnel. This worries us more than problems with sales reps. **Self-comfort.** Some bosses are particularly like Ah Q, very optimistic and good at self-comfort, especially those domestic companies that have some brand recognition and product recognition, and relatively high single-product profit margins. Because profit margins are large, they can easily absorb hypermarket costs and various cooperation conditions, so they relax their vigilance and even don't think there's a problem. "The wool comes from the sheep's back. Anyway, my product has high profit, I'm not afraid of you. I'll play along with whatever you do." They don't psychologically value hypermarkets and don't treat doing well in hypermarkets, spending less and doing more, as an important topic. Because they're too rich, they don't need to study operational skills; too rich, no pressure, they can burn money to get by, and the team has no competitive or fighting spirit, and employees don't focus on self-improvement. "I'm rich and powerful, I'm the king, I'll crush you with money!" If the boss thinks this way, they'll find that employees are better at spending money, and there's never enough. The store's attitude toward you is: "You have money, I'll take it for free, and I'll still complain it's not enough. Giving is expected. If you don't give enough, I'll be unhappy and make your life hell. Anyway, besides burning money, you don't know how to do anything else." Self-comforting bosses are too naive. There are so many domestic and international top companies; their profits aren't higher than yours, but have you seen such thinking? Besides, how much money do you have to keep wasting day after day with hypermarkets? Don't you know hypermarkets are juicers? **Boss culture.** China is a magical country, and many Chinese companies are magical because the so-called corporate culture often becomes a boss culture. What the company wants doesn't matter; what matters is what the boss wants. How to please the boss is more important than how to do the work. If the boss is satisfied, it benefits me, and I can get promoted and raise my salary. So it becomes about pleasing the director, the manager, the supervisor, the team leader, forming a hierarchical boss culture. The company's interests are set aside, so it's not surprising to see things that sacrifice company interests to satisfy the boss's interests. Chinese people are so good at building relationships with superiors! "Man can conquer nature!" Because the boss's personal will dominates, there are no work standards, or standards are not enforced, and there are too many special cases. The boss's will becomes more important than the company's system. Employees learn to read faces. What the boss wants is more important than what the company wants. How to cater to the boss and please the boss is more important than how to do things correctly. To make the boss happy, they hide the truth and report only good news; to deal with the boss, they spend unnecessary money to buy temporary glory; to deal with the boss, they rob Peter to pay Paul to maintain a facade of prosperity—. If a company's KA team has such thinking, how can it truly do well in hypermarkets?
We've analyzed many reasons why hypermarkets are hard to do well in. So how should they be done well? There's a lot to say, but to summarize simply: **Start with the basics and details, change the single-soldier, single-point, loose operation model, take a systematic and professional route, and establish a KA management system suitable for your own company.** We'll discuss the topic of establishing a KA management system in another article.
Author: Huang Jing
Huang Jing, expert in hypermarket backend system design, researcher on supplier-retailer relations. With over ten years of professional procurement experience, from large state-owned retail enterprises to foreign hypermarkets, she has served as procurement section chief, procurement manager, procurement director, and training director, with a relatively complete career in the modern retail industry. She has conducted in-depth research on supplier-retailer relations, especially on procurement issues, negotiation, costs, contracts, and conflict resolution that suppliers care about.
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