Lu Wenbing: From The Roots Of Niu Gen Sheng To The President Of Little Fat Sheep

Lu Wenbing, the chief executive of the small fat sheep, was born to Niu Gensheng, a member of the Inner Mongolia sheep, who helped to finance and list a bull in Inner Mongolia. At first, he did not want to go to "little fat sheep", but the old ox finally let Lao Lu feel free to go and help the "sheep" financing and listing.

The 9 floor of Ulan Road, Baotou, Inner Mongolia, is a five storey building compared with the surrounding buildings. The two lambs, carved from white marble, stand close to the side of the gate and look very close.

On the top of the building, the five big characters of "little fat sheep mansion" stand together with the signs of the surrounding buildings, making it difficult to discern the influence of "Shabu" in Chinese restaurants.

The two floor downstairs of the little fat sheep building is the place where the patrons can rinse mutton, and the crowd is bustling.

Even in the five floor, Lu Wen Bin's office, the flavor of a mutton chafing dish is still winding.

When he entered the room, he did not hear its fragrance. At that time, Lu Wen soldier had no sense of newcomer. He sat reluctantly on the chair of the president.

In the interview process, Lu Wen's two phone rings, one is Motorola V3, the other is the PHS which has worn out and broken.

The "abandoned ox" from the sheep, "Luoxing" and "Luwen soldiers" are the sheep who claim to be very fond of mutton.

It is interesting that Niu Gensheng, the chairman of Mengniu Group, a former owner, is an ox, claiming to be dealing with cattle all his life.

Lu and Niu Gensheng are different from their poor backgrounds, and Lu Wen Ping has a pleasant journey.

After graduating from University, he worked as a civil servant, worked as a deputy factory director in a factory, and later engaged in the securities and financial industry. He worked in Inner Mongolia securities regulatory bureau and Everbright Securities.

Since then, Lu Mengbin has joined Mengniu and is responsible for investment and financing. He is the planner and promoter of Mengniu's listing in Hongkong, and became Vice President of Mengniu's investment and financing in 2002.

In 2004, after consulting with Mengniu company, Lu Wenbing was pferred to small fat sheep as executive vice president. In April of this year, he officially became president of Inner Mongolia small fat sheep catering chain corporation.

Lu Wen and Lu Wen joined the little fat sheep after a little "unintentional".

Due to the rapid expansion of small sheep and the implementation of the general agent system, many unqualified franchisees went wrong and seriously affected the brand image of little sheep.

At this point, little sheep need foreign aid badly.

Zhang Gang, chairman of the small fat sheep chairman, revealed that he first met Sun Xianhong, another vice president of Mengniu, and invited him to join us.

After Zhang Gang's third invitation, Sun Xianhong finally came to visit the little fat sheep himself, but he was accompanied by Lu Wenbing, director of financial investment at Mengniu.

The intention of sun Xian Hong is to let the ROK soldiers who are proficient in finance see the family property of the enterprise. Unexpectedly, when they get out of the door of the little fat sheep, Lu Wenbing says, "very good, it can be entered completely."

The result of this is that Zhang Gang gave Sun Xianhong the 5% stake of the little sheep, and Sun Xianhong gave him 2% to Lu Wenbing, and two of them became the shareholders of the little sheep.

He had hesitated before, and Mengniu was in the limelight. He also held considerable options.

But Zhanggang advised him that after the listing of little fat sheep, the value was immeasurable. How could the option be mentioned in the same breath?

At the same time, Zhang Gang sent Niu Gensheng a letter, named for Lu Wen, and asked the government to come forward and say "three visits to the cottage".

In order to let Lu Wen soldier feel relieved, Niu Gensheng said to Lu Wenbing, "when you want to come back, you can come back."

The last reason for joining the little fat sheep is that, "I personally prefer to invest and do business on the market, and I am used to standing behind the scenes."

In his view, he has been immersed in the investment field for many years, and has many ideas, and also has industry judgement, which is enough to operate in this field.

Financing and listing for little sheep became the main reason for Lu Wen to join.

In addition to helping many companies listed on Everbright Securities, Mr Lo also participated in the two financing process of Mengniu in 2002 and 2003.

Lu Wen and Lu Wen Wu did not lose hope.

In 2006, 3I and two overseas investment institutions jointly invested 25 million US dollars to become new shareholders of little sheep, and little sheep became the first Chinese catering company to introduce overseas private equity funds.

3I, headquartered in London, has invested more than $12 billion in assets and has invested in Focus Media. The most famous investment project in mainland China is Suntech Wuxi, which is based in Miami.

In August of 2005, 3I began contact with little sheep.

At that time, he was busy looking for suitable investors for the company, and the suitors came in succession. Nearly 20 investment institutions at home and abroad showed their good intentions, including Goldman Sachs, a heavyweight investment bank.

After a comprehensive consideration, 3I estimates 800 million -10 billion yuan for little sheep.

In the "linked terms of business performance", the little fat sheep promised the other party that the compound annual growth rate should be no less than 40%. If the target is not agreed, the little sheep will provide compensation to the other party.

At the end of June 2006, little fat sheep finally reached an agreement with 3I and Pu Kai. The two sides jointly invested 25 million US dollars in the 30% share of the joint venture company, of which 3I contributed 20 million and Pu Kai invested 5 million.

At the same time, executive directors from 3I and Pu Kai appear in the board of the joint venture company and have a veto power in the resolution of the board of directors.

"Little fat sheep just got the 30 million yuan loan from the Agricultural Bank," he said. "In fact, it is not short of money."

Lu Wenbing said that when foreign investors entered the small sheep as investors, it was to make the company have an international governance structure and financing capability.

He said, "little sheep will be listed overseas in the next year, probably Hongkong."

The plan will raise about 1 billion Hong Kong dollars.

As for how to deal with the funds to be raised, Lu said, 80% of the financing will be used in the catering industry, the number of restaurants to expand the small fat sheep will be expanded; the other 20% will be used for the marketing of chafing dish soup, and the sale of lamb meat into the supermarket, which accounts for about 10% of the total.

In May 28th, May 28th, Shanghai, the 2007 National Franchisee conference and the small fat sheep join the market consolidation results and the future strategic press conference were held here. More than 130 franchisees made the venue lively.

Small fat sheep announced the same day, restart alliance strategy.

In the view of Lu Wen bin, this is the largest event in the 8 years since the establishment of little fat sheep. It has important strategic significance.

In the domestic market, the first and second tier cities are mainly direct battalions. The two or three tier cities are mainly franchising, forming a pattern of mutual complementation and mutual promotion, and the domestic market is becoming more mature and perfect, so there will be no general agent in any country.

Lu Wenbing explained the strategy of redefining the fat sheep.

In the overseas market, there are nearly 20 stores in the United States, Canada, Japan and so on. All of them are direct battalions. The leaders are stationed at headquarters, and the soup is carried by the side.

"We use some New Zealand mutton outside China," Lu Wenbing said. "In fact, mutton in Inner Mongolia is still tasty."

In fact, before the re recruitment of franchisees, the little fat sheep had already cleaned up the portal.

As early as the beginning of development, small fat sheep's joining strategy is "joining the main, focusing on direct camp".

We have set up provincial, municipal and county general agencies and independent franchisees throughout the country, and have implemented direct operation strategies in key cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.

This kind of horse race and large scale operation mode played a positive role in the early development of small sheep. It not only satisfied the market, but also created good brand benefits, which laid the foundation for small sheep in the short span of two or three years.

The speed of joining the league has also exposed more and more problems.

The quality of the franchisee, the quality of service and management are uneven, and the imperfect chain service system also makes the small sheep have to slow down.

At the same time, as a result of the popularity of small sheep, many "Li Gui" also took the opportunity to get a slice of it, which seriously hurt the reputation of the little fat sheep brand.

The little fat sheep gradually realized this problem.

Since the end of 2002, small fat sheep have taken a series of measures to reverse the confusion of joining the market.

The core is to adjust the franchise policy, from the original "to join the main focus, direct camp" into "direct camp based, standardized joining."

Therefore, the franchise center was established in Beijing, mainly responsible for the franchisee's contact, management and service.

At the beginning of 2003, on the basis of the investigation of the franchise center, the board of directors made a decision to suspend business. After a long time, little fat sheep did not add new stores.

At the same time, the little sheep staged a series of standardization and rectification to join the market in a phased and focused way.

From 2003 to 2007, the company carried out large-scale rectification of the joining market.

After several years of continuous cleaning, adjustment and regulation, the number of chain stores has decreased from 721 in the peak period to 326 in the current period (105 outlets and 221 franchisees).

Among them, there were 218 unqualified stores that were closed after the general agency was expired, including 72 in Henan, 38 in Shandong, 39 in Shaanxi, 2 in Qinghai, 43 in the northeast, 43 in the franchised stores which were banned because of the fact that they could not maintain the image and reputation of small sheep; 19 stores were banned because of violation of regulations; there were 40 stores being banned because of overdue operations; there were 21 stores banned by major complaints; and there were 21 stores on the grounds of bad management and closed stores, and the stores were closed due to force majeure factors. The stores were closed to the stores in.

At the same time, small sheep also see "good" to close.

Purchase and incorporate the profitable single store or general agent into the standardized management system of the company's direct store, and gradually recover the agency right of the general agent at all levels.

For those unqualified stores to ban, for those who are poor in operation, but can actively cooperate with the rectification of the store to be retained, and deadline for rectification.

"After rejoining the market, we should not only focus on quantity and quality," Lu said.

He said that in the future, small sheep will further strengthen their control over chain stores, whether they are franchised stores or direct stores. After rejoining, the emphasis will be placed on strengthening guidance, service and management of franchisees, including not only the guidance of pre location, but also the management and services of unified logistics distribution, store supervision, supervision and staff training.

The ultimate goal is to improve the standardization of franchise store operation and make it operate at a high level so as to achieve the three win win among small fat sheep companies, joining partners and consumers.

"The market of Chinese catering industry is really big," he repeatedly sighed.

He introduced to us that "China Food Market Research Report 2006" showed that in 2005, the retail sales volume of catering industry in China reached 888 billion 680 million yuan in the year, and exceeded 1 trillion yuan in 2006.

One of the coordinates that can be referred to is "Hongkong has only 5 million people, but there are many restaurants in which the annual income is about 5 billion yuan."

Lu Wenbing said.

In the past ten years, the Chinese food industry has been growing by two digits.

This market is very large and expands very fast, but the market is very dispersed at the same time. There is no large catering group in China that can occupy 1% of the market share. The catering market is the most dispersed market, and the catering industry is a fully competitive industry.

In recent years, many Chinese food have tried to replicate the successful experience of KFC and McDonald's.

"Shabu chafing dish is very easy to standardize, which is not comparable to any Chinese restaurant company."

Lu Wenbing is the way to explain the success of little sheep.

He believes that the scale of Chinese food enterprises is largely restricted by the chef.

But chafing dish is different, lamb of small fat sheep is standardized supply and production, hot pot soup is industrialized production, standardized packaging.

More importantly, little sheep are not restricted by the cooks.

In 2006, small fat sheep hired Roland Begg, an internationally renowned strategy consulting firms, to do its due diligence. It concluded that the domestic market capacity of little sheep is at least 1500.

With the rapid growth of the number of diners, the demand for mutton is increasing.

Lu Wenbing said, "at present, the level of processing slaughtering in Inner Mongolia is relatively low, and we will actively guide and improve its comprehensive utilization rate."

According to Lu Wenbing's description, the little fat sheep will spend 110 million yuan on cattle and sheep breeding and processing. The number of sheep is about 70 million, which is enough to meet the market demand for mutton.