Why do hot pot restaurants add desserts? What can the "hot pot + dessert" model develop into? "How many girls are here for desserts?" Most of the signature dishes in this hot pot restaurant are actually desserts? "

Recently, many hot pot brands rely on desserts to attract customers. What is the effect?

ONE

Hot pot is starting to become "sweet"

In a hot pot restaurant, 13 of the 20 signature dishes are desserts!

Desserts cover a wide range of Chinese desserts, including yogurt, burnt grass and other Chinese desserts, Hong Kong-style desserts with Yangzhi nectar, and Korean desserts with shaved ice in the snow-capped mountains that have become popular in recent years.

In online reviews, almost every review mentions his desserts, which are rich in variety, professional, delicious, and exquisite...

This is the old hot pot of Lu Principal (hereinafter referred to as "Lu Principal"), which has exploded in Chongqing recently. It queues for an average of 3 hours and has become an Internet celebrity restaurant where young customers are rushing to check in.

However, this "hot pot + dessert" model is not unique to Principal Lu. Hot pot skewers brands such as Nan Hot Pot and Anger 80, which are also represented by Chongqing Xinrui Hot Pot, are all a little bit "do not do their jobs" and delve into desserts.

Coincidentally, the neighboring Chengdu dining colleagues also discovered the charm of desserts. Originated in Chengdu, Jiyu Thai Seafood Hot Pot has 130 stores across the country. Every time a new store opens, it always focuses on promoting its own "free and unlimited supply of desserts".

Hot pot giant Haidilao seems to be responding to this trend of desserts. Recently, his new products are mainly dessert snacks, such as mango pig dafu, cheese fish fillet, horseshoe yam egg tarts and so on.

It seems that the hot pot, which has always been stimulating, seems to be really starting to sweeten.

TWO

Dessert goal: to please young people

Mixing and matching desserts with hot pot is just like Cou Cou's unique path of "hot pot + tea". It seems inconsistent, but it is the inevitable development of the market.

1. Sweet and spicy complement each other perfectly

Without exception, catering people first explain from the product dimension.

"We added desserts at the beginning of the establishment, but we actually started from the taste." Du Beibei, the proprietress of Chongqing Noodles-Fat Girl Noodle Shop in Beijing, told Xiaoxin that many traditional Sichuan-Chongqing hot pot restaurants have ice powder. Traditional Chinese desserts, because they are matched. Therefore, when making Chongqing noodles, she also naturally paired ice powder and cold cake with Chongqing noodles.

"After eating the spicy hot pot, desserts can alleviate this stimulation very well." Yang Aixiang, co-founder of Liziba Liangshan Chicken, told Xiaoxin that sweet and spicy are complementary flavors. For this reason, Liangshan Chicken, which is a sub-category of authentic Sichuan-Chongqing hot pot, has recently added sweet varieties, and even added a dessert station next to its new store, which shows the emphasis on desserts.

2. Profit-seeking single product: gross profit is generally higher than that of meals

“Desserts do not affect the sales of dinner meals, they are a positive increase in the store.” Zhou Yu, the head of Oban China Drink, said that Oban, as a well-known service provider in the catering industry, paid attention to desserts as early as 7 years ago and returned to the seabed. Lao has done the "drinks + desserts" service plan. "However, the influence of desserts in the industry at that time was not as strong as it is now, and Haidilao only used a few of our drinks."

However, Haidilao has quietly increased prices recently, and behind the increase in customer unit prices, there are many new desserts.

Moreover, as we all know, the profit margin of desserts is relatively high. Zhou Yu, for example, for example, a Yangzhi Ganlu can sell for 15-20 yuan in a regular restaurant, but its cost can be controlled at 4 or 5 yuan.

3. The juvenile economy is on the rise

Taking a closer look at these few food and beverage brands that were the first to try desserts, Xiaoxin found that they all accurately target young people without exception.

Anger 80’s positioning is very clear, that is, to catch the post-90s, post-95s, and even post-00s; Jiyu’s focus is also on the 18-35 year-old customer group, and even more specific to women; and the founder of Lu principal Chen Yusen In order to get closer to young people, even set a rule for the marketing department to only recruit employees under the age of 25.

Behind the clear positioning is just to capture the mainstream customer base.

Judging from the online user data of Meituan from March to April, young people in the three age groups of 85, 90, and 95 are the absolute main force in online hot pot consumption, contributing 85% of the market share.

In fact, not only the hot pot, but the mainstream consumer groups in the entire industry are getting younger. Many catering people said that under the epidemic, only young people dared to come out and consume.

To please young people is actually the core driving force for adding desserts.

Whether it is products, marketing, or services, constantly capturing, digging into, and satisfying the needs of target customers are the rules of survival that, in the eyes of the public, are "net celebrity brands".

Just as Yang Aixiang explained to the "Unrecognizable" new store: "Although there are many difficulties and doubts. Embracing young people is still our direction."

THREE

What can the "hot pot + dessert" model grow into?

When a new species comes out, we will inevitably try to explore what it will look like in the future. What can the current "hot pot + dessert" model grow into?

In addition to the traditional mode of adding several desserts to the menu, Xiaoxin sees that there are more new ways to play in the industry.

1. Drainage weapon: free desserts, attract customers

Free desserts are a powerful tool for many hot pot restaurants to attract customers.

During the peak period of the restaurant, the waiting time is long and endless. Snacks such as popcorn and fruit have become standard actions. Yes, it’s better, but it’s hard to bring surprises, and it’s harder to trigger customer self-propagation.

Chen Yusen said, “Now the value of the face is justice, and the value of the face is the flow. No matter how you shoot traditional things, it won’t appeal to him. Only if there is good looks, there will be second spread.

Therefore, Principal Lu set up a stall in the store, and a dedicated person is responsible for making a wide range of desserts, and they are provided free of charge. For consumers, this is a surprise service.

As a result, evaluations like the following abound.

On the surface, the free supply of desserts is a loss-making business, but he has his own statement, "We position desserts as marketing products, which is a draining thing, so we did not regard the raw materials and free sales of desserts as costs. It’s marketing expenses.”

2. Shop-in-shop mode: special stalls, take-out delivery

Wang Yi, the founder of Anger 80, once provided two keywords to the media: dessert station and menu.

There is an external dessert station at the entrance of each store, which focuses on Chongqing's local special desserts, such as ice glutinous rice balls, with 7 or 8 flavors, such as Baixue, Rose, Anger, Toffee and so on.

The products at the Dessert Station can be sold internally, as an auxiliary product for hot pot, or sold externally and take away.

This auxiliary sales effect is obvious. It is understood that the highest single store can sell more than 700 iced dumplings a day, and the sales of its desserts account for about 10% of the total revenue. For example, the 9th Street Store has a monthly maximum turnover of 1 million, and desserts can be sold for 150,000.

3. Independent brands: from hot pot to desserts, try new products

In the early years, Coucou created the original "hot pot + tea" model, and it was also the first to develop from a store-in-shop to an independent tea brand "Chamicha". With a profit ratio of over 80% of tea drinks, Chamicha's bar counter in the Coucuo store can bring a 20% high revenue share to the store.

Along this path, we can predict that there may be hot pot brands in the future to try this out and test the water dessert track. Pang Mei Nian Zhuang has developed an independent dessert brand-Pang Mei Picking Sugar, which focuses on seasonal Chinese sweets.

In this regard, Du Beibei said that it was the result of letting the flow go. “The store initially had small noodles and Chinese desserts and snacks. Customers were guided by the menu and gradually developed this dining habit. The small noodles must be added with a cold cake or ice powder. "

After cultivating this consumption habit, Du Beibei took advantage of the opportunity of store renovation to set up a dessert stall next to the original location of the store, which not only met domestic demand, but also sold out.

To be an independent dessert brand, she also has her "ambition" for desserts, and she wants to be a different Chinese syrup brand. "Make it in accordance with the season. For example, our ice cream is handmade Italian ice cream, and we will regularly extend new products in combination with the season. We make persimmon sorbet in autumn. Recently, we have been on the candied haw sorbet in the cold winter." Bravely cross.

FOUR

The hot pot track divides, divides and recombines

From subdivision to cross-border union

In this cold winter, the hot pot is boiling as always, and there have been many changes in the past two years.

The first is to continuously subdivide, from the original red soup and white soup to the current hairy belly, waist slices, coconut chicken, pork belly chicken...there are countless subdivisions.

The continuously refined track is to refocus the consumer group to meet different users more accurately. Of course, in addition to subdivision, there is also integration. From the past hot pot "+ tea" to today's "+ dessert", they are all breakthrough attempts by brands in the deep Red Sea.

Regardless of the division, division, and combination, in-depth research is actually the result of deep insights into consumers. Where is your target group, what they are thinking about, what they are doing, and what they like, you try to do what they do. The so-called "userism" is just that. "Hot pot + dessert", how far do you think you can go?