Abstract: Due to fierce competition, many catering SaaS companies even started to sell software on e-commerce platforms. Most of the customers purchased on e-commerce platforms are small businesses. Their survival rate is low and the rate of bankruptcy is high, which is even more valuable for the company's long-term development. low.

The story should start with catering SaaS (software as a service).

The earliest Internet, or the C-end world, everyone is busy doing websites, doing apps, playing games, and few people pay attention to how to connect with the line, not to mention Internet-based enterprise service products, the Internet at that time. Lines and lines are like a sea that traverses a huge width, like an equal sign, moving forward in parallel and not crossing each other.

God said that there must be light, so there is light, Internet entrepreneurs saw the market for business services, so in the second half of 2014, the Chinese Internet suddenly entered the spring of the B2B industry.

Soon, venture capital and entrepreneurs began to flood into the B2B industry. A large number of companies were born in the past. Among them, the catering industry became the pioneer of the B2B industry due to the large market size, the large number of merchants and the low IT rate.

Fairly speaking, catering is the closest SaaS service to consumers and the Internet. After all, the Chinese people are eating for the sky, and the bigger things are bigger than eating. However, many startups have found that the catering industry operates after entering the catering SaaS industry. The multi-format and complexity far exceeds my imagination.

First of all, the chain and links of the restaurant front and rear, including the front hall, kitchen, supply chain, etc., including Chinese and Western food, fast food, hot pot, etc., different styles of restaurants have different software requirements, resulting in the product can not be standardized Products that cannot be standardized will generate a lot of research and development costs.

Secondly, software needs to be sold after research and development. A large number of restaurants means that a large number of sales teams are needed. As the cost of labor increases, the cost of sales of the company continues to increase. The average cost of a sale reaches about 10,000 yuan, which means It is difficult to form a sales team with hundreds of people.

Third, the characteristics of catering SaaS “heavy service” make the service just after the software sales, site investigation, installation, training, shop, after-sales service, etc., a lot of manpower and material resources in the whole service process, resulting in the cost of the company. It is difficult to compare with income, and it is difficult for most startups to break through.

Nowadays, SaaS is already in the Red Sea. Countless companies have entered this quagmire and then got stuck. "There are many manufacturers and small agents. The agents are small and miscellaneous. The products are old and old, and the service is slow and poor." "The manufacturers do not make money, the agent earns Small money. The customer spent money and regretted saving money. This sentence summarizes the basic status of the entire industry.

So what are the problems with catering SaaS? I think there are three core issues that have caused the industry to slow down.

The three core issues of catering SaaS: bubble, high valuation and profitable knot

The bubble is full. The banquet of SaaS is low, which is filled with a large number of startup companies. According to industry statistics, domestic startups that make catering software reach thousands of peaks. One of the most important reasons for the high bubble is that the threshold is low. Many small companies are like a small workshop. Several engineers write software code, start a brand name, and set up a sales team. They set up a new product and then financed. In a cell-like fashion, a large number of new companies were quickly created, and the bubble was flooding the market for a time.

The value is too high. The food and beverage SaaS industry seems to have a low threshold, but the high cost of obtaining customers and the low survival rate of customers (the restaurant has a 70% annual bankruptcy rate) has become the dead end of many companies.

According to industry estimates, the market value of a new three-board listed company in the market was as high as 1 billion, and its number of open customers reached 20,000 in 2017. The value of each customer has reached 50,000 yuan, which has violated common sense of business. In addition, according to the 70% business failure rate, how much value can the remaining customers bring to the company? The bubble is self-evident.

Especially in recent years, due to fierce competition, many catering SaaS companies have even begun to sell software on e-commerce platforms, while customers who purchase on e-commerce platforms are mostly small businesses, with low survival rate and high rate of failure, and the value of the company's long-term development is even more Low.

The profit is dead. Early catering software, the price is as high as tens of thousands of dollars, a startup company can still profit if it can sell hundreds of thousands of software every year. In the SaaS phase, venture capital entered the market, prompting the company to generally start SaaS, and the price has dropped from tens of thousands of yuan to thousands of yuan, hundreds of dollars, and even free models. This kind of capital intrusion has stirred the market. To a large extent, it has shaken the profitable soil on which the entire market depends.

Why is retail SaaS a new blue ocean?

In October 2016, Ma Yun first proposed the concept of new retail. In the following year, new retail sales were in full swing. Jingdong also proposed unbounded retail, new convenience, daily convenience and convenience, and other major companies in the past year have launched unmanned convenience stores, unmanned shelf products, the entire new retail market was suddenly activated.

In the new retail industry, whether it is giants like Ali, Tencent, JD, or traditional companies like Carrefour and RT-Mart, they are all in the process of exploration, and platform-based companies have not yet formed. For startups, retail SaaS is still a blue ocean.

And capital is also pouring into this blue ocean market. However, from the second half of 2017, the intelligent retail service platform “Store+” recently completed 30 million RMB Pre-A round financing; the retail SaaS enterprise “Qijiayun” completed A round of nearly 100 million financing; the new retail scene marketing SaaS platform Le Dou got tens of thousands of angel round financing and so on.

Why is the retail SaaS company suddenly coming to spring? In the retail SaaS, the supply chain is its core, which determines that, unlike the multi-format and complexity of the catering industry, the complexity of the operation of convenience stores in many communities and business districts is greatly reduced, the products are easily standardized, and the convenience stores are upgraded. The need is great and the pain point is obvious.

Community and business district convenience stores, as a community and business district, the flow of people is relatively fixed. The core is to improve internal operation efficiency, reduce wear and tear, and improve the data and scientific selection of category selection through SaaS software. This is the retail SaaS service. The supply chain that the business should do is empowered.

Let's take 7-11 as an example. 7-11 is the core of its competitiveness for the scientific, data and high efficiency of its store supply chain management. In the supply chain product empowerment, 7-11 manages the single product very finely. When doing product analysis, it also analyzes and manages according to various items. For example, it will separately perform a certain pure water or tea beverage. Analysis is not simply a matter of beverages. According to sales volume and customer preferences, different types of products are divided into different single items, and the dynamic changes of the products at each moment are mastered through the management of single items, and the accuracy of stocking is realized. Through this sophisticated product management, the 7-11 convenience store keeps inventory to a minimum without being out of stock, raising profits to a maximum. As the champion of the Japanese retail industry, its single store sales are much higher than other convenience store companies.

The cloud processor can complete data analysis in 20 minutes, helping the store to adjust the price, delivery and promotions in real time. 15-18 kinds of goods will be exchanged every 3 days, and the product elimination rate will be 70%. The headquarters also has set up the staff of OFC (Operation Site Guidance), each of whom is responsible for 7~8 stores, and is engaged in the consulting work of the first-line store operation guidance. They come to the store twice a week, each time staying for 3-4 hours.

The 7-11 across the sea provides a very good study sample and role model for Chinese retailers, and for those supermarkets that want to run into the new retail era, Shangchao, commercial complexes, direct sales stores, The complete SaaS service software is the only way to get started, which is also the business opportunity of retail SaaS.

Can retail SaaS make money? can

Ok, so much, then for the large number of small and medium-sized SaaS entrepreneurs still waiting to see, the most concerned issue is, can retail SaaS make money? The answer is, yes.

We can give a few examples.

I will briefly explain that this is a comparison chart of the profitability of retail and catering SaaS service companies listed on the Main Board and the New Third Board. The company is doing retail services, and Tiancai Shanglong and Keruyun are doing catering. In the first half of 2017, the retail service company SiXun Software's operating income in the first half of 2017 reached 537.88 million yuan, net profit of 2374.95 million yuan, Kemai technology revenue of 246.565 million yuan, net profit - 3.189 million yuan, and catering services The company's Tiancai Shanglong's revenue was 33,170,200 yuan, but the loss reached -232.03 million yuan. The same catering service company was like a cloud. In the first half of 2017, the revenue was 68.772 million yuan and the net profit was -554.47 million yuan.

In other words, the company that makes catering SaaS is still losing money, and it is a huge loss, and the retail service has already made money.

How to understand the future development of catering SaaS? I think it can be understood as a highway. The purpose of the highway is to facilitate the transportation between destinations, but if the highway is built in a deserted desert, the loss is inevitable.

Take the film industry as an example. Before the emergence of such as cat eyes and Taobao tickets, the cinema's SaaS system only solves the management inside the theater. When the online ticketing system is connected, the platform connects the theater and the user, and the user can buy tickets in real time through the mobile phone. The selection of seats has solved the pain points that the former users can't buy tickets for popular movies, wait for long time in the theater, can't choose seats, and finally improve the attendance rate of the theater, which is convenient for users, so each ticket adds 3 or 5 yuan. The service fee is also accepted by the user.

In the same way, the new retail has become unstoppable. Ali has invested in RT-Mart and made a fresh box. Tencent has invested in Yonghui Supermarket and invested in the new retail product super-species incubating by Yonghui Supermarket. The trend of Internet giants integrating offline retail resources has become more and more obvious. And a large number of supermarkets and shops scattered in the streets and second- and third-tier cities will also access the Internet at an extremely fast speed.

This is the best era in the retail SaaS industry. It can be expected that in the next two to three years, a large number of offline retail companies will be integrated into the new retail system. This huge SaaS demand is unimaginable for every catering SaaS service company. .

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