The coffee accompanies you to encounter a public protest from the franchisee who is accused of being a liar brand.

Coffee to accompany you to make amends?

Coffee accompany you fraud company to return my hard-earned money-on April 25, 2015, Yixiangcheng Coffee in Nanan District of Chongqing was hung up by a group of uninvited guests, attracting onlookers around this seemingly lively coffee brand. why on earth has it become a "fraud company" in this group of people?

It turns out that this group of uninvited guests are actually franchisees who accompany you in coffee. They have joined the three stores that accompany you in Chongqing, but now all three stores are closed. Out of dissatisfaction with the coffee company, these franchisees came to this direct store in Elephant City with banners to protest.

In fact, this is not the first time these franchisees have protested. Ms. Wang, a franchisee, told the Business New Media reporter at the scene of the protest that a direct store with you in the northern new area of Chongqing was closed two weeks ago because of their protest, but so far your company has not taken any measures. Also at the scene of the protest at the store in Yixiang City, the clerks did not come forward to stop it, but just stopped the business and wait for it to change, while the person in charge of the operation who came later did not express strong opposition and accepted the truth with a look of helplessness after a few words of unsuccessful persuasion.

The franchisee publicly protested, and the company's employees did not intend to stop it, while similar store closures broke out in other cities in the country, such as Guiyang and Hangzhou. What's wrong with coffee with you? What is the operating system behind this Korean coffee brand? What kind of problems are implied in this system?

The "special" joining mode

Coffee accompany you was founded in 2008, has more than 800 chain stores in South Korea, is the largest coffee chain brand in South Korea. In recent years, the Chinese coffee market has grown rapidly. under this trend, a company called China Enterprise Investment Group established Coffee Management Co., Ltd. in Shanghai in 2012 in cooperation with Korean Coffee Co., Ltd. is responsible for introducing this brand to the Chinese market.

What kind of company is China Enterprise Investment Group? Public data show that the China Enterprise Investment Group is a cross-industry, trans-regional joint-stock company, mainly involved in real estate, finance, aquaculture, tourism, associations and services and other fields. Its chairman, Lu Changqing, has a series of halo-like titles such as "President of the World Outstanding Chinese Business Association", "Chairman of China Private Entrepreneur Association" and "Chairman of China Zhejiang Merchants Association".

On the face of it, this cooperation between China and South Korea shows a trend of "strong cooperation". At the beginning of the cooperation, Korean coffee accompanies you to put aside its bold words and will challenge Starbucks' position in the Chinese market.

How to challenge? Coffee accompanies you in the Chinese market to adopt two modes of opening stores: direct stores and franchisees, and except for a small number of direct stores, more than 95% of the stores with you are franchisees. More importantly, its joining model is completely different from the usual franchise, but a model that it calls "fiduciary entrepreneurial franchise".

What is a "fiduciary business license"? That is, the franchisee and the coffee company will cooperate to open a store with 49% to 51% of the shares, while the franchisee will fully entrust the store to the management of the coffee company and enjoy the dividend income. With only money and no effort to take care of it, you can own a coffee shop endorsed by South Korean stars Jang Geun-suk and Kim Soo-Hyun, and enjoy the profits. For many franchisees, this is undoubtedly a great temptation.

Chongqing, a group of franchisees who organized protests, recalled to reporters that the reason why they joined coffee to accompany you in 2014 was mainly based on three points: first, the domestic coffee market was hot and the business prospects were good; second, there would be no problem for big Korean brands; and third, they all had their own businesses, and this model of not having to manage themselves was aimed at their needs.

Based on this strong sense of trust, when negotiating to join, they did not even carefully question the cost budget and revenue expectations given by the coffee company. For example, how much does it cost to open a coffee shop with you?

Take a store of about 200square meters as an example, according to the calculation of the coffee company, the total cost is about 3 million yuan. This includes 350000 yuan for entrusted operation and management fees, 100000 yuan for staff training, 600000 yuan for interior design and decoration (3000 yuan per square meter), 100000 yuan for on-site supervision, 800000 yuan for equipment and furniture, 100000 yuan for signboards and images, 100000 yuan for MD goods and consumables, 100000 yuan for POP advertising and event planning, 100000 yuan for logistics deposit, 90,000 yuan for initial materials, Fees such as 100000 yuan for license processing and 350000 yuan for entrusted business deposit.

Franchisees later found that almost every item in this long list of fees had the problem of overpriced or fictitious names. For example, it costs 100000 yuan to apply for industrial and commercial licenses and various certificates. For example, Kimberly-Clark M39 double-headed semi-automatic coffee machine, the wholesale price is about 50, 000 yuan, coffee with you is priced at 120000 yuan. For example, a variety of margin, franchisee and coffee to accompany your cooperation, in fact, is a joint venture to open a store, there is no shareholder to another shareholder margin reason.

In fact, according to the normal market price, the actual cost of opening a coffee store of this size is about 800000 yuan, while the franchisee spent 1.47 million yuan and only accounts for 49% of the shares. What is even more outrageous is that the franchisees in Chongqing have not yet seen the proof of investment of another 51% of the shares in your company with coffee.

Chaotic store management

Now, remembering the "overlord contract" that accepted the coffee to accompany you, Chongqing, a group of franchisees who organized the protest, said they blamed it for being hot-headed at that time. In fact, some franchisees have questioned some of the terms of the contract, but the answer is that coffee accompanies you to use a unified national contract, which cannot be changed. "such a big brand, it is impossible to fool people," these franchisees finally chose to join.

And this is just the beginning of a series of problems, and more problems follow after the store opens.

Ms. Wang, the franchisee of the Chongqing Ruifu Square store, told the reporter that before the opening, the staff of the Chongqing office made a planning book for the opening ceremony at a cost of up to 30,000 yuan, which surprised Ms. Wang. "what kind of flower basket costs more than 300 yuan each?" Ms. Wang questioned the offer, which was significantly higher than the market, and finally rejected the proposal.

Ms. Wang revealed that there are only two staff in the Chongqing office of your company, one of which is responsible for joining the store, while the other is mainly responsible for the operation and management of the store. At present, coffee accompanies you in more than 10 stores in Chongqing, and this kind of staffing is certainly not enough.

But even so, Ms. Wang is unable to control the store to some extent. For example, the Reifu Plaza store in Chongqing is located in the gathering place of entertainment venues in Chongqing, and the flow of people is relatively large at night. Ms. Wang suggested that the business hours be postponed to 12:00 in the evening. However, after the business was delayed for a month, the coffee company moved the closing time to 10:00 in the evening without notifying Ms. Wang.

The problem is more than that. As an investor, although she is not directly involved in the operation of the store, apart from the daily turnover, Ms. Wang can not get any other financial data from the coffee company. According to the previous agreement, the two sides have to set up a joint account and jointly supervise it, but Ms. Wang has not seen this account so far. The same thing also happened to the franchisees of Nanping New Year's Day department store and Nanping East and West Motors Store.

What happened next shocked Ms. Wang and other franchisees-the coffee company was in arrears with your company. Due to the long arrears of raw material suppliers, equipment suppliers and even the construction side, the raw material suppliers stopped supplying materials to most of the stores in the country, and the equipment suppliers refused to repair the faulty equipment. As a result, some of the products cannot be sold.

In the case of "running out of ammunition", local stores can only purchase raw materials locally, and even the most core raw materials, coffee beans, are purchased at will, directly leading to the decline of coffee quality and inconsistent taste, which is undoubtedly a devastating blow to a chain coffee brand. In fact, many consumers have also found this problem. Coffee tastes different in different stores, and most of them are terrible. As a result, many franchisees have found that the local purchase prices of raw materials of the same brand and specifications are far lower than the previous prices of coffee to accompany you with the distribution of materials.

Ms. Wang and other franchisees reflected this series of questions to the person in charge of the coffee office in Chongqing, but the answer was: "there is nothing we can do. We have to ask the supervisor in the southwest." The director of the southwest district pushed it to the company headquarters, and the question never got a satisfactory answer.

After more than half a year of trouble, there was an even more surprising news that South Korea had withdrawn its investment. As for the reason, it is said that after South Korea found these problems, in order to maintain the image of "coffee with you", it chose to withdraw its investment after failing to stop it. It is also said that the South Korean side can not compete with the Chinese team in corporate politics, do not have a say and divest.

An awkward protest

There is a problem that Ms. Wang and other franchisees still do not understand. If coffee accompanies your company through more than 600 franchise stores across the country, it should also attract more than 600 million yuan. Even if half of this money is spent on store operation, it will not be as chaotic as it is now. So, where on earth did the money go?

It is rumored that the Chinese investment group took the money to invest overseas, but the investment failed, resulting in a break in the company's internal capital chain. At the same time, its coffee company does not want to take care of your shop, resulting in many stores across the country not making money or even losing money.

In December 2014, Ms. Wang and other three franchisees in Chongqing helplessly chose to withdraw their shares and stop their losses. After negotiation, the coffee company agreed to the divestment and liquidation of the three franchisees and gave the settlement price. Ms. Wang thought it would end with a loss of hundreds of thousands of yuan, but unexpectedly, the coffee was delayed again and again with your company, not to be solved.

In March 2015, Ms. Wang received a notice from Reifu Plaza (which was closed in July 2014 due to poor management) to make up for the shop rent owed. "Coffee accompanies your company as a store manager, why not coordinate the rent to the mall?" Ms. Wang is angry at the inaction that coffee accompanies your company.

In the end, the store was shut down because of a lack of water and electricity. What makes Ms. Wang even more angry is that coffee accompanies your company to remove dinner plates and other materials without notifying her. The same situation also occurred in the New Year's Day department store in Nanping.

Desperate franchisees have to choose to put up banners in the direct stores that can only accompany your company in coffee, and there is the scene at the beginning of the article. Dramatically, when they first protested at a store in the northern new area of Chongqing, Lu Changqing personally called and invited them to send a representative to Beijing for an interview.

The representatives they sent met Lu Changqing at the Zhejiang Trade Building near the Bird's Nest, the headquarters of the China Enterprise Investment Group. Lu Changqing promised face to face that the liquidation money would be returned by March 31. Unexpectedly, after returning to Chongqing, the franchisees have not yet received the settlement, and they can no longer contact Lu Changqing. These franchisees thought that the coffee company had no credit to speak of, so they had no choice but to go to the direct store in Elephant City, Nanan District, to protest. At the same time, they also took the matter to law and reported it to the economic investigation for filing.

With regard to this series of questions about coffee company, the reporter asked the coffee company for confirmation, but Mr. Huang, director of store operation in Chongqing, and Qi Xiaobing, head of coffee company in Chongqing, said that they would not be interviewed and would not make any response. The reporter contacted Lu Changqing on the phone, and his phone has not been answered.

As of press time, "Coffee accompany you" two direct stores in Chongqing are still closed, the matter is still up in the air. Ms. Wang and other franchisees told reporters that there are still many franchisees who want to join this "liar brand". The reason why we protest publicly is to make it no longer "deceitful".

Source: Sina Finance