The road to entrepreneurship with the aroma of coffee

Zheng Qibin and his brand cafe.

Zheng Qibin's team decorated the cafe by themselves.

It is the annual graduation season, and a new group of fresh graduates are about to enter the workplace from campus. While they are running around looking for jobs, Zheng Qibin, a recent graduate majoring in social work at Guangdong University of Finance and Economics, is already a young entrepreneur with a self-created coffee chain and three branches in Foshan and Guangzhou. The boy from Jieyang, Guangdong Province is only 23 years old this year.

When it comes to coffee, many people may immediately think of popular films such as "Coffee Prince one" and "36th Story". It is the dream of many young people to open their own coffee shop. The goal of Zheng Qibin and his team is more than that, but to build the number one brand of Chinese university coffee chain. Interestingly, the coffee brand they founded is called "Aichens", which means "Benedict" in English. While most of their peers are still immersed in the imagination of the future, they take action to turn this sweet-smelling dream into reality. In August 2012, this team, which does not come from heavy universities, with the "Aichens" business plan, beat many famous universities across the country and won the Silver Award in the final of the first phase of the National Huatu Education College students' Entrepreneurship Fund.

The logo of the cafe is a butterfly, which not only represents the aroma of coffee can attract butterflies, but also contains the meaning of "breaking cocoons into butterflies". Zheng Qibin's entrepreneurial story is also like coffee, which tastes bitter before sweet. "there are a lot of ups and downs in the process from a small egg to a butterfly flapping its wings," he said. No matter how bitter it is, we never give up, because this is our dream and we have been fighting for the butterfly. " He summed up the entrepreneurial process and experience of himself and his team into three sentences: "Dream blossoms because of madness; action, loyalty because of persistence; sharing, moved by sincerity."

Open pub to test the waters for running a coffee shop

In September 2010, Zheng Qibin came to Guangdong University of Finance and Economics with a bright vision for the university, and soon he adapted to the university life. Recalling the situation at that time, he said that his freshman year was when he was most passionate. at that time, like other freshmen, he actively fought for class cadres and join the club, but, "if I hadn't met that group of people, I think my life probably went on at my original pace, and they changed the course of my life."

The "group of people" mentioned by Zheng Qibin refers to a team called Rongqi. The team was founded in November 2010. "Rongqi" means "Rongqi", which means "merging all the wizards in the world". Rongqi team was founded by Zheng Qibin's partner and his brother Goh Chee Wee. Zheng Qibin hit it off with his brother Goh Chee Wee and chose to join. "when communicating with him, I think he has a lot of ideas. Rongqi's idea is: 'one person can walk very fast, but a group of people can go farther.' I want to go further, so I choose a group of people. " At present, Rongqi team has developed to the fourth generation, a total of more than 60 people, and has a variety of professional talents, is an efficient combat learning team.

In addition, another reason is that the team is mainly composed of fellow villagers from Jieyang. In Zheng Qibin's view, this team "has a very high sense of cohesion and a strong sense of belonging. Unlike ordinary societies or organizations, our mutual connections and feelings are not only four years of college, but even throughout life." A year later, Zheng Qibin took over the position of team leader from his brother and became the captain of Rongqi.

In May 2011, the Rongqi team took the first step in entrepreneurial practice-the opening of Rongqi pub. At that time, it was rare for college students to open a pub. Although it was only a small shop of 20 square meters, it attracted a lot of popularity. On the first night of business, from 6: 00 p.m. to more than 4: 00 a.m. the next day, Zheng Qibin mixed 60 or 70 cocktails and "shook until his hand was almost broken." The wine in the shop was almost sold out and there was not enough ice. They even went to the milk tea shop next door to borrow ice. After closing at more than 5: 00 in the morning, the team still had a meeting in the store to sum up the business situation of the day. Zheng Qibin said with a smile, "it's crazy to think about it now. Maybe it was at that time that I gradually had that kind of wolf nature in my heart and was eager to fight."

After that, the "Rongqi" team participated in the "College Student Challenge Cup Business Plan Competition". Brother Goh Chee Wee found him again and shared with him the preliminary idea of opening a cafe. "We want to be a coffee shop, first of all, because we don't have a coffee shop in our school, and it is a necessary place for leisure and communication on a university campus. Second, we have done relevant research and found that the market gap of cafes is still very large, and the development trend is very good. Third, coffee is a foreign culture, and its acceptance at home is not very high. We also hope to be the promoters of cultural integration, so that coffee culture can be integrated with traditional culture. "

In the process of participating in the "Challenge Cup," Zheng Qibin, as the captain, often had to follow up on the work of various sections. Staying up all night became his routine, with a plan of more than 100 pages, checking word for word for errors and then taking them to typesetting. Later, the coffee shop's entrepreneurial project won the bronze prize in the provincial college students' business plan competition. In the just-concluded 2014 Guangdong University Student Challenge Cup, Zheng Qibin and his partner went out again with their business plan, won the Guangdong gold medal and successfully entered the national competition.

Self-taught design into half a "decorator"

Since October 2011, Zheng Qibin and his team have been constantly looking for suitable space for the cafe, and several site selection plans have failed, either because the rent is too high or because the location is not ideal. Later, they shifted their target to the idle coffee shop on the first floor of the library on the Sanshui campus of Guangdong University of Finance and Economics. Zheng Qibin recalled: "I remember when we looked at the clearing and said something like this: it would be nice if we could have a cup of coffee of our own here in the future." So they decided to open the first cafe here.

But trouble comes one after another. Zheng Qibin said, "We are just ordinary students with no social background." How to write the project plan, how to get the venue, how to get the money. A lot of problems appeared all of a sudden, and each of them was very difficult for us to solve at that time. "

So Zheng Qibin and the other two founders took dozens of pages of cafe project plans and went to school leaders one by one to distribute them as leaflets. "in the craziest time, the three of us wanted to go to lunch after printing the plan, but we found that there was no money. All three of us added up to 11 yuan, so we simply bought three bottles of eight-treasure porridge, leaving 50 cents left." In the end, almost all the school leaders knew about how many students wanted to open a cafe in the school. After more than half a year of communication, the school was finally moved by the persistence and sincerity of these young people and formally signed a contract with Zheng Qibin's team to rent the venue to them.

Then, Zheng Qibin, they ran into a financial problem. Sanshui has a storefront of 260 square meters, and the first phase of the start-up capital needs 150000 yuan, which is astronomical for the three of them. In desperation, they decided to resell the pub they had opened before and raise money through financing, financing and loans.

After solving the financial problem, the rest is the decoration of the storefront. In the summer of 2012, Zheng Qibin and his team began their decoration tour in jerseys, flip-flops and a tape measure. Because everyone has no design knowledge and decoration experience, they can only find a lot of space design drawings for their own research. They also found several of the best decoration companies in Sanshui District to see the site, put forward suggestions, and then integrated the plan put forward by the decoration company, and decided on the design plan of Sanshui shop.

In order to save costs, they also found the local decoration construction team, half-contract workers and half-package of materials, and became half of the "decoration master". Throughout the summer vacation in 2012, Zheng Qibin and his companions spent designing, polishing boards, cleaning and working as porters. On a hot day of more than 30 degrees Celsius, they were carried and drenched with sweat. Zheng Qibin said with a smile that his clothes "can really wring out water." When making wall cabinets, they learned the whole design style and style from a book about space design. Zheng Qibin still remembers that at that time, the carpenter could not help asking them, "did you guys learn to design?" In November of the same year, their first coffee shop officially opened on the Sanshui campus of Guangdong University of Finance and Economics, and the first "butterfly" broke out of its cocoon.

"as long as you work hard and stick to it, your dream won't stay at the age of 20."

A person full of stories is the most attractive. When the Sanshui store first opened, what Zheng Qibin did in the store every day was to share their entrepreneurial stories with customers. "every time we share, there will be a different feeling, of course, our team has more than one story." He still remembers that the insipid narration and the true plot once made many students who came to drink coffee to tears. "We don't share stories to win other people's tears. But when our stories move others, we will naturally be infected. " Zheng Qibin said so.

2013 was Zheng Qibin's busiest year, and the 22-year-old went through a lot. Since his trip to Beijing in January, the cafe has been running more and more smoothly. He opened a second store in April and registered the company in July. This year, they opened a third branch in the university town.

Each branch, with a size of 50 to 100 square meters, is small, beautifully decorated and has its own characteristics: in the second branch, the menu is displayed in a handwritten blackboard newspaper, and these beautiful and neat fonts are written by Zheng Qibin. He believes that doing so will make their cafe more campus-like. In the new third branch, they opened a showcase with hundreds of boutique books for free, as well as lovely Winnie bears and lush plants.

Zheng Qibin told Nanfang Daily that now every employee of the cafe is full-time and post-90s, and they are gathered together by their love of coffee and their desire for dreams. Sometimes, Zheng Qibin's company will send employees outside to attend training to learn coffee technology and management knowledge.

Although Zheng Qibin started his business as a sophomore, he did not neglect his studies and won a scholarship during his college years. "I've been through everything except failing college." Zheng Qibin said jokingly. In his view, reading and practice are both an important way to learn. When he reads a book, he has a habit of integrating his own experience into it, experiencing what is described in the book and drawing knowledge from it. He will also take notes while reading books, write down what he thinks and think, and improve the efficiency of his study.

Zheng Qibin's parents, both government employees, did not approve of his starting a business at first, hoping that he could find a relatively comfortable and stable job. However, he proved his determination by his actions. On one occasion, his father said to him, "now that you have decided to do a good job, concentrate on doing it well, it does not matter if you fail. Not paying attention and not working hard is the biggest failure."

Zheng Qibin said bluntly that he hopes to promote their coffee chain in Chinese universities in the future, create a coffee culture that belongs exclusively to the campus, and become the first brand of coffee chain in Chinese colleges and universities. They also plan to make their stories into micro-movies, share them with you, convey a kind of positive energy, and encourage people to pursue their dreams bravely.

Reviewing his entrepreneurial experience, Zheng Qibin said frankly: "if you have a dream, you must have the courage to pursue it, otherwise the dream is just a dream." As long as the heart and persistence, the dream will not stay at the age of 20. "