Arranging for Lou Xiao'e to go to Shiweitian for inspection is not complicated. All he needs to do is say hello to Cao Jiajia.
Cao Jiajia was not happy at first, even if she heard that Lou Xiao'e came to inspect and want to invest, she was not happy.
Today, Cao Jiajia has some experience and knows that investment is a good thing, especially investment from Hong Kong people, which is a great thing.
However, Cao Jiajia believes that Shiweitian is just one store, and it is already doing very well, and there is no money left to invest in it.
In Cao Jiajia's view, continuing to invest is nothing more than working on renovations, but if it is renovated, the business will be closed for several days, and that's all money.
No matter how well-decorated it is, the food can't be exorbitantly expensive, and the restaurant is so big, has so many customers, and the business is so good now, there's no need to bother anymore.
From a certain point of view, Cao Jiajia's point of view is correct, so Cao Zhiqiang can only tell her privately that he will open many branches in the future, and then form a chain restaurant group with many branches, and then let Cao Jiajia be the leader of this chain restaurant Group manager.
For this reason, Cao Zhiqiang also briefly told her what a restaurant chain is, that is, many branches have the same sign, uniform decoration, uniform clothing, uniform food, etc.
Although Cao Jiajia has never seen a real restaurant chain, she will think about it.
This can be understood as long as you think of a restaurant chain as copying several Shiweitian restaurants and then putting them all under her control.
Think about it again. There is an upper limit on the guest capacity of a hotel, which means there is an upper limit on the income. But if several hotels are added together, the income will be doubled.
Thinking of becoming a general manager who could manage many hotels, Cao Jiajia finally agreed to let Lou Xiao'e come in and take a look, including the accounts.
But in fact, Cao Zhiqiang knew that he was deceiving his own sister.
It’s not that Cao Zhiqiang has never thought about starting a fast food chain, but it’s difficult for a restaurant like Shiweitian to start a fast food chain.
The reason is very simple. The real emphasis of the fast food chain model is not the superficial skills of unified signage, unified decoration and uniform clothing, but the standardization of meals and cost control.
Real fast food restaurants do not have high requirements for the level of chefs, but they have relatively high requirements for the standardization of food taste.
That is to say, for the food in chain fast food restaurants, at least the food in different restaurants should have similar tastes, good taste, reasonable prices, and do not require too high-end chefs.
Therefore, if you really want to open a fast food restaurant, the most suitable models are hot pot and Malatang.
Food is Heaven is a little different.
Shiweitian is a traditional restaurant. The food prices are relatively high, the ingredients are relatively high-end, and the chef's skills are also relatively high.
Although most of the ordinary dishes here are made by He Yuzhu's apprentices, and most of the meals use secret seasonings provided by Cao Zhiqiang, some high-end dishes still require He Yuzhu to make them himself.
In other words, Shiweitian is a mid-to-high-end restaurant at its core.
If nothing else, let’s just say that He Yuzhu also knows how to cook Tanjia cuisine, which is a unique skill.
Moreover, the craftsmanship of the Tanjia cuisine cooked by He Yuzhu is no worse than that of the Tanjia cuisine on the seventh floor of the Peking Hotel.
It's just that He Yuzhu doesn't usually cook that kind of Tanjia cuisine at Shiweitian, but more of high-end Sichuan cuisine.
And it is impossible for a restaurant like this, which relies heavily on the chef's cooking skills, to operate a fast-food restaurant model in large quantities.
Having said that, no matter how good the food is, limited by conditions and history, simply talking about the dishes, it cannot really compare with the Tan's cuisine on the seventh floor of the Peking Hotel, because it lacks the richness of other people's history and culture.
In other words, if he is also cooking Tan family cuisine, He Yuzhu's food may not be inferior to the chef on the seventh floor of the Peking Hotel in terms of color, flavor, but due to the lack of other people's history and culture, it will still be a close call.
In addition, the decoration tone of Shiweitian is there, and the price is also there. It is destined to only take the middle-class route, or focus on middle-class consumption.
For such a hotel, even if it makes money, the profit limit is clear, and the development direction is also clear.
Not to mention the profit limit, this is related to passenger flow.
As for the development direction, in fact, the only way to upgrade it to a high-end hotel is to take it.
Because Shiweitian is a traditional restaurant that relies on chef skills, at least for now, it is difficult to follow the model found in every branch.
In Cao Zhiqiang's future plan, if he wants to get involved in the catering industry, he is destined to work in the fast food restaurant chain model.
This is because Cao Zhiqiang systematically provides secret recipes for meals and has detailed preparation methods.
In the book "Chinese Cuisine: Three Thousand Cravings for You" that I signed up for, it provides 3,000 ways to make Chinese food. That's it. The key is that each dish is made very scientifically, not only with specific temperatures and times. , even the ingredients are accurate to the milligram.
In other words, "Chinese Cuisine: You Will Die Three Thousand" is not a traditional Chinese food preparation method at all, but more like a laboratory model, or an industrialized food processing factory model.
As long as the dishes inside are made using the assembly line factory model, the taste will be similar.
Even if the dishes are not specific, there are many auxiliary ingredients and seasonings and the production method itself is enough to be a gimmick.
For example, one of the ramen sauces can be produced industrially and only sell this sauce.
One of the recipes for Malatang soup can also be industrially produced.
It's just that the cooking method in this cookbook is more like a laboratory production method. If you want to transform it into industrial production, you still need in-depth research and exploration, similar to turning laboratory products into industrialized finished products.
Cao Zhiqiang didn't have time to do this at the moment, so he just scratched the surface, made some easier-to-make sauces and marinades, and made some relatively easy fast food in Shiweitian.
For example, Shiweitian’s tea eggs use the recipe provided by Cao Zhiqiang and have a unique taste. They are now one of the most popular star products.
There are also various braised tofu products from Shiweitian, which are so popular because they use Cao Zhiqiang’s secret recipe.
The takeout window of Shiweitian is becoming more and more popular. In addition to Shiweitian's reputation and relatively reasonable prices, it is mainly because the tea eggs and braised bean products here have a special taste and can attract repeat customers.
But in fact, Cao Zhiqiang has long discovered that those takeaway foods can be produced independently. Now that they are merged with Shiweitian, it actually lowers the quality of Shiweitian.
After all, no matter how good the taste of tea-leaf eggs and braised bean products are, they will never be on the table.
It's just that Cao Zhiqiang's temporary focus is not on Shiweitian, so he allows Shiweitian Restaurant to continue to grow wildly.
However, this does not mean that Cao Zhiqiang looks down on the food industry. On the contrary, he actually attaches great importance to this industry.
As mentioned before, Cao Zhiqiang’s main goal is to make food first, making money is second, and the main purpose is to turn this place into a catering training base.
In addition to training chefs, we also need to train waiters, so the number of chefs and waiters at Shiweitian is more than ten times that of ordinary restaurants.
Currently, there is no real cooking training school, no real waiter training school, or even related majors in China.
These problems are secondary. The most important thing is that the conditioning formula provided by Cao Zhiqiang cannot be easily leaked, so he needs reliable people.
Therefore, when Cao Zhiqiang opened Food is the Sky, making money was second, and the key was to give chefs and waiters a realistic place to practice.
For this reason, the chef apprentices and waiters who work for Food are basically young workers from the Hongguang Machinery Factory. This means that these people come here as formal workers to work as chef apprentices and waiters.
Once the chef apprentices and waiters in Shiweitian have learned a little bit, and Cao Zhiqiang has enough funds, he will bypass the Shiweitian brand and open a bunch of chain fast food restaurants.
He has even thought about what kind of fast food to open, and he has opened two types in advance, one is a Chinese fast food restaurant focusing on Malatang, and the other is a Sichuan hot pot restaurant.
Among them, Malatang is a low-end chain store, while hotpot restaurants are more mid-range.
In addition to Malatang and hot pot restaurants, he also wants to build a food processing factory, specializing in the production of various artificial foods, such as instant noodles, jelly pudding, and so on.
But if you want to do all this, you must have money.
Cao Zhiqiang has made a lot of money now, but if he wants to develop the catering and food processing industries, that little money is just a drop in the bucket.
Originally, Cao Zhiqiang really coveted Lou Xiao'e's funds, but now, he no longer paid much attention to Lou Xiao'e's funds. What he cared more about was Lou Xiao'e's identity and channels.
Just kidding, the country still owes him two billion US dollars. Even if it is not paid in one lump sum and paid slowly, it will be enough for Cao Zhiqiang.
However, Cao Zhiqiang cannot use this money directly. He must first open a bearer account in an overseas offshore bank, then set up an offshore company, and finally invest the funds in the name of offshore company investment. .
With the current domestic power, it is impossible to find out the situation of overseas offshore companies, so this plan is relatively safe.
As for Lou Xiao'e, Cao Zhiqiang wanted to use Shiweitian's shares in exchange for part of Lou Xiao'e's US dollars or Hong Kong dollars. Coupled with Lou Xiao'e's support in Hong Kong, he could use his identity as an investor to start a company in Hong Kong.
As long as Cao Zhiqiang has a public company in Hong Kong established with the help of Lou Xiao'e, he can use it to do a lot of fancy things.
If nothing else, he can easily invest the foreign exchange given to him by the country into his own company in Hong Kong through investment, and then transfer it to China. This way, it will be safer.
In addition, if Cao Zhiqiang opens a trading company in Xiangjiang, he can also use the trading company's skin to better transport sensitive materials domestically.
In short, working with Lou Xiao'e has very broad prospects and will not arouse suspicion.
Relatively speaking, food is the most important thing, so it doesn't matter if it is given to Lou Xiao'e.
After all, what Cao Zhiqiang really values is not the Shiweitian restaurant, but the people inside.
But I couldn't tell Cao Jiajia about these things, so I could only use the name of the chain store to fool her.
In fact, it doesn't matter even if he can't be deceived. After all, Cao Jiajia is just a manager, not a boss.
The real boss of Shiweitian is Cao Zhiqiang. If he makes a decision, no one else can stop him.
It's just that Cao Jiajia has a special status, so she needs to explain something to her.
However, through this incident, Cao Zhiqiang also discovered a problem, that is, Cao Jiajia's nature as a relative.
Cao Zhiqiang suddenly discovered that nepotism was actually not a good thing for him.
Even though Cao Jiajia is considered more reasonable, her views on many things are still out of sync with her own.
If everything you do in the future has to be like now, with all kinds of explanations and lies, it will be really annoying and annoying.
So Cao Zhiqiang secretly decided to let Cao Jiajia be in charge of at most one store in the future, and Cao Jiajia's family would not be allowed to interfere in the rest.
Even if he wants to open a fast food restaurant in the future, Cao Jiajia cannot be chosen as the general manager. After all, she does not understand this aspect of management.
On the contrary, Lou Xiao'e can provide herself with talents in this field.
After all, Hong Kong is one of the Four Asian Tigers. At least in the service industry, it is currently ahead of the country.
If nothing else, let’s just talk about the Jianguo Hotel where Cao Zhiqiang currently lives. Basically, the management staff there are sent from Hong Kong.
It is precisely because of the management staff sent from Hong Kong that the service level of Jianguo Hotel is the best in Beijing.
As for Chinese fast food restaurants, although they don’t exist in China yet, they are already familiar to Hong Kong.
In Hong Kong at this time, not to mention Western fast food such as McDonald's and KFC, even Chinese fast food was everywhere.
It can be said that in the catering industry, Xiangjiang is actually crushing the mainland. Even the catering industry in Beijing is still a step behind the catering industry in Xiangjiang.
Regardless of whether there is any Tanjia cuisine in the capital, it only relies on a few chefs. In terms of true scientific management, it is really far behind Hong Kong.
Therefore, if Cao Zhiqiang really wants to open a fast food chain in China, he may really have to find Lou Xiao'e for relevant management talents.
In addition, Lou Xiaoe is an excellent manager herself.
Moreover, Lou Xiao'e makes a clear distinction between public and private affairs. As long as she does not have too much personal relationship with her, she is a very good partner in business.
Looking at it this way, the advantages of establishing a good relationship with Lou Xiao'e indeed outweigh the disadvantages.
After convincing Cao Jiajia, Cao Zhiqiang went to Lou Xiao'e who was looking at the accounts and asked her about her initial thoughts on Food for the Sky.
"Preliminary impressions." Lou Xiao'e closed the ledger and said thoughtfully, "Although I have only scratched the surface, I feel that the sanitary conditions here are good, the decoration is okay, and the food tastes good.
But these are not what impressed me most.
What impressed me most is that your waiters are more polite and smile to everyone.
Smiling to customers is not a problem in Hong Kong, it is normal, but in the Mainland, I really don't see it that often.
You can make the waiters here smile when facing guests, which is great in itself. "
"Auntie Lou is great!" Cao Zhiqiang smiled and gave a thumbs up, "You can see it right at a glance. This is the basic service tenet of our place. I call it smiling service."
"Service with a smile?" Lou Xiao'e was stunned.
Cao Zhiqiang said with a smile: "To be honest, most of the restaurants here are basically state-owned, or they are contracted by individuals, or self-employed restaurants, so the dining environment and service quality are just like that.
If nothing else, let’s talk about the waiters. There are very few waiters who can serve guests with a smile all day long.
So I specifically ask the waiters here to smile when facing guests, no matter what their mood is or what the guests are like.
I call this kind of service with a smile, and use this method to make guests feel at home.
Although it is just a small method, it seems that the effect is pretty good now. "
"I see." Lou Xiao'e nodded, "But how come those people are willing to listen to you? How come they are willing to accept service with a smile?"
"Because the chef apprentices and waiters here are all interns at Hongguang Machinery Factory." Cao Zhiqiang smiled slightly.
"And I have a very good relationship with Director Li in the factory, and the director also listens to me. There was an agreement when we transferred these people to work.
According to the agreement, my decision can basically determine whether these people can become regular employees and whether they can stay in the factory.
In addition, apart from this, the key point is that the reward and punishment system here is quite special.
People who work here have two incomes, one is a basic salary, and the other is a performance bonus.
The basic salary is the same for everyone, 15 yuan, but the performance bonus is different.
Performance bonuses are not fixed, but are determined based on their daily performance. If performance is poor, bonuses will be deducted.
The maximum performance bonus is five times the basic salary. If you want to get it all, you must perform well without being penalized at all. Service with a smile is the top priority of performance appraisal.
To this end, we have also made a special performance appraisal booklet, which records various assessment and deduction standards in more detail.
Therefore, if they don't want to lose their iron rice bowl in the factory and the high bonuses here, they must follow my rules. "
Lou Xiao'e was stunned: "Is that so?"
"That's it." Cao Zhiqiang nodded.
(End of chapter)
