February 10th, Friday.
Capital City, at the office of “Cold Noodle Girl.”
Qi Yan was busy with her colleagues, preparing matters related to the food laboratory.
Originally, the entire Cold Noodle Girl company was immersed in an atmosphere of confusion and uncertainty, not knowing what to pursue. Because this brand was founded by Meng Chang, who had originally created a complete theoretical framework, but now, Meng Chang’s theories had been thoroughly debunked, along with his personal reputation being completely trampled to pieces. As a result, the employees who had been energized by Meng Chang’s motivational talks were all now plunged into confusion.
However, after reading those articles about Meng Chang and Mr. Pei, Qi Yan led the employees of Cold Noodle Girl to once again find their direction for struggle!
Qi Yan decided to lead the employees, following Mr. Pei’s instructions, to continue fighting with determination, working hard to change Cold Noodle Girl’s current situation, and absolutely refusing to disappoint Mr. Pei!
The first thing she needed to do was recruit excellent street vendors as food consultants, establish a food laboratory, and improve the taste of all menu items including grilled cold noodles.
After the Spring Festival, Qi Yan’s plan continued to advance.
She had already sent out a special investigation team to continue discovering vendors with exceptional skills across various cities nationwide.
The team leader was Zhang Yahui, the young street vendor who had previously stood out at the street food competition. Of course, many employees from Cold Noodle Girl were assisting him.
After finding excellent vendors, if they could be brought to the capital, they would be invited. If not, substantial sums would be spent learning the secrets and recipes of their street food. In any case, they couldn’t return empty-handed.
With so many cities nationwide, even limiting the search to first-tier and second-tier cities would take considerable time. Qi Yan clearly understood this would be a long-term task, so she wasn’t in a rush but instead considered dividing it into several phases.
Building the food laboratory and discovering excellent vendors would proceed simultaneously, with neither being delayed.
At this moment, the food laboratory in the capital was almost ready, with only some detailed issues still being finalized, which Qi Yan was carefully considering.
Just then, a colleague came over saying: “Sister Yan, I need to report something to you.”
After a pause: “Slackin’ Delivery has opened a store in the capital, right across from our store, separated by just about ten meters, practically face to face.”
Qi Yan looked up, momentarily stunned.
Slackin’ Delivery?
From what Qi Yan knew, Slackin’ Delivery already had stores in the capital, though not many. Previously, the closest Slackin’ Delivery store to Cold Noodle Girl was more than ten kilometers away, posing no competitive threat to Cold Noodle Girl whatsoever.
But this time, Slackin’ Delivery had actually opened right across from a Cold Noodle Girl store? Less than ten meters away, hardly different from face to face!
What did this mean?
Qi Yan was well aware that aside from the unnamed restaurant in Jingzhou that never moved or opened branches, Slackin’ Delivery was Tenda Group’s only restaurant group.
Slackin’ Delivery operated very differently from other delivery services. Both its regular delivery and premium “Dine & Go” service emphasized takeout container recycling services, featuring light-oil, low-salt home-style cooking. It was extremely popular in Handong Province where waste sorting was implemented.
In recent months, Slackin’ Delivery seemed to be pushing into first-tier cities like the capital, Magic City, and Goat City under Mr. Pei’s guidance, with apparently good results.
After all, such high-priced, high-service, high-quality delivery stores would find better markets and more favor with office workers in major metropolitan cities.
But why open Slackin’ Delivery right in Cold Noodle Girl’s face?
Undoubtedly, Slackin’ Delivery would compete directly with Cold Noodle Girl.
Despite Meng Chang’s grandiose claims back then about Slackin’ Delivery and Cold Noodle Girl being complementary, that was all hype for investors. People only had three meals a day, and the takeout customers in the same area were limited. Now with Slackin’ Delivery’s rich ingredients and superior flavors available, who would still order grilled cold noodles all the time?
This would definitely have a huge impact on Cold Noodle Girl!
Of course, after the recent tumultuous events, Cold Noodle Girl was long past its previous packed state, appearing quite desolate. Though operating at a loss, at least there were still some customers.
With Slackin’ Delivery’s arrival, Cold Noodle Girl’s already dire situation would surely go from bad to worse.
The colleague reporting obviously understood this clearly and was somewhat panicked: “Sister Yan, what do you think – is this Mr. Pei’s decision, or did the head of Slackin’ Delivery act independently? What should we do?”
Compared to the coming market competition, Mr. Pei’s attitude was what truly worried everyone.
As for market competition, everyone clearly knew they couldn’t compete with Slackin’ Delivery. The worst case would just be losing more money each month.
But if this was Mr. Pei’s directive, then his current attitude toward Cold Noodle Girl was definitely worth examining.
Did he want to use Cold Noodle Girl as kindling to make Slackin’ Delivery’s fire burn brighter?
In that case, all of Cold Noodle Girl’s employees might end up being sacrificed together.
After a moment of silence, Qi Yan said: “Stay calm, don’t scare yourself first.”
“I’ll go there myself and investigate what’s really going on.”
…
Half an hour later, Qi Yan arrived at the Slackin’ Delivery store diagonally across from Cold Noodle Girl.
This storefront had been vacant for over two months, and was now under renovation, with workers bustling about intensively.
From the renovation progress, construction had apparently started only after the New Year, with still some time before the store officially opened.
From a location perspective, this Slackin’ Delivery store would indeed directly compete with Cold Noodle Girl, as the two stores were too close together, their delivery coverage areas essentially identical.
There was someone wearing a safety helmet overseeing the site, with others explaining the renovation details to him. Qi Yan judged he must be someone like this store’s manager.
Since they were all employees under Mr. Pei, Qi Yan directly approached and greeted him, then introduced herself.
The young man in the safety helmet immediately smiled and shook hands with Qi Yan: “Hello, I’m Rui Yuchen, the head of Slackin’ Delivery.”
Qi Yan was momentarily stunned.
Rui Yuchen?
Wasn’t he the overall head of Slackin’ Delivery? A Tenda Group executive who could report directly to Mr. Pei?
Qi Yan clearly understood that while Cold Noodle Girl was technically a Tenda Group business, its status was far inferior. She couldn’t report directly to Mr. Pei; when issues arose, she could only first consult He Desheng, who would then report to Mr. Pei.
The status of Cold Noodle Girl versus Slackin’ Delivery within Tenda Group was completely different.
Qi Yan just hadn’t expected that as the overall head of Slackin’ Delivery, Rui Yuchen wouldn’t be in Jingzhou. Why had he come to the capital?
Though Rui Yuchen didn’t know Qi Yan, he was obviously aware of Cold Noodle Girl’s situation. He removed his safety helmet and handed it to someone else, inviting Qi Yan to sit at a nearby café.
Qi Yan did have many questions she wanted to ask, so the two went to a small café nearby together.
…
After ordering coffee and making small talk, Qi Yan hesitated, unsure where to begin asking.
Though she had many doubts, Cold Noodle Girl carried much less weight compared to Slackin’ Delivery. Asking directly seemed somewhat presumptuous, and moreover, if this was Mr. Pei’s arrangement, wouldn’t her questioning appear too forward?
Rui Yuchen noticed Qi Yan’s hesitation and smiled: “I know you must have many questions. Don’t be shy, ask whatever you want.”
“If you’re asking about this store, I can tell you that the location was personally selected by Mr. Pei, and since there was a suitable storefront in this area, I set up the new branch here.”
“However, this time we’re opening more than ten new stores, and it’s not just Slackin’ Delivery. Other Tenda physical businesses, including Slackin’ Internet Café and Tuoguan Fitness, also have plans to expand into the capital.”
After Rui Yuchen briefly explained the situation, Qi Yan finally understood the whole story.
Around the Spring Festival, Tenda’s various physical businesses once again faced the question of “where to open new stores.”
Rui Yuchen was slightly troubled by this question.
Previously, Mr. Pei had decided branch locations, and Rui Yuchen just needed to execute them. But now, he had to decide all branch locations himself, with Mr. Pei generally not interfering, suddenly placing much more responsibility and pressure on Rui Yuchen’s shoulders.
In first-tier cities like the capital and Magic City, there were already quite a few Cold Noodle Girl stores. But going forward, should they continue penetrating these major first-tier cities, making Slackin’ Delivery stores more densely distributed? Or shift to other second-tier cities, first ensuring most cities had Slackin’ Delivery stores, then gradually develop from there?
But Rui Yuchen didn’t agonize too long, because he and Xiao Peng and others quickly gained insight from Mr. Pei.
Though Mr. Pei hadn’t said it explicitly, his actions said everything.
Mr. Pei had invested massive advertising for Tenda’s physical businesses in major cities like the capital and Magic City. What did this indicate?
Obviously, he was hinting for Rui Yuchen and Xiao Peng to hurry up and continue populating these super-tier-1 cities with branches!
If Mr. Pei’s advertisements had already aired, but they didn’t follow up with opening stores, wouldn’t that greatly disappoint Mr. Pei?
So, Slackin’ Delivery, Slackin’ Internet Café, Tuoguan Fitness and other physical businesses immediately decided to continue opening branches in cities like the capital and Magic City!
Tree Sloth Apartments, due to funding issues and because the local Jingzhou market wasn’t saturated yet, didn’t immediately follow suit. But Slackin’ Delivery, Slackin’ Internet Café and other businesses generously finalized several new branch locations.
These branches used up all recent profits from both businesses for quite some time ahead, but that was fine. After all, this was the established policy Mr. Pei had set for them – spending every bit of profit on branches.
With Mr. Pei backing them up, not worrying about cash flow problems, Rui Yuchen and Xiao Peng could naturally spend freely.
Therefore, this Slackin’ Delivery store was one of these new branches.
Because work focus was shifting to the capital, Rui Yuchen also traveled from afar to the capital, planning to oversee these several capital stores until they opened without problems before deciding the next step.
After learning that Rui Yuchen planned to continue opening more stores in the capital, Mr. Pei didn’t say much, only specifically emphasizing building a flagship store of the highest specifications directly across from Cold Noodle Girl.
As for why, Mr. Pei didn’t explain.