"It's a little bit worse, but it's acceptable considering that the population density in Los Angeles is larger than in other cities in California, and actually we're building new supermarkets that also take into account the number of people in the neighborhood, like the San Francisco supermarket we're in now is a little bit smaller than the one in Los Angeles, but not much, and a lot smaller in Torrance City." Pierce explained.

"Well, that looks pretty good." Chen Zhiwen nodded and said, although there are not many people in the supermarket, everyone pushes a large trolley, and there are a lot of goods in the car.

The core of the warehouse supermarket is to let members come once in a while, and then come to a shopping spree, either to fill their own small warehouse, or to fill their own cars, this business model, will lead to low foot traffic, but also reduce Costco's demand for labor, you know, in the United States, one of the main costs of supermarkets is labor, the number is small, but also allows Costco to calmly open high wages, to poach other supermarkets experienced people.

Pierce continued: "Eric, there is a problem, it may become a problem for us in the future, Costco's middle management talent is transferred from Fedmart, and now Costco only has 5 supermarkets, which is not a problem for the time being, but if we continue to build new supermarkets, then there will not be enough people in this area.

In addition, Fedmart and Costco's business model is still different, and people from other supermarkets can't get started directly, so I hope that the company will allocate a special amount of money to develop talents. ”

"How did you guys train Fedmart before?" Chen Zhiwen asked rhetorically, for the cultivation of talents, is any company must have a plan, small companies can also directly poach people, large companies cannot, must have their own internal training plan, the larger the company more rely on this set of planning, such as a large car company or a large Internet company, are directly recruited from the university, rarely in the community, unless there is really a shortage of people or the recruited person is very capable, or the position is special, can not be cultivated internally.

Pierce shook his head with a smile and said: "Fedmart doesn't have a specific plan in this regard, we are all recruiting normally and cultivating slowly, because we have only opened more than a dozen supermarkets in more than ten years, and the turnover rate of personnel is relatively low, so we are not in a hurry to lack people at all."

Now Costco is expanding very fast, and the model is different from traditional supermarkets, expanding at the current rate, it may be seriously understaffed next year, and at that time, it can either stop expanding or can only barely operate, which will have a very big hidden danger. ”

"Then how to cultivate?" Chen Zhiwen asked.

"I don't have this information yet, and I also want to slowly improve and make the talent training plan a standard, and this can only be learned slowly when cultivating new people, and we and new people are learning processes." Pierce said: "The easiest way is to recruit more people, a supermarket needs 10 managers, then recruit 20, spend more labor costs, and then let everyone be familiar with it, when opening a new store, directly transfer people to the past, and then the new store also recruits more people, the same operation, in this process, the company will also slowly improve the training process, shorten the labor cost and time cost of training." It's just that in this case, the company's profits will be reduced a lot. ”

"It doesn't matter if you drop a little, to open a new store, in addition to the cost of hardware, the personnel aspect is also a part, besides, the more stores you have, the lower the operating and procurement costs will be." Chen Zhiwen said indifferently: "It's just, are the locals willing to go to other places?" ”

Pierce said: "This is no problem, even if you go to the local store, it is basically the beginning of a period of time, maybe half a year or a year, and when the staff level of the new store is enough, you can come back, supermarket operation is actually not a high-tech job, and the people we recruit locally also have other relevant experience, and they are familiar with it quickly." ”

"Supermarket operation does learn quickly, but new stores are often the most tired, especially our supermarkets also need to open members, the success or failure of supermarkets often depends on the first half a year, this half a year is successful, the supermarket is basically successful, if it fails, it will be difficult to turn over." Chen Zhiwen thought for a while and said: "Pierce, I think we need to train a group of elite talents to guide the new store, the more experienced they are, the more likely the new store will be successful, and it may even surpass the previous store." ”

"That's a great idea." Pierce pondered for a moment and agreed, "We have a team that is good at developing members in the early days of supermarket opening, and as long as they do a good job, it can basically reduce the risk of opening a new store." ”

"Then we will recruit highly educated talents, give priority to high-achieving students majoring in retail, marketing, and psychology, and you can also invite some professors and experts in this area to guide and analyze how to make it easier to attract people to become members. Chen Zhiwen said boldly: "Money is not a problem, it should be spent, in addition, the training plan for ordinary management talents you just said is also implemented." ”

During this time, Chen Zhiwen has actually gotten rid of the initial lack of funds, Red Bull is developing very smoothly, the sales volume of the US market is considerable, and it is far from reaching the peak, the market has a lot of room to rise, just to prevent other beverage giants from entering the market in the future, and now all the profits of Red Bull are even overdrawn in the future. Although Red Bull can't take out the funds to do other things at present, as long as it can develop well, it will be the biggest help to Chen Zhiwen.

And the United States, the household appliance industry is indeed average, but the high-profit industry of arcade machines has budded, wait for a year and a half, not to talk about the return of 100 million US dollars a year net profit like Taidong Company, as long as there is a three-to-fifty enough.

And the biggest success, of course, is Wal-Mart's stock, which is still rising, and it is high-quality credit capital.

Costco is also losing money now, but the first supermarket in Los Angeles, if the investment costs are not evenly shared, can already be said to have begun to make a profit, warehouse supermarket, profit is so fast, and the most important thing for supermarkets is to master a huge cash flow, the retail giants of later generations, in fact, more than half of the net profit, is relying on cash flow, not retail profits.

Except for the immediate uphill battle in Hong Kong, there is basically no economic pressure left, and the only thing that needs to be continuously invested is Costco's non-stop expansion, which is the core strategic plan at present, even more important than Wharf or Hutchison in Hong Kong.

If there is no problem with funds, then the expansion of hardware is naturally not a problem, and if the personnel problem caused by rapid expansion can be solved, it will be foolproof.

"Okay, then I'll ask the personnel department to make a preliminary plan, and I'll show it to you after it's written." Pierce asked, "Eric, how much longer do you need to stay in the United States?" ”

(End of chapter)