Now the catering industry is particularly profitable. What's the best to sell?

How to plan the product line of a restaurant when it is ready to open? Is it a big and comprehensive product route or a single product strategy? It is also the implementation of the single product strategy. Why do fish explorers live better, while tourists in Le Caesars show obvious signs of decline? What can be done to better meet the needs of consumers?

A brand's product line determines its ability to attract customers. So product line planning is very important. If the product line is too long and too wide, it will lead to the difficulty of supply chain management and the inefficiency of the kitchen, and will also affect the procurement of equipment and the moving line of the kitchen; The most important thing is that if you do too much and make too many mistakes, you can't do anything well-the products are unprofessional and customers don't recognize them.

But if the product line is too short and narrow, customers' needs can't be met-some old customers complain that they often come here and feel nothing to eat, and some customers will say, "Your noodles here are very good, but there are no side dishes, and it feels monotonous."

So, the question is:

How to plan the width of product line and what is the basis of decision? What is the length and depth of the product line? ? Should consumers be given enough choices to eat the same food, or should they adopt the ultimate single product strategy, just like Tai Er just made a pickled fish? 1? What does the width of the product line depend on?

The width of product line refers to the number of product lines. Ruxi tea has only one big product line-tea. Naixue's tea has planned two product lines at the beginning of its business-tea and soft continental bag; Beverage is a product line, so is European soft package. Take Qiao Fenghuang, a brand I have run, as an example. The product line width of a restaurant is five one-meter lines, two rice, three snacks, four desserts and five drinks.

What is the product line width of a start-up brand?

The width of the core product line depends on the dining habits of consumers, matching needs and the product competitiveness of enterprises. Simply put, the width of the product line depends on demand and competition? .

So, what is the collocation of consumers' eating habits?

While eating porridge, be sure to match some dry food; While eating spicy food, there must be some cool desserts/drinks to relieve spicy food.

Take the brand of porridge as an example. As a brand of casserole porridge, Qianfu porridge shop started from Dongguan and also sells some traditional Cantonese refreshments, such as shrimp dumplings, chicken feet, fried dough sticks and radish cakes. In the dining habits of southern customers, only eating porridge is not a meal, but a meal with some dry goods. This is the definition of "how to eat" in a cultural system.

This is the dining habit that consumers need. Therefore, it is definitely unreasonable for porridge to be a single product line, and porridge+refreshments is a natural combination.

Let's take another example of Joe Phoenix. As the first brand of beef powder in South China, Qiao Fenghuang designed the product line with beef powder as the core and beef powder (main meal)+snacks (auxiliary meal)+drinks/desserts (enjoyment) as the core concept, and simulated the dining scene of customers.

Cheap and fast-a bowl of beef powder; Eat just right-a bowl of beef powder+a snack; Social enjoyment-a bowl of beef powder+a snack+a dessert/drink. So, the width of the product line must be based on the insight into the consumption habits of the target customers? . Joe Phoenix's three product lines mainly consider the consumption habits of three consumer groups. Interestingly, according to the competitiveness of products, there are only two product lines that can really drive consumers to make decisions: beef powder and dessert.

The reason is that Qiao Fenghuang is superior in the competitiveness of beef powder and dessert products, and these two product lines have achieved absolute differentiation with competitors. Although the click-through rate of snacks is very high, the homogeneity is serious, so it is still a necessary supplement based on consumers' eating habits, rather than a strategic factor that drives consumers to choose you.

In principle, a strategic product line that can drive customer consumption, one master and one pair is enough? For start-ups, it is almost impossible to have resources to control more than two product lines that can really influence consumers' decisions.

2? Length and depth of product line

The number of product categories in each product line is called the length of the product line. The depth of product line refers to the taste and collocation of products. Generally speaking, the length and depth of a product line can be regarded as an indicator, that is, the number of SKUs.

1 The fewer brands you choose, the easier it is to make a deal.

When it comes to the length of the product line, Chen Ning of Le Caesar once mentioned a very classic assertion-customers don't need too many choices, so keep SKUs to a minimum.

He also cited a scientific experiment to prove his claim-the famous jam selection experiment, which was led by Sheena Iyengar, a researcher at Stanford University. The experiment takes the local grocery store as the experimental site, trying to understand how people make choices.

In the experiment, Iyengar's research assistant posed as a supplier of water jam and set up two stalls in the gourmet shop for tasting.

The first tasting booth has six flavors to choose from: peach, black cherry, red gallon, orange, kiwi fruit and lemon cheese. Another booth has 24 flavors to choose from-besides the six flavors mentioned just now, there are another 18 flavors. At two tasting booths, customers will get coupons after tasting and can buy a bottle of jam at a discounted price.

The survey results show that there are 24 kinds of stalls that attract more customers, but fewer people end up buying jam? . Customers crowded in front of the booth to try, but most people had no choice because of too many flavors, and finally didn't buy a bottle at all. Only 3% of the customers have tried in the stalls with 24 flavors? Bought jam; And those who try to eat in stalls with six flavors are more able to decide which flavor is suitable for them, about 30%? Some people finally bought jam.

Le Caesar believes that the scientific principle behind extreme segmentation comes from this-too many choices will lead to paralysis of customer decision-making? . The capacity of the human brain can only process less than 5~7 information options at the same time, so it is generally impossible to compare more than 7 information options horizontally at the same time, and the most comfortable number of information chunks is 4.

There is nothing wrong with this truth itself. The basic principle that trout and Reese talked about in Positioning is that the mind hates chaos. This is also the "segmentation category" and "single product strategy" that the catering industry has been calling for in the past two years.

There seems to be an answer. The width of the product line is determined according to the matching needs and competitiveness of customers, with a main product line and a pair as the core product line, plus several supplementary product lines. ? The length of the product line is no more than four.

This is true in theory, but there are great problems in practical application.

Choose more brands to attract more customers.

The jam experiment tells us that customers who are faced with too many choices will lead to paralysis in decision-making and simply don't choose. However, another important conclusion of this experiment has been ignored by everyone-that is, there are 24 kinds of jam-flavored stalls, which attract more people to watch.

In other words, although the customer actually paid for it, too many choices made the customer give up buying. But at first, more choices are more attractive to customers.

3? Attraction stage → decision-making stage

If we regard the choice of customers as a two-step process, that is, customers will have an attractive stage before choosing, and then there will be a real decision-making stage.

1 Where does customer choice paralysis occur?

Obviously, the paralysis of customer choice occurs in the later stage: in the scene of catering industry, customers have been attracted by many products and have already entered the store, and they will face the real purchase decision when they are ready to order at the table.

At this time, the customer has been booked by the store. Simply make the dishes recommended on the menu better. As long as the waiter's recommendation is slightly in place, customers are unlikely to leave.

So, in fact, customers have two real needs:

1. Before facing the real decision, they need to feel that they have many choices;

2. In the real decision-making process, they need to make decisions easily.

What really affects the restaurant business is often the first stage-are customers attracted? . Therefore, a restaurant must give people the impression of rich products and numerous choices in order to catch customers' attention in the attracting stage.

Then, after the customer has entered the store, in the specific ordering scene, it is necessary to help the customer make a decision-to recommend the signboard in place and reduce their choice anxiety. (Stall restaurants are another matter, because you don't enter the store when making decisions, so too many choices are likely to lead to loss. )

In short, there must be many product lines and few choices.

The single product strategy does not know how many catering people have been pitted. The single product strategy of the Internet is feasible because on the Internet, an e-commerce platform can radiate the whole country through the express delivery system, so the customer base it faces is actually very large.

However, a restaurant often only radiates a few kilometers nearby. In this case, it is necessary to rashly learn the single product strategy of the Internet.

2 under what conditions is the single product strategy feasible?

A single product policy is only valid in the following two environments:

1. The passenger flow base is large, the mobility of people is large, and there are many strangers. For example, a tourist business circle, or a top shopping mall in a city; ;

2. The depth of the product is very good. Although it looks like a single product on the surface, it can evolve into different flavors, colors and collocations, and there are many SKUs.

So, let's take the super items such as the grilled fish of the fish detective and the pizza of Le Caesar. There are five or six kinds of fish, eighteen kinds of grilled fish, and only one kind of grilled fish, which adds up to nearly 100 SKU. And its subsidiary product line barbecue is a supplement, and there are many choices.

On the other hand, Le Caesar's durian pizza is only divided into three types: Golden Pillow, Sultan King and Cat Mountain King, and the tastes of these three types are basically the same, far from the depth of the product, which is a terrible thing.

Therefore, the single product strategy is not only a single product, but also a single product. . With the same single product strategy, the product structure of fish exploration is much more successful than that of Le Caesar. The main line and sub-line of the product are reasonably matched, and the product has many depths, which will not dilute the core brand assets, nor will it cause consumers to be bored because of too few choices.

In fact, judging from the current market reaction, after two or three years of market intimacy, brands that started with the single product strategy have lived better, while Le Caesar's customers have obvious signs of decline.