Markor furnishings's family history

Meike Group, which originated in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, is imbued with the insecurity of "immigrants" by nature, which enables it to take a half step ahead of every industrial environment change.

"I know more and more about business, so my hair is getting shorter and shorter." Feng Dongming, a young Xinjiang oil painting artist with long hair shawl and torn jeans 17 years ago, is now the chairman of Meike Investment Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Meike Group).

The artist's passion and impulse, together with the pine resources in Xinjiang, made Feng Dongming win the title of "King of Pine" in the United States. When pine furniture OEM was doing well, Feng Dongming outlined markor furnishings on the drawing paper, aiming at establishing furniture retail network channels; Then, two years ago, he made another brilliant stroke, and this branch was for Meike's fine chemical business.

"Now the company is an iron triangle. Below it are two wheels made of furniture and chemicals, and at the top is retail. This is our business strategic structure. " Feng Dongming, who now emphasizes that he is only grasping the "general direction", sometimes uses the word "sense of balance" when talking about the triangular strategy of building the future blueprint of Meike Group.

In fact, if we look at Meike's 17-year development process, "balance" is the key word that dominates every major strategic choice of this company.

between density and density, the longitudinal rein gallops. In Feng Dongming's words, this is quite similar to the brushwork of Chinese painting-it is easy to race horses, and it is impenetrable.

If you can't play, go abroad.

During the ten years from 1994 to 23, Meike Group always earned US dollars.

the predecessor of meike group, Urumqi decorative arts research institute, was founded as early as 199. Feng Dongming still clearly remembers the document number: 8833 issued by Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in accordance with the spirit of the Central Committee that allowed intellectuals to run collective enterprises or private enterprises. Parents and lovers belong to the art circle, and he wants to jump out and "do something different". Feng Dongming believes that the impulse at that time originated from "honor" rather than "money problem".

of course, at first, it revolved around art. There are painting studios, garden studios and interior design studios in the institute, which mainly help some places such as museums to do decoration design, and later extend to interior decoration.

"When the word' company' is mentioned, we always associate it with' leather bag company'," said Feng Dongming, so he was reluctant to transfer the research institute to a company. Of course, as a research institute, there is no need to pay taxes like a corporate legal person. In 1993, at the urging of the local industrial and commercial bureau in Xinjiang, Feng's research institute was changed into a company system and became Xinjiang Meike Industrial Co., Ltd. The company's name "Meike" just comes from the Markor or that Feng Dongming casually pulled out of his pocket. "This (brush) can create all beautiful things."

it wasn't long before Feng Dongming began to feel that "the situation has changed". He suddenly found that a large number of interior designers suddenly appeared in Xinjiang, failing to do things professionally, kickbacks were flying everywhere, and he made connections everywhere. He drew drawings for a week, but it was far less "effective" than others running all night.

"You said that I was an artist and knocked on your door at night. As a section chief of infrastructure, you looked at me with a questioning and confused eye, which was tantamount to killing me and humiliating me. At that time, I thought, I have to choose a reasonable and standard game rule. " Recalling the past, when it comes to excitement, Feng Dongming always habitually leans forward to a greater extent.

"At that time, we chose to quit the decoration industry with increasingly irregular competition." Susan, who joined Meike Group in 1992, thought that it was against this background that Meike considered international trade at that time because foreign business rules were more complete. Susan is now the retail project director of Meike Group.

In desperation, Feng Dongming went to the local Academy of Sciences and spent several hundred yuan to search for news and find a new way out. It was still a rare thing to know how to surf the Internet. At that time, Feng Dongming noticed a news that some industries were moving from Malaysia and Taiwan Province to Chinese mainland, and one of them was furniture manufacturing. "I do interior design, which is vertical design; The horizontal design is indoor display, 7% of which are related to furniture. " Feng Dongming said that at this time, his family origin also gave him some innate advantages. "My father made stage props all his life, furniture in qing dynasty furniture and Ming Dynasty, and furniture needed in model operas, which I am very familiar with." At the same time, he believes that it is relatively simple to operate export business as long as it is "accurate in delivery, good in quality and reasonable in price".

Around p>1992, some foreign furniture brand manufacturers often couldn't find a suitable OEM in China. "At that time, the industry was mainly state-owned enterprises, and the two sides could not bridge the gap conceptually." In Feng Dongming's view, this is an opportunity.

whoever knows how to play with taste can get on this bus.

when he was young, Feng Dongming, who often had the impulse to wrap the Hongshan Mountain in Xinjiang with cotton and white cloth, began to play "taste" at this time.

He put a 12-year-old pine tree in the middle of everything, and half of it was used as a bar, which was placed in the pine furniture model room in Meike Xinjiang, decorated with dead leaves of red willows. "At that time, foreigners were stupid to see it, and that kind of leisure made them feel that China people also knew leisure and could play with taste."

Xiang Bing, dean of cheung kong graduate school of business, who likes to cite Meike as a case of China's enterprise internationalization, said, "He studies fine arts and has a first-class ability to connect with foreigners. He can choose to connect with foreign high-end furniture, so that he can get more gross profit."

As a result, Feng Dongming, who knew nothing about furniture manufacturing, started manufacturing and exporting pine furniture.

however, according to Yang Lei, director of the consulting department of the Furniture Association, the furniture export process in the early 199s was far from simple. Exporting companies first needed to find an international trader and partner. At that time, China's largest furniture manufacturing and export base was in Dongguan, Guangdong Province, and most of them were Taiwan-funded enterprises transferred to the mainland.

Rent a van, a box of mineral water and two plastic bags of steamed stuffed buns for three trips. Feng Dongming and them are looking for a suitable partner in Dongguan. Finally, the general manager of Meike Company found Guo Shanhui, the chairman of Taiwan Province Taisheng Group. Taisheng Group is currently one of the largest furniture manufacturing companies in Asia.

Feng Dongming's ideas and passion touched Guo Shanhui, and he decided to cooperate. After all, it was a "bit crazy" idea to make furniture from pine. Compared with rosewood and huanghuali, pine is soft in texture. Taisheng, who is familiar with the American market, will explore the American pine furniture market together with Meike. In January 1994, Meike's first container was exported to the United States, with a value of about $25,. After one year of cooperation, in August, 1995, Meike Industrial Co., Ltd. and Taiwan Province Taisheng Wood Factory Co., Ltd. (controlled by Taisheng Group) jointly established Meike International Furniture Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Around 2, Feng Dongming began to be called "the king of pine" by American furniture manufacturers. At this time, Meike began to be involved in the production of a variety of wood furniture. Today, Meike exports about 2 TEUs per month.

Location of Tianjin: Returnees

Tianjin Port is a necessary checkpoint for Meike furniture export.

In p>1996, Meike Group, located in Xinjiang, began to find that long-distance transportation from its production base to Tianjin Port became an obstacle to its growth. Feng Dongming entrusted Tianjin office to inspect the local investment environment. Chen Yimu and others, who are in charge of communicating export affairs in Tianjin, think that the policies and regional environment of Tianjin TEDA Economic and Technological Development Zone are very suitable for the redevelopment of Meike, so they suggest Feng Dongming to establish a new manufacturing factory in Tianjin.

At this time, Meike Company earned millions of dollars in foreign exchange every year, which made it very comfortable in Xinjiang.

However, after the on-the-spot investigation in Tianjin, Feng Dongming, then the chairman of the company, decided to rebuild a factory in Tianjin. According to the internal staff of Meike, Feng was "pushing through the crowd" on this issue at that time. Feng Dongming's reason is that there are many Fortune 5 companies in the Economic Development Zone, and Meike Company should be adjacent to them.

In June p>1997, Meike International Furniture (Tianjin) Manufacturing Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Meike Tianjin Manufacturing") was established, and several factories were built and put into operation one after another.

In fact, it seems that choosing Tianjin can be regarded as the first step in the transformation of the United States and Germany, especially after the change of national policy in 1998.

in p>1998, the natural forest protection project was implemented in China due to the flood. Meike Group began to turn to Russia, Finland, New Zealand and other places to purchase wood. In the same year, the national natural forest resources protection project began to be piloted. In October 2, the State Council officially approved the Implementation Plan of Natural Forest Resources Protection Project in Northeast Inner Mongolia and other key state-owned forest areas (including Xinjiang). In 25, the natural forest in Xinjiang was completely stopped.

At this time, Meike's wood procurement in New Zealand and other places has been stable, and it has invested and built a wood supply and processing base in the Russian Far East, as well as two wood processing logistics centers in Alashankou Port in Xinjiang and Erenhot in Inner Mongolia, initially forming a supply chain system with Russia as the source, Alashankou and Erenhot as the bases and factories and customers as the terminals, thus alleviating the pressure of raw material supply in downstream manufacturing.

after raw materials need to be imported, Tianjin has become the nearest manufacturing place for raw materials. Most of the wood does not need to be transported to Xinjiang and then turned into furniture and returned to Tianjin Port for export, so the transportation cost is greatly reduced. At the same time, Meike International Wood Industry (Tianjin) Co., Ltd. not only supplies wood to Meike Tianjin, but also sells wood to foreign countries.

In fact, Meike's emphasis on the supply of upstream raw materials can be seen from the decision to introduce two state-owned shareholders-Fuyun Forest Farm and Tianshan Western Forestry Bureau in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in 1999.

these two institutions each held 2.97% of the shares of Meike, which were listed later. Feng Dongming's consideration is: "As the person in charge of the enterprise, we must consider our own business chain and anti-risk ability. As a downstream furniture manufacturer, it is particularly important to demand and control the upstream wood. We must have the advantage of pine resources in Xinjiang."

While the export business is still booming, Feng Dongming thought of another problem.

At the beginning of his business, Feng Dongming didn't understand and even avoided "loans". Feng Dongming, who claimed to be a scholar, began to gradually understand the importance of financing for a company after a branch manager of the Agricultural Bank of China who had the task of issuing loans explained to him how to borrow chickens to lay eggs. Around 1999, he proposed that Meike be listed.

In October p>1999, Meike International Furniture Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Meike) was incorporated, mainly engaged in home manufacturing, retail and international wood industry.

On November 27th, 2, 4 million A shares of Meike were listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

The survival network of the fearful is king

In the process of preparing for listing, an international political event prompted Feng Dongming to consider the inherent risks of this business of making dollars.

On May 8, 1999, the Embassy of China in Yugoslavia was bombed.

That night, Feng Dongming watched Phoenix TV news all night. He stood on the bed and stared at the screen.

For Meike Group, which only has export business, if Sino-US relations reverse, then everything may have to go back to zero.

Feng Dongming began to think that there was not much room for growth in export business, and then he thought of political issues and exchange rate issues, and needed to do something to hedge risks.

At the same time, with the rapid growth of GDP in China, the purchasing power of domestic consumers is gradually increasing, and people who "get rich first" begin to talk about "life".

Meike Group, which has been studying abroad for many years, has the idea of "returning to the sea".

"After China's material civilization, we have the responsibility to tell consumers a more tasteful international home standard. For example, there must be a dresser or antique cabinet in the bedroom, because you must put a dozen underwear and ten pairs of socks, change them every day and wash them once a week. " Talking about Meike's "returnees", Feng Dongming will talk passionately about the need for China people to improve their quality of life.

In fact, Meike Group is also in urgent need of a new market that can boost its performance growth, aiming at the furniture retail business.

In January p>22, markor furnishings Furniture Chain Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as markor furnishings) was established, and began to prepare for the establishment of the store, and named the store as markor furnishings.

As the largest pine furniture OEM in Asia, a considerable number of investors questioned Meike Group's choice to return to the domestic market to do mid-to high-end home retailing. They are not optimistic about the single-store profitability of large specialty stores, fearing that the retail business will drag down the performance of Meike shares. In the end, Meike shares only hold 51% of the shares of markor furnishings.

In the case that institutional investors are not optimistic, Meike Group decided to buy back some shares of Meike shares to ensure that the plan to enter the retail industry will not be hindered. Meike Group's abacus is to build a retail network with 4 stores in the mainland market. On the one hand, it will extend the industrial chain to the downstream; on the other hand, specialty stores are an extremely effective way to build furniture brands.

investors' worries are not unreasonable, and Feng Dongming admits that retail and manufacturing are two completely different industries. Therefore, in Meike Group, these two businesses are completely operated by two different teams.

in view of the lack of retail experience, markor furnishings joined hands with Ethan Allen, an old American furniture manufacturer and retailer. The way of cooperation between the two parties is: markor furnishings sells products of markor furnishings and Ethan Allen at the same time.

The latter transferred the management mode to markor furnishings, including helping markor furnishings to carry out personnel training and informatization. In 21, before there was a physical store, markor furnishings decided to spend 1 million yuan to adopt stores retail management system developed by American software vendors, which can be used to manage 4 stores.

on December 28th, 22, the first markor furnishings chain store opened in Tianjin. In the following five years, markor furnishings has opened more than 2 chain stores in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Hangzhou, with an average of 4-5 stores per year.

the speed of opening this store is not fast, especially in the past two years when chain stores have become popular. In this regard, Susan, director of Meike Retail Project, thinks that this is "related to the services provided by markor furnishings, which can only be accurately achieved through the coordinated operation of a system".

In markor furnishings, all salesmen are called design consultants. "They need to give consumers suggestions on furniture selection and matching. Many times, design consultants need to visit customers' homes before they make proposals." Liu Chunjie, head of the advertising department in charge of brand promotion in markor furnishings, said, "Behind every design consultant, there are four people providing relevant service support on average." The average number of standard design consultants per store is about 3. In other words, the rapid expansion will undoubtedly reduce the service quality of these "design consultants".

markor furnishings Management College (formerly Company Training Department) came into being. At the beginning of opening the store, it will provide full-time training for new employees for 45 days. With the deepening of the training, it will be extended to corporate culture, business skills, management and other aspects. "After the training, our trainers often work in the store with the trainees for one month to give guidance." Chen Peng, a college trainer, said that Chen Peng joined Meike Tianjin as early as 1999 and served as a planning and design consultant.