New entrants face challenges, Zibo barbecue has cooled down? Old merchants have indeed switched to barbecue | Zibo | entered the market

Since the beginning of this year, the continuously popular Zibo barbecue has begun to cool down!

Although the Dragon Boat Festival holiday has just passed, the performance of Zibo barbecue is still "top-notch". According to relevant platform data, Shandong has also become the province with the largest barbecue order volume in China. But recently, "Zibo barbecue cooling down traffic has declined" has become a hot topic on Weibo, sparking discussions among netizens.

Industry insiders have stated that every hot topic and every wave of traffic has a periodicity, and it is completely expected that Zibo barbecue will return to normal from the top stream.

Catering top flow, gradually cooling down

Starting from March, accelerating in April, and reaching its peak in May... Looking back at the "boom" of Zibo barbecue, it can be considered a "perfect life" of top-notch catering.

Zibo Barbecue has become popular on the Internet since March this year. At that time, hot topics such as "college students group to Zibo for barbecue" and "taking high-speed railway to strip the skewers, Zibo" were frequently searched by the media. The local government of Zibo even opened a special barbecue train for this purpose.

Entering April, Zibo barbecue became extremely popular, and the trend of "rushing to Zibo for barbecue" swept the country. During the May Day holiday, Zibo became one of the top cities in Shandong Province, and hotels in Zibo were fully booked.

With the cooling of Zibo barbecue, analysis suggests that the so-called decrease in heat is actually more of a return from peak to normal, which is a normal phenomenon.

As the flow of traffic begins to ebb, entrepreneurs who have joined the trend of opening barbecue restaurants have begun to face new challenges.

Traffic recedes, challenges come

According to relevant information, from March 1st to June 18th, there was a surge of 694 new barbecue related enterprises in Zibo City. Nowadays, some once fully booked Zibo barbecue restaurants have returned to normal business. At the same time, many stores have posted sublease information.

Mr. Meng has been operating a barbecue restaurant in Zibo for many years. When talking about the "barbecue fever" this year, he smiled and told reporters, "Business has never been so hot before, and I have never been so tired." Due to long-term staying up late and high-intensity work, during the peak period of the barbecue boom in Zibo, Meng Xiansheng once accumulated into the hospital.

Recently, several newly opened barbecue restaurants near Mr. Meng's storefront have started to be transferred or have plans to be transferred. Mr. Meng stated that the main reason for the transfer of these stores was the lack of business. "A while ago, I felt like I could make money by opening a store, as if I could monetize it. Those who used to work in other industries have switched to barbecue. As soon as the popularity subsided, tourists began to decline."

A local barbecue industry insider in Zibo told Cover News reporters, "There are indeed some local barbecue shops in Zibo that are being transferred, but internet famous shops like Muyang Village are still doing very well, and the business they follow is relatively average."

"At present, it is summer, and in fact, Zibo citizens eat more barbecue in the summer. However, after the heat subsides, the supply of barbecue shops exceeds demand, and such a problem will definitely occur," he said.

Xiaobing reduces fever and returns to normal

As one of the "souls" of Zibo barbecue, Zibo Xiaobing's current situation truly reflects the situation of Zibo barbecue "reducing fever".

At the beginning of the hot season of Zibo barbecue, small cakes were once crazily snatched, and many manufacturers in Zibo were in short supply locally, not to mention orders from other places. But according to the reporter's understanding, the situation of "one cake is hard to find" only lasted for two months.

Due to the difficulty in finding a cake, many locals in Zibo have also chosen to enter the pit. Mr. Meng said, "My friend used to work in the printing industry. Later, when he saw the Zibo barbecue fire, he bought a machine. It took him about a month to process various documents. When the machine was adjusted, the pancakes became less popular."

Due to Zibo Xiaobing's emphasis on small profits but high sales, high transportation costs are not suitable for manufacturers. According to Mr. Yuan, the shelf life of small pancakes at room temperature is generally 3 days. If they are transported from Zibo to Chengdu, they can only be transported by air, and transportation costs are a significant issue. If transported by cold chain, the time may be longer, but the taste of the pancakes will be greatly reduced.

He said that in the past, there was often a situation where small cakes were gone in the store, which caused customer dissatisfaction. Now, the demand for small cakes has returned to normal, and manufacturers and products offer a variety of choices. "This is the more normal situation."

After the traffic, where to go and where to go

Mr. Yuan from Zhangdian, Zibo, opened his first Zibo barbecue restaurant in Chengdu in the second half of last year. According to him, he did not expect it to become popular when he first opened Zibo barbecue in Chengdu. When it comes to his current business, "Actually, if I just do it as a regular barbecue, the business is still decent."

"There are also many restaurants in Chengdu now, some of which are not owned by Zibo people, and some used to be Northeast barbecue or Sichuan barbecue, because the heat has also increased to small pancake ovens and other Zibo barbecue items. If the heat gradually subsides, it is estimated that they will still make their own barbecue again," Mr. Yuan said.

In the local area of Zibo, shop owners like Mr. Meng who have been engaged in barbecue for a long time have actually prepared for the decrease in barbecue heat. Previously, he refused a large number of requests for franchises or naming from outside or local areas, and like in the past decade or so, he hoped that his barbecue restaurant could steadily continue to thrive.

"I am a barbecue seller, responsible for making the taste good. Everything else is beyond my control," Mr. Meng told reporters.