In October 2016, the third quarter report of metersbonway in 2016 announced: the report showed that the company's revenue up to the reporting period was 4.7 billion, an increase of 8.83% year on year; although there was still a small loss, it had been reduced by 12.73% year on year, and the net profit is expected to turn into profit quickly.

In the face of the continuous decline in performance in three years and the still sluggish real retail industry in China, this well-known leading fashion retail enterprise in China has really released obvious positive signals through the third quarter report. So does this mean that the company under the spotlight has entered a new healthy development track? What kind of business status quo and transformation and upgrading path does it reflect?

Is the transformation and upgrading of real enterprises driven by external factors or the only way for China's industrial development?

A popular point of view in the industry is that the entry and competition of foreign brand retailers make national brands and retailers appear weak and hard to fight back. However, if we look back on foreign brands such as automobiles, consumer goods and mass merchandising entering the early domestic retail industry, it is not difficult to find that many local brands have or are making a comeback, occupying a decisive position in the market again, and even playing a leading role in some segments. In fact, "competition" will always stimulate potential participants to become stronger and become an external driving force for the growth of an industry. In the early market dividend era, national brands such as Meibang have experienced a short-term comfortable life of boiling frog in warm water. After foreign leading enterprises such as Zara, H & M enter the Chinese market, what they really bring to such local enterprises is not the superficial short-term performance setbacks, but more the awakening and maturity of market awareness, the accelerated construction and improvement of internal core competitiveness, and the rapid development of products Follow and innovate beyond.

E-commerce is also widely regarded as an important factor to impact the real economy. Meibang's clothing industry is regarded as the most serious e-commerce industry. In my opinion, the so-called "Internet shock" is nothing more than the loud cry of the Internet economy as a "new business model, retail model" at the beginning of its birth. E-commerce has awakened the traditional retail industry, but it has never and will never really replace the real industry. E-commerce is an online retailer, which can't replace brand makers, producers and offline retailers. As the contact point of the new "retail and customer service", the mature Internet is deeply integrating with brand merchants, offline retailers and producers, forming a new business form, creating a new omni-channel shopping experience for consumers, and driving consumption upgrading and industry upgrading together with entity enterprises. Take Meibang for example, the Internet is becoming an internal necessary tool or external partner for its transformation and upgrading, helping Meibang to accelerate the formation of new business forms, product experience and sales mode. Meibang has repeatedly said to the internal and external that the dilemma of the company and the whole industry today is mainly due to its immaturity in the past, failure to build a competitive product system, operation mode, and standard and efficient management system. This example shows that after the end of the era of extensive horse racing enclosure, local enterprises are driven by market factors such as foreign investment and e-commerce, striving to lead enterprises into a new stage of development through the reconstruction of core competitiveness and market leadership.

What to turn into and where to go? Transformation and upgrading direction of real industry

Looking at the transformation of traditional industries in recent years, there are many "transformation", but few "transformation" are successful. Many enterprises, including garment industry, seek for new growth points through diversified investment, and avoid the risk of sustainable development caused by the lack of competitiveness in the original industry. In the clothing industry, there are many diversified enterprises that are fully e-commerce or real estate investment. But "transformation" is not "transformation". Although diversified investment may help individual enterprises improve their own revenue stability, only "transformation and upgrading" can essentially promote the progress of industry and market development. Meibang is one of the first founders of virtual operation and franchise operation in China's clothing industry. In today's industry dilemma, Meibang's transformation choice highlights its national sense and sense of responsibility. It strives to reshape its internal core competitiveness and external market competitiveness with the spirit of craftsmanship and innovation, and drive and lead China's consumption upgrading and economic restructuring. This seems to be a relatively difficult way of upgrading and transformation, but it is the way out and the right way for China's real industry.

When it went public in 2008, Meibang proposed to catch up with Zara, the global fast fashion leading brand. But today's Meibang is not trying to simply copy Zara. On the surface, it is true that the product development cycle, new frequency and full direct retail mode of Zara are not realized in Meibang today, but the company is moving towards a new development mode of extreme single style brand experience through the multi style fission of Meibang brand. In the brand combination of new brand styles of Meibang, such as newear, hystyle and novachic, each style corresponds to different consumer's life attitude and life scene, different fashion connotation and renewal speed, different city level and business circle format. Therefore, the product development model, development cycle, new frequency and channel selection of each style brand are all forming their own matching differences Dissimilation operation mode. The former multi-style public leisure clothing retail enterprise is pursuing its dream of returning to China's leading fashion brand in the way of "consumer focus" and "business model innovation".

What are the key elements and the only way for the transformation and upgrading of fashion retail industry?

When many fashion retail enterprises are faced with internal and external troubles and sluggish performance, they often rush to seek medical treatment and blindly seek change and innovation. The results are not only useless, but even worse. In the past few years of declining performance, Metersbonwe has also struggled to find the root cause of the problem and the cure. After actively trying Internet innovation and market innovation, the company gradually realized that "never forget the original intention and return to specialty" is the most fundamental success factor for the enterprise to get out of the predicament. To respect the market, to respect the consumers, and to focus on grinding the brand and product strength with the spirit of craftsman are the foundation and the key to rejuvenate the vitality of the enterprise.

Craftsman spirit is to cultivate new core competitiveness. Apple, IBM, UNIQLO and Muji all entered the dormant and transformation period after their glory, thus ushering in the enterprise's glory again. These cases show that enterprises should keep a low profile when they enter the transition period, so that they can accumulate and develop after the completion of the transition. When you meditate, you are not eager to go to the market to turn over the clouds and rain. How can we "fly a dragon in the sky" without "use it alone"?

Generally speaking, local enterprises tend to be more grounded, especially in the market environment outside the first tier cities. This could have been its advantage in expanding the market. However, in Meibang, the core management of the company has realized that compared with foreign-funded enterprises, the company has several key shortcomings: lack of consumer thinking, lack of focus on market positioning, lack of attention and ability to product research and development, lack of experience in brand building and management, lack of systematic standardization lean management ability of modern enterprises, etc. Therefore, Meibang is trying to win the market through "more focused" and "more professional" ways by "quality as speed, efficiency as scale". Taking the precise focus of consumers as an example, for stock business, Meibang guides the optimization of product structure in the next quarter by analyzing the marketability of listed products through big data; optimizes product development efficiency through Internet pre-sale to improve the marketability of new products; understands consumers' life attitude, life style, style preference, life scene and conclusion through continuous and in-depth consumer portrait research In line with fashion trend and social trend, provide input for precise product development.

Compared with the craftsman spirit of "seeking good", the transformation of enterprises should also strive to "seek new". On the one hand, enterprises need "innovation" to speed up metabolism and form a correct ability layout. For example, under the new channel transformation strategy, Metersbonwe has developed more than 800 new stores in the first three quarters of 2016, and it is estimated that 1000 new stores will be opened in the whole year, thus effectively replacing a large number of low efficiency and low profit stores formed due to extensive site selection or business circle transfer in the past. On the other hand, the important way for enterprises to "seek innovation" is to make trial and error quickly and at low cost. The enterprise that can create the future must have the courage, attitude, practice and perseverance of "trial and error", and quickly optimize and grow through the experience learned from "trial and error", so as to find out more effective models and products. Through Bongo and Youfan, Metersbonwe boldly tried Internet innovation, which not only effectively clarified the correct transformation mode and direction of entity enterprise "+ Internet", but also found profitable product operation and innovation direction for Bongo and Youfan through rapid iteration and experience optimization. There has never been a golden key and quick rule for transformation and innovation. Rapid adjustment and Optimization in trial and error will be the only way for traditional enterprises to borrow "Internet thinking" for effective innovation.

Globalization, Internet innovation, economic transformation, consumption upgrading and other major trends and environment will still bring sustainable and profound challenges and opportunities to the real industries such as fashion retail. The in-depth transformation, integration and innovation within and across industries are in the ascendant, and the transformation and upgrading of fashion retail industry is just starting, with a long way to go.

After the honing and dormancy of the past three years, in 2016, due to its focus on the core business, metersbonway's performance has gradually begun to reverse the trend of decline: revenue growth and loss narrowing; the first stop of decline and recovery in franchise performance; rapid increase in the number of new style stores under the channel metabolism; distinctive and ready-made sub brand image; effective transformation and upgrading of brother brand me & city; me & city and moomoo, me & City ki Compared with the same period last year, DS children's wear business has grown by more than 20%; Internet businesses such as all online shopping have developed rapidly; and omni channel member service system is becoming more and more perfect. As a typical representative of national fashion brand, although the transformation of Metersbonwe is still on the way, its beneficial exploration and practice are bringing a lot of inspiration and reference to the fashion retail industry. Chinese national brands and local enterprises in fashion industry are worth looking forward to!