A Lot of People in The Cafe

On January 7, 2011, Ji Ernie posted a very attractive post -- "Use 2000 yuan to open a cafe!" ", "Isn't this illegal fundraising? Skepticism followed, but it was also supported by many netizens who shared the same dream. The second girl's boyfriend is to learn the law, to help her make an explanation and statement, the standard system. A week later, more than 140 people had signed up, far more than had been asked for shareholders. Eric quickly closed the post, according to the time sequence, selected the top 50 shareholders as a total investment of 210,000 yuan.

Subsequently, the shareholders have the passbook in the hands of two girls.

"I can't tell you how much trust I felt when I saw so many strangers hand me their bankbooks." Two girls recalled the mood at that time. In the end, with 50 shareholders contributing 210,000 yuan, the cafe's dream came to a step closer to reality. However, there are always so many gaps on the way to realizing your dream.

At the first general meeting. Through independent registration and platform speech, shareholders have 1 vote for each 2000 yuan of investment, and finally, vote to elect a board of directors composed of 5 people. Mosquito Ernie is elected as the chairman of the board with the most votes. The next thing you have to consider is, how much does it cost to run a cafe a year, excluding revenue? A post by user Mo Ke detailing the cafe's budget came up with 700,000 yuan. Now the 50 shareholders have to face the challenge of adding shareholders or investing more.

"If you do not increase the shareholders and funds, it is difficult to do a good job of 210,000 yuan, but some shareholders feel that there are too many shareholders to manage." Two girls analysis, some shareholders are not willing to add shareholders, maybe "subconsciously feel that what has been obtained, must be protected, do not want too many people to join in to share."

"So I started it first. If I didn't want to share it with you, would there still be shareholders? Would there still be our cafe?" The second girl's words woke up the shareholders. After a heated discussion, it was agreed that the platform must be open to survive. The shareholders made additional investments, and at the same time opened a post on the Internet to solicit 30 new shareholders. Finally, the total number of shareholders was confirmed to be 80 (2 people withdrew later due to personal reasons), with a total investment of 410,000 yuan.

Can register to encounter a problem again. A registered limited company requires several shareholders not more than 50 people, 78 shareholders how to go to register? An equity agency is an option, but is it feasible? "We texted all the shareholders and volunteered, and we found that not everyone wanted to be a registered shareholder, and some wanted to be proxy because other than the registration, the voting rights and so on were the same. Some shareholders find people they trust to represent them." Finally, the actual registered 22 shareholders, the other registered shareholder's agent. Although with 700 thousand yuan ideal investment still has a gap. But the shareholders' meeting decided to open the cafe first and try to make a profit as soon as possible.

That decoration is to test whether lovers can enter the palace of marriage a canard, did not think of shareholders of the differences and difficulties are also concerned with decoration.

In fixing the decoration style, the shareholders for the end are installed as a small clear wind or rock wind each opinion, after a few discussions voted to decide, small pure and fresh prevailed. The style is set. Start decorating! Who knows to meet a black decoration team, after water and electricity transformation is completed, maybe to see the children face of shareholders, think they do not understand, want to take the opportunity to get a sum of money, only this one will open the price of 60 thousand yuan, shareholders unprecedented unity external, with decoration team battle of wits. Emergency call a few understand the decoration of shareholders, in the cafe to negotiate with them, from seven o 'clock at night to more than twelve.

The black heart decoration team is a bad comer, unexpectedly said "do not give 60,000 things all removed", a shareholder see their scheme, and said, "dismantle it!" After successfully catching a move, and then with them to reason, the carrot, and stick, finally cut the price step by step to a reasonable price of 30,000 yuan.

In September 2011. Green signs, nearly 200 square meters of area, small and fresh decoration style, slow music, artistic temperament of the shop assistants. Managed by 78 young shareholders, the cafe called "Many People's Cafe" opened in Beijing's Chaoyang district.

If it's not professional, who's going to manage it?

Most of the 78 shareholders are post-85 graduates. They have no business experience, and they do things based on their passion. They are idealistic. But so what?

"The first store must be somewhere large. This is the consensus of the shareholders, otherwise, the shareholders would not be able to sit." Two girls said with a smile. "The shareholders explore the store or find information or provide information. The site selection team travels around for a month, weighs rent and location, and finally signs a three-year contract to rent the cheapest and largest place, but the rent of 240,000 yuan per year is" overwhelming "for them. Rent plus the cost of renovations, etc. The initial investment is spent, and it is too extravagant to find a professional person to manage the cafe. So shareholders with no business experience kept brainstorming.

To realize the real participation of many people, they set up many working groups, such as the publicity group responsible for the bar, the activity group responsible for the coffee bean, the product group, the administrative group, etc. The leaders of each group are relatively fixed, and the staff will be constantly rotated. Because the work of the group is mainly carried out on the Internet, there are not so many time and geographical restrictions, and more and more people can participate.

Shareholders are mostly involved remotely, so who runs the cafe? This brings us to Mork. His online name is Moke GG. His real name is Zhao Shanjun. After graduating from university, he worked as the operations director of a well-known Beijing bookstore. Soon after the post was published, Mok began to pay attention to it. With his experience in running the bookstore, Mok put forward various suggestions and guidance in the QQ group of the cafe. From the beginning, Mok chose not to become a shareholder. Because he felt that the group of young people on the road with their dreams "needed someone to criticize them."

He then became operations director for the first three months of the cafe's opening, free of charge, with two shareholders working part-time as clerks and two more hired full-time. Since the clerks were inexperienced, Mock did training and coaching. Everyone works as a store manager in shifts, and the store manager on duty is responsible for coordinating everything in the store. I hope to use this method to get you started as soon as possible. After half a year, the shift manager system was changed, and the full-time clerks who worked here for a long time and reached a certain level of ability could work as a rotating managers for three months. It worked, and now the clerks are extraordinary enough to make their coffee and even develop new ones.

This year's ideal, next year's reality

Now, in addition to the daily operation, the cafe has to do two interesting activities every week to reflect the characteristics of the cafe and attract customers. The ideas are also from the shareholders.

Recitals, coffee academies, film screenings, etc., are mostly artistic, probably because many of the shareholders are artistic youths. Shareholders are still thinking of various activities, "there is an exchange shop in Wudaoying, we are communicating with them to apply their operation of exchanging goods here, but it is not simple barter, the goods will be brought to a price, and then according to the price to exchange things." "The cafe wants to create a platform where shareholders or customers can realize their ideas," she said.

In the process of realizing the dream of a cafe together, the shareholders are not only partners but also especially good brothers and sisters. They often get together. The night before the interview, the shareholders went out to "corrupt", and then returned to the restaurant to chat and play games late into the night. "It's like going home to have a fixed bit to play with, and still own." Shareholders are proud of it, and their relationships are like family. On their birthdays, their "mobile phones explode and there are countless people @you on Weibo". There IS a STOCKHOLDER NET name popcorn, that day her birthday, two girls are in the store to see the clerk to buy popcorn back, why all buy popcorn, two girls are confused. When they put popcorn on the plate to make popcorn happy birthday, the two girls suddenly became enlightened. Photos of the event were shared by shareholders on Weibo.

There are several universities near the cafe, and Eruniu and the other shareholders wanted to provide them with a platform for activities, and the menu and pricing were aimed at this group. Another said, "It feels like our temperament is very much like students, in terms of overall positioning. 'The Many People's Cafe' is more like a student society." So their ideal is to run the store well, and they hope to open a branch and to open a branch in a place where the university is more concentrated.

In the choice of shareholders. They also think. Ernie said, "In the past, it was in the order of registration, and there were no screening criteria. If you open a branch and then absorb new shareholders, you want to set some standards." Because they found that the similarity of shareholders is too high, IT industry and do design in the majority, the resources are similar. Development may not have many advantages. But she still wants the shareholders to be young graduates because at least they haven't had their dreams crushed by life.

However idealistic, survival is their biggest problem. It can take three years for a cafe in the industry to recoup its investment. Two girls said that the money invested by shareholders is used up in the early stage, and the operating expenses are supported by the money earned. But we're still a little far from breaking even. After paying one year's rent now, next year's rent will be a problem. Recently shareholders have been debating what to do next.