In June 5438+that year 10, Beijinger Liu Wuyi opened the first Puls Matt Club in China on Qing Xue Road, Haidian District. The member store adopted the warehouse membership system and sold a lot of goods imported from the United States, which made the Beijingers at that time feel refreshed.
Liu Wuyi's "China Puma" claims to be "a member shopping and warehousing club originated in the United States. Its core concept is to provide low-priced and high-quality brand products and services, thus embodying the significance of the membership concept and forming a' member loyalty purchase' model."
At that time, most people in China regarded China Puma as a foreign retailer, but China Puma was a "100% private enterprise" from beginning to end, and never had any foreign investment. Its owner has always been Liu Wuyi and his family. Liu Wuyi was able to use the American brand "PriceSmart" because he signed a franchise authorization agreement with American Price Ventures, Inc. on 1996. As early as the mid-1950s, Sol Price, an American, founded a new retail model-warehouse membership supermarket, and named his own supermarket after Fedmart. 1976, Sol Price and his son Robert Price founded a company named Price, co. (Nasdaq PCLB) and renamed it "Price Club", which is a warehouse membership supermarket under the company.
After more than ten years of development in the United States, "Price Club" is determined to open up overseas markets due to fierce domestic competition. 1992, Price, co. established a joint venture with a Mexican retail enterprise, with each party holding 50% of the shares. The joint venture company launched the first "price club" supermarket in Mexico that year. Since then, Central America has become the key expansion area of Price Company. ..
1993, Price Company reorganized with Costco Wholesale Corp.(COST, Nasdaq), another American retail enterprise, and established PriceCostco, Inc.( PCCW, Nasdaq).
The new company is named "PriceCostco" after the chain supermarkets owned by the original merged parties, including1kloc-0/Costco supermarket and 94 Price Club supermarkets, thus becoming the leader of American warehousing membership chain stores.
1994 because it is difficult to reconcile the business direction and development strategy of the merging parties, it is decided to split the business of PriceCostco, Inc. The new company, Price Enterprises, Inc.(PEI), was separated from PriceCostco, Inc. and specialized in real estate management. Under the leadership of PEI, a wholly-owned subsidiary, Price Ventures, Inc.(PVI), was established. It is this PVI that registered the trademark "PriceSmart" in the United States Patent and Trademark Registration Office 1994.
The main task of PVI is to expand the warehouse membership supermarket chain outside the United States. There are two ways to expand: first, franchising, that is, allowing other companies to use the "PriceSmart" trademark to open warehouse member supermarkets, and the authorized party PVI will provide technical support and collect the franchise fee; The second is to open a "PriceSmart" supermarket overseas in the form of sole proprietorship or joint venture.
1In May 1995, the first franchised "PriceSmart" supermarket opened in Saipan, Micronesia, Pacific Ocean. In the past two years, some Indonesian, China, Malaysian and Philippine companies have also signed franchise agreements with PVI to open PriceSmart supermarkets in their own countries.
According to American domestic media reports, 1996, Timetone International Group, Inc., established by Liu Wuyi in the United States, signed a franchise agreement with PVI. According to the agreement, Tomton and his partners in China can use the trademark "PriceSmart" to open supermarket chains in Beijing, Tianjin and other cities in China.
This is the first time that an American brand "PriceSmart" has married a China enterprise. Everything that happened afterwards showed that Liu Wuyi, who was authorized by PVI franchise, brought the "PriceSmart" brand back to China, making it blossom all over the country. But on the other side of the ocean, PVI mainly develops PriceSmart supermarkets in Central America and the Caribbean by means of sole proprietorship or joint venture.
In America, there has never been a PriceSmart supermarket. 1997, PriceCostco, Inc. changed its company name to "Costco Whole Corp.", marking the end of the four-year marriage between Price, Co. and Costco Whole Corp. In the same year, PriceSmart, Inc(PSMT, Nasdaq) was incorporated, and the assets of PVI, a wholly-owned subsidiary of PEI, were injected into PriceSmart, Inc.
As a result, the three-year-old American brand "PriceSmart" acquired a company carrier of the same name, and PriceSmart, Inc. (Nasdaq PSMT) was later widely called "American Puma" in China.
The newly established Puma in the United States is fully responsible for the overseas expansion of "PriceSmart" supermarket chains, and focuses on areas where developing countries are concentrated, such as Central America and Asia. Gil Partida, the former president of Puma, even declared: "The mission of the company is to provide a large number of goods and services to the poor in developing countries and emerging countries."
1998, American puma company established a joint venture with a Panamanian company, and American puma company held 60% of the shares. They plan to open nine warehouse member supermarkets in Central America and the Caribbean. At that time, PriceSmart supermarkets in Costa Rica, Dominica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and other countries opened one after another. Since then, Trinidad and Tobago, the Philippines, Mexico, Guam and Nicaragua have also opened more than a dozen PriceSmart supermarkets.
It is worth noting that more than half of Puma's expansion in the above-mentioned fields in the United States is the establishment of wholly-owned companies, and the joint venture company holds a controlling stake. According to the annual report of Puma 1998 in the United States, as of that year, the franchise form of "PriceSmart" only existed in China and Saipan.
200 1 and 2002 are undoubtedly the peak periods of Puma's development in the United States, and all developing China countries such as Central America and the Caribbean occupy a large market share in the local retail industry. Similar to China, the appearance of American Puma in these countries and regions has been praised as "American retail giant" by local media. Even the President of Nicaragua attended the opening ceremony of the local PriceSmart supermarket.
On June 5438+10/October 65438+May, 2002, a Tribune Union in San Diego published a report entitled "Puls Matt's Expansion in the Third World". According to the report, during the global economic downturn and the decline of the retail industry, Puma in the United States maintained a low-cost and high-volume business model and saved 520,000 member customers. Some analysts believe that Puma in the United States has the potential to become a retail giant in third world countries because of its unique market expansion.
At the same time, the above report thinks that the economic and political environment in China is very different from that in the United States, which will be an obstacle to the development of Puma in China. However, puma in the United States obviously does not admit this. The president of the company in Asia said that PriceSmart's business in China is developing well, and it is estimated that its sales in China market will reach 483 million US dollars in 2002.
Corresponding to this optimism, in August, 2002, the annual report published by American Puma Company showed that its profit in the last fiscal year (August, 2006, 5438+0-August, 2002) reached 1 1 ten thousand dollars. This is also the best performance of puma in American history-puma has been losing money in the United States since 2003. Although PriceSmart has achieved good sales performance in China, its sales performance is not included in the financial statements of Puma in the United States because Puma only operates as an authorization in China. Puma USA only grants China the franchise-providing technical management support and brand.
In fact, Puma in the United States charges China about $654.38 million+for joining each PriceSmart supermarket every year, and there is no capital exchange between the two parties.
With the expansion of Puma in Central America and the Caribbean, Puma is also moving towards China step by step in China. From 1997 to July 2003, 13 Puma member stores opened in various places.
According to Caijing survey, in February of 20001,Puma USA re-signed a franchise contract with Novont, Inc., an American company of Liu Wuyi, and Novon Holdings Limited of China. According to the contract, Puma allowed the two companies to open stores in China under the brand name of "PriceSmart" and provided relevant technical support and management training. At the same time, it is required that "the appearance of the store, including the design, layout planning, employee clothing, equipment and brand of each chain store, should be consistent with Puma's own stores".
It is also emphasized in the contract that the US will provide suggestions on the opening, development and business plan updating of China member stores, and its senior staff will visit China at least twice a year to give guidance to chain member stores. In addition, if the Chinese side requests it, the US side is obliged to train its senior managers.
According to the contract, each chain store of Nuoheng Company in China has to pay 1 16900 USD annually. More importantly, the United States has clear requirements for the opening speed of Nuoheng Company in China-Nuoheng Company promises to open five Puma member stores in 200 1 year, three in 2002 and four in 2003; If China doesn't keep its promise, it will pay a fine of 1 16900 USD to the US for each one opened less.
China Puma, which fell into financial crisis after 2002, is obviously unable to complete the above-mentioned "heavy responsibility". In 2002 and 2003, China Puma Corporation only launched four Puma member stores.
In the second half of 2004, Puma in China staged the "Shops Overturning Storm", and in February of that year, the cooperation between Puma and Liu Wuyi in the United States came to an end. One month before 10, the United States issued an ultimatum to China, asking it to pay the franchise fee and interest totaling1400,000 USD within 30 days. But China didn't respond. 12 10, the United States suspended the franchise agreement and PriceSmart bid farewell to the China market.
While bidding farewell to China, Puma's self-operated stores in other parts of the United States have recently encountered troubles: on February 28 this year, three Mexican PriceSmart supermarkets closed-this was the first stop for Puma to go overseas; On March 29th, the minority shareholders of Puma's joint venture company in Guatemala applied to the court for bankruptcy liquidation, so as to settle the debts and repay the arrears.
Today, Ma Shang has 26 member stores in 65,438+03 countries in Central America, the Caribbean coast and the Philippines. Its sales in fiscal year 2004 was close to $665.438 billion, down 7.7% from the previous year, with a net loss of $30 million. -