On the morning of New Year’s Day, a woman known only by her surname, Min, arrived at the Haidilao outlet in Xi’an’s IMIX Park as she always did. But this time, her role had shifted. Instead of managing a single store, she was now responsible for overseeing three, part of her training to become a multi-store manager.
This change is part of Haidilao’s latest initiative—the “Pomegranate Plan.” Over the past six months, the company has been rolling out a series of sub-brands: Yanqing, Xiaohai Hotpot, BarBecue, Miaow Master, Feipai, and Congqian Yinxiang, among others. According to 36Kr, these brands have collectively opened nearly 50 new locations. Yanqing alone already operates 25 stores, with plans to add ten more.
With growth in its flagship brand slowing, Haidilao’s ambition to cultivate a second major brand has become more apparent. But the company’s ability to scale new ventures hinges on one critical factor: capable store managers. Founders may set the direction, but it’s managers like Min who determine how quickly and effectively new stores can expand.
Min is the kind of manager Haidilao is banking on. A veteran employee, she graduated in 2007 and has been with the company ever since—17 years and counting. Her career began in logistics at Shuhai, Haidilao’s supply chain division, where she moved up the ranks from human resources supervisor to senior HR manager. Later, she pivoted to store operations, and by December 2018, she was tasked with managing a new Haidilao outlet in Xi’an’s IMIX Park. She has held that role for more than six years.
As of mid-2024, Haidilao operates 1,343 stores, with more than a thousand managers like Min at the helm. Until recently, most of these managers oversaw just one location. But as Haidilao pushes forward with its multi-brand strategy, store managers’ responsibilities—and career trajectories—are evolving.
Investing in its people
Investment is often said to be about investing in people, and Haidilao’s internal entrepreneurship model embodies that belief. When the company seeks leaders for its new ventures, seasoned employees are the first ones tapped.
When Haidilao first embraced its multi-brand strategy in 2020, it mobilized its top coordinators—known internally as “coaches.” Among them was Yang Hua, who joined the company in 1999 as an entry-level store employee and worked her way up to coach. By 2022, she launched her own internal venture, Yanqing, and now leads Haidilao’s entrepreneurship committee.
Entrepreneurship comes with risk, but Haidilao is willing to take its chances. “We’re prepared to try 100 times just to succeed once,” Yang told 36Kr. If a venture fails, the company absorbs most of the financial loss, while the founder takes on a smaller portion—leaving room for a second or even third attempt.
“Haidilao’s style is to shoot first rather than aim first,” said one company insider. “If you fire off 100 shots, you’ll hit something eventually.”
Still, choosing the right leader for each venture is crucial. According to Wang Qiang, director of Haidilao’s entrepreneurship office, the company’s internal entrepreneurs generally fall into three categories: long-serving, dedicated employees; managers with backgrounds in internet technology; and external entrepreneurs brought in from outside.
For Min, stepping into multi-store management was partly inspired by an existing success story. “Yang Hua was a store manager who rose through the ranks in Xi’an. I’m also a store manager in Xi’an,” she said. The connection, she admitted, might seem like a stretch, but within Haidilao, Yang has become a role model.
At the company’s group conference last April, Min heard Yang speak for the first time. Back then, Yanqing had just one store, and the Pomegranate Plan was still in its infancy. Later, Min visited Yanqing’s first location in Xi’an and left with a new ambition—opening her own.
But store managers like Min must meet two key requirements before they can transition into multi-store management. First, the Haidilao store they currently oversee must maintain at least a B-level rating. Second, they must build a backup leadership team at their original location.
For example, at Yanqing’s IMIX Park location, the front-of-house and back-of-house managers were both handpicked by Min from her old Haidilao store.
“We won’t make any plans to open 100 or 200 outlets,” Yang said. “The number of new stores depends on how many good managers and suitable locations we can find.”
In the food service industry, there’s a saying that a great location is something you wait for. Min’s expansion happened when an opportunity landed in her lap. In mid-2024, a neighboring business shut down due to poor operations, leaving behind a prime storefront.
Because Haidilao was already a tenant at Xi’an’s IMIX Park, negotiations moved quickly. The lease was signed in June 2024—contracts were finalized in just over a month, a process that normally takes three to six. By August 2024, Yanqing’s doors were open.
With only a single wall separating her two locations, Min found managing both stores surprisingly manageable. She framed the change in simple terms: “It’s just adding 30 more tables.” The biggest operational shift was the menu—barbecue emphasizes meat more than hotpot—so it mostly meant creating “one extra functional zone in the kitchen.”
Haidilao relies on process management to evaluate stores, working under the belief that if the process is solid, results won’t be bad. Its “four-color card” system—focusing on service, cleanliness, food quality, and food safety—is the company’s primary performance metric. The same system applies across its multi-brand concept and has even been copied by competitors like Chagee.
Despite venturing into new brands, Haidilao’s signature service remains intact. Perks like hair washing, hair braiding, manicures, and Sichuan opera face-changing performances continue to be part of the experience.
“Our team’s core capability is managing both employees and customers,” Yang said. The company has developed structured methods to support its staff and provide enough incentives to keep them engaged. Meanwhile, founders are expected to do one thing well: train their store managers to run their respective business categories effectively.
Store managers that earn millions?
Min’s understudies are also eager to open their own stores. Every new location creates openings for front-of-house and back-of-house managers, as well as other specialized roles—expanding career progression opportunities across the board.
For Min, selecting and developing these future leaders is the most time-consuming aspect of managing multiple locations. She must prepare her backup team to handle everything from customer complaints to menu updates—an intensive training process that can take anywhere from six months to a year.
Entrepreneurship at Haidilao carries risk, but the potential rewards are significant. According to Wang, Haidilao’s internal founders receive a mix of incentives: equity stakes, base salaries, and profit-sharing. Bonus pools are also available for cross-department collaborations.
Multi-store managers like Min benefit from a three-month liability waiver period when they first take over a new location. If the store turns a profit within that time, they receive a direct cut of the earnings. For managers, this profit-sharing model is the primary source of income, and those with strong leadership skills can earn additional income by training apprentices and even mentoring the next generation of apprentices under them.
To align interests, Haidilao has designed a unique profit-sharing structure. Store managers can choose to earn a direct percentage of their own store’s profits, or they can opt for a smaller individual share while also collecting a portion of profits from the stores run by their apprentices.
“Apprentices and grand apprentices are their permanent assets,” said Yang. “It’s part of Haidilao’s values—when the master teaches well, the master also does better.”
Because of this tiered structure, Haidilao store managers have long been known for their high earnings. During the company’s peak expansion years, top-performing veteran managers with multiple apprentices could rake in more than RMB 100,000 (USD 14,000) per month. However, as Haidilao’s flagship brand matures, such figures have become rarer.
By integrating the store manager system into its multi-brand strategy, Haidilao hopes to cultivate a new wave of high-earning managers.
“An ordinary hotpot or barbecue manager might make RMB 10,000 (USD 1,400) or RMB 20,000 (USD 2,800) a month,” Yang said, “but at Haidilao, if a single manager can train four backup teams, they could open four different stores in one mall and earn four times as much.”
Internally, the company debated whether managers should be allowed to oversee multiple stores. In the end, the decision was to move forward, reinforcing Haidilao’s philosophy of empowering workers to shape their own careers. Founder Zhang Yong has even stated internally that he wants strong store managers to reach annual seven-figure (RMB) salaries.
Of course, managers only receive dividends if the store model proves viable, making it a test of the entrepreneurship committee’s judgment. Every new business proposal is evaluated by the committee and reassessed at key checkpoints—three months, six months, and one year after launch.
If a store underperforms, there are two paths to closure. The committee may consult the founder, who can determine that the project has no future and pull the plug. Alternatively, locations may be benchmarked against one another, and if a store consistently underperforms, it undergoes a comprehensive review before being shut down.
Haidilao also keeps an internal memo documenting key takeaways from its entrepreneurial initiatives. Recognizing that many challenges share common patterns, the company holds monthly internal entrepreneurship meetings and updates the memo based on feedback from founders. Topics range from product R&D and cost control to financial modeling, creating a reference guide for future business leaders.
In just over two months since opening, Min’s Yanqing store received an A-level rating. As more store managers join, Yanqing has raised its application threshold from B-level to A-level. Meanwhile, Min is already onto her next challenge—managing a newly launched private dining concept.
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Starbucks has long been praised for having one of the most mature systems for training store managers in the industry. KFC, which has opened over 10,000 locations in China, once set the gold standard for highly standardized operations. Today, both brands are prime targets for talent poaching by China’s new wave of homegrown restaurant chains.
As the franchise market heats up, a new breed of super franchisees has emerged. Meanwhile, Haidilao is taking a different approach—cultivating super store managers who can oversee multiple brands within the same region. A single shopping mall may not be able to sustain two Haidilao hotpot restaurants, but it can likely support four of Haidilao’s different brands—all under the leadership of one store manager.
“The store manager is basically the head of a family. Within a single mall, each apprentice operates a different brand under them,” Yang said. “In a 500-meter radius, you won’t find any other management approach this efficient.”
Starbucks has also embraced a multi-store model. Recent reports suggest that the coffee giant is restructuring select locations into “multi-store communities” (MSC), where a single manager oversees two stores, breaking away from the traditional one-store-one-manager structure.
For leading brands, opening a new store is easy—training a great manager is not. Expansion simply adds to a company’s store count, but a strong managerial pipeline is what truly widens the operational gap between competitors. According to 36Kr, Chinese fast food chain Micun Bibimbap recently slowed its expansion plans due to a shortage of qualified store managers.
Haidilao, meanwhile, has taken a more measured approach with franchising. While its multi-brand strategy has moved at full speed, its franchise business has expanded slowly. The reason is clear: Haidilao’s service model is difficult to replicate through a franchise network. Instead of pushing into unfamiliar territory, the company has opted to consolidate operations under its own umbrella—allowing a single manager and team to oversee multiple brands at once.
Haidilao has dabbled in multi-brand ventures for years, but early efforts saw mixed results. In 2021, several of its incubated fast food brands shut down. By 2024, however, the company’s strategy had evolved. This time, Haidilao is leveraging its supply chain and core strengths to scale more effectively.
Among its new sub-brands, Yanqing has been most preeminent. The concept naturally integrates with Haidilao’s hotpot supply chain, creating operational efficiencies. “Hotpot and barbecue are inseparable,” Yang said. “The cuts of beef used in Haidilao hotpot and those for grilling are completely different. In the past, we’d negotiate on one or two cuts—now we discuss prices for the whole cow.”
Yang, a serial entrepreneur within Haidilao, previously managed Wugu Sancan before shifting to barbecue with Yanqing. She found herself better suited for high-end offerings, where customer interactions are more personal and emotionally engaging. Now, she works closely with the store managers under her wing, many of whom have followed her across different ventures.
At the end of December 2024, Haidilao held its first offline preparatory conference for the Pomegranate Plan in Wuxi. The event saw an overwhelming response—Yang alone received 200 applications from aspiring multi-store managers. After a rigorous selection process, she certified more than 160 of them, officially elevating them to “reserve multi-store managers.”
“Talent is the one problem you can’t just solve with money,” Yang said. “That’s the core issue.”
KrASIA Connection features translated and adapted content that was originally published by 36Kr. This article was written by Yang Yafei for 36Kr.