In the past few months, nearly 1,400 4S stores have been canceled, and the auto industry has entered the "live" mode.

Introduction: From January 1 to May 12, 1,345 car dealerships nationwide have been registered for cancellation.

Author | Zhao Xiaodao

Source | Auto Service World (ID: asworld168)

"Business, by its very nature, is a game of survivors. For entrepreneurs, failure is part of a career. It's a regrettable, but not shameful thing." -- Wu Xiaobo

"The most unfortunate thing is that the market comes back and the company is gone." Professor Zhou Qiren of Peking University's National Development Research Institute recently lamented at an online seminar, "Made in Foshan: Market Breakout under the Epidemic," which is becoming a reality.

At the end of January 2020, a massive outbreak of a new coronavirus epidemic sent the already sluggish automotive market into an even colder winter.

With the gradual improvement of the domestic epidemic situation, coupled with the national and local governments have introduced policies to support the industry, the domestic automotive market began to rebound.

In April, the first positive growth in auto sales occurred, with auto sales reaching 2.07 million units, up 43.5% sequentially and 4.4% year-on-year, and sales ended the 21 consecutive months of decline in China's auto market since July 2018.

Unfortunately, too many car dealers, did not last until the market rebounded.

Enterprise search data shows that from January 1 to May 12, 1,345 car dealers have been registered for cancellation nationwide (company cancellation refers to the process of terminating a company's legal personality when the company declares bankruptcy, is acquired by other companies, does not renew the expiration of the specified business period, or the company's internal dissolution and other circumstances, the company needs to go to the registration authority to apply for cancellation). In the nearly 1,400 automobile 4S stores, nearly 60% of the time is the creation of 3 years or less of the enterprise, in the crisis when the time comes, there is not much of the original accumulation of them, become the first batch of enterprises can not carry.

In addition, we found that not all enterprises were crushed by the epidemic, and many of them had already suffered a lot of internal damage.

The black swan of the epidemic, to some extent, is the bottom line test of the immunity of the enterprise, some people have a stronger immunity to the impact of the epidemic and live well, and even growth against the trend; some people accelerate the death.

First, nearly 1,400 4S stores were written off

The largest number of write-offs was in Shandong, 137, accounting for 10.2% of the total number of companies written off; followed by Henan Province and Guangdong Province, respectively, 96 (7.1%) and 95 (7.0%) of the car dealerships were written off. Comparatively speaking, Hubei, the area hardest hit by the epidemic, had just 45.

In the national ranking of cities with the highest number of car dealerships canceled, Xi'an topped the list with 31, followed by Chongqing and Changsha, with 27 canceled companies.

According to data from the Ministry of Public Security, as of the end of 2019, 11 cities in the country have more than 3 million car ownership, Xi'an, Chongqing and Chengdu ranked among them, which can not help but let a person send out the question of why the market is so large volume, and every year is still growing, being in these cities, why the 4S stores have come to the situation of the cancellation of the company, which is in the end, who is at fault?

In terms of business size, car dealerships with registered capital of 2 million (including 2 million) or less have more than 600 companies written off, accounting for 46% of their total number of companies written off, nearly half.

Second, the establishment of enterprises within 3 years, become the hardest hit by the write-off

"97% of startups will die in 18 months."

Wu Xiaobo, author of The Biggest Loser and finance writer who has been studying business failures for 20 years, said this in the live broadcast of Wu Xiaobo Explains The Biggest Loser.

He argued that the entire business world in China is changing dramatically, and that it is already the country with the most startups in the world, with 10,000 startups being born every day, and at the same time, it is also the country with the most failures, with more than 2 million falling every day, and with 97% of them being declared dead within 18 months.

This same curse exists in China's auto industry. Of the 1,345 4S stores that were canceled, 806 were startups that were founded less than three years ago, accounting for nearly 60% of the total.

Compared to mature companies, they are more vulnerable in the face of the crisis, and most of them do not have the original accumulation and strength to withstand the market crisis caused by the epidemic.

Among these startups, 17 new energy vehicle 4S stores are among them.

In recent years, China's new energy vehicle production and sales have made remarkable achievements. In 2016, China's new energy vehicle production was 517,000 units and sales were 507,000 units, an increase of 51.7% and 53.0% over the same period, and the number of retained vehicles exceeded 1 million.

New energy companies have become the stars of the automotive industry, and this track has attracted a large number of gold diggers. Similar to traditional fuel cars, automobile dealerships are an important part of the new energy industry chain, and many people are investing in the market. However, opportunities and risks are often born from the same source***, and some people have not yet tasted the sweetness of this new energy cake, and have already retired from the market.

Three, why did they fall?

1345 car dealers to the point of writing off the business, we believe that the demise of the enterprise can not be separated from these two aspects, on the one hand, including the epidemic, including the impact of external policies, the environment, on the other hand, it may be the internal management and internal management of the problem.

1, the impact of the epidemic

2020 the beginning of an epidemic so that originally in the downturn of the automotive industry, suffered a dark moment, and as the automotive circulation in the field of the nerve endings - 4S stores, has become a storm by the impact of the largest ring.

In March, Yang Wenxiang, general manager of Yangzhou Ruifeng Automobile Group in Gaoyou, said in an interview with Auto Service World that compared with the same period in 2019, their performance in February this year slipped by nearly 80%.

This is close to the overall market decline data, in February, China's narrow passenger car market sales of 252,000 units, a year-on-year decline of 78.5%.

Suffered a continuous avalanche of car sales in February and March, the first 4S stores dealers have been unable to carry. Some industry sources said that the short-term impact of the epidemic will continue, and the phenomenon of company write-offs is expected to continue in the first half of the year.

2, economic downturn, lack of consumer confidence

Currently, China's economy is in a downward cycle, the lack of growth in disposable income of residents, consumer confidence and then recede, the car as a commodity, the first to bear the brunt of the impact.

"Most developed countries have a deep adjustment in the 8-10 years after the first year of automobile popularization. China's automobile popularization year is between 2009-2010, if 2010 as the first year of popularization, there will be a deep adjustment between 2018-2020." Lang Xuehong, deputy secretary general of the Automobile Circulation Association, made this comment on the future of the automobile industry a long time ago.

Indeed, in the year of 2018, China's automobile production and sales volume for the first time in many years of negative growth, the car market has entered a period of low-speed growth.

In summary, the economic cycle hit the industry cycle, the fate of car dealers is unpredictable.

3, the impact of the policy

Looking back on the booming development of the automotive industry, the stimulus effect of the policy can not be ignored. Among them, the policy of halving the purchase tax on automobiles can be said to be a heavyweight policy for the growth of the automobile market.

Since its introduction and implementation in 2009, China's auto sales jumped from 9.28 million in 2008 to 13.6 million in 2009, with sales surging by 46.2%.

In 2018, the purchase tax reduction policy was canceled, and China's auto sales declined for the first time in 28 years.

Now once again, the auto industry is in dire need of policy stimulus, and there are already many auto practitioners and experts calling for the resumption of the purchase tax exemption policy since 2009, as a way to boost auto consumption.

4, the manufacturer is the root cause of the plight of dealers

In February, China's automobile dealers inventory warning index of 81.2%, some experts pointed out that the inventory warning index is located in the cordon above, has been a very dangerous indicator, which means that many dealers may not be able to survive this "epidemic"! The end.

In the end, dealers face a high inventory dilemma to a large extent from the strong OEMs. In order to expand production capacity, as well as access to capital certainly, car companies on the one hand, a large-scale spread of 4S stores, in addition to sales business and other rebate policies to allow dealers to press the inventory.

In the early years, due to good market conditions, car companies and dealers are in a good state of "hello, I'm good, everyone is good", but in the past two years, with the industry in the cold, dealers are faced with high inventory, the pressure of the capital chain at any time to break, in 2019, nearly 47% of China's car dealers in new car sales in fact, in a state of loss, and the car companies are in the same situation as the new car dealers. Losses, and car companies continue to intensify the contradiction, in a relatively weak position of the dealer rights events.

5, the impact of the Internet platform

July 1, 2017, with the implementation of the "Management Measures for the Sale of Automobiles", the channels of automobile sales are becoming diversified, in addition to the traditional car 4s store, the field of automobile circulation into a large number of emerging forces.

Auto Supermarket. early July 2017, Suning high-profile foreign announced that it will open the first car supermarket, creating a new O2O car consumption mode, located in the downtown Xinjiekou, Nanjing's core business circle, the first car supermarket of Suning Ebay positioning high-end boutique, the supermarket's car display, business layout and a series of automotive services, the experience is completely different from that of the 4S store.

The services of Suning Ebay's car supermarket cover car sales, car financing, motorcycle and electric car, car accessories, after-sales maintenance, car maintenance, used car trading, car clubs and other special areas, in addition to a variety of car accessories and oil and gas brands.

Unmanned car supermarket. In less than half a year, Ali entered the field of automobile circulation. December 12, the first Tmall unmanned car supermarket in Nanjing, according to media reports, three days, more than 30,000 units of automobile Tmall automobile supermarket booking, very hot.

Auto new retail players. In the past two years, the field of automobile circulation has attracted a lot of Internet players, such as the bullet car, Maodou new car, Renren car, Youxin, peanut good car and listed company Yi Xin Group and other Internet platforms to grab new car sales of this piece of cake.

Unlike traditional 4S stores, these emerging Internet platforms are attracting young car owners through online channeling, large-scale offline stores, and finance leasing financial programs.

6, car dealers own reasons

Take Huge for example. As early as 2018, huge was sold stores, closed stores, fined, shareholders to reduce the holdings of negative news entangled. According to the media, the first electric car network reported that in May 2019, the huge group submitted a "bankruptcy reorganization" application. The Shanghai Stock Exchange has determined that Chairman Pang Qinghua is not suitable to serve as a director, supervisor or senior manager of a listed company within three years. This means that Pang Qinghua is no longer playing the role of director of Huge Group, and was penalized for resigning.

In the past few months of 2020, five automobile 4S stores under Pang Group were registered for cancellation. From the leading enterprises to bankruptcy and reorganization, huge encounters let people saddened.

Write in the end:

Under the influence of multiple factors such as economic downturn, industry cycle and epidemic impact, the automotive industry has seen a wave of write-offs.

The epidemic is not completely over, and it is foreseeable that the impact of the epidemic will continue, and it is expected that the reshuffle of the automotive industry will continue this year.

For practitioners, there is still a tougher road to travel, be prepared for at least half a year of winter.

As one of the auto 4S store group boss said, today is the very period, can survive is the hero. Survive the reshuffle period of these years, and survive to see the light of day.

Indeed, the only way to survive is to have more possibilities.

A good business is one that buries its head in the sand and waits for spring. And at the end of every winter, the flowers will bloom in the spring.

PS: With a complete list of canceled car dealers.