Chapter 423 New cooperation with Wal-Mart (please ask for monthly tickets at the end of the month)
Li Xiaolong nodded and said: "Yes, I have made movies in Hong Kong before, and now that I have come to the United States, I naturally want to enter Hollywood;
And Hollywood has always been dominated by white people. I must become the first Chinese star.”
“I am ambitious,” Yang Wendong praised, “But it is definitely very difficult. , white Americans inherently don’t like other races, so it’s okay to be a supporting role or villain. As for the protagonist, even if you win, some white audiences may not be so easy to accept.”
Xenophobia is actually normal. The same is true even for Asians. Not to mention other whites and blacks, even yellow people in different places may be treated differently. Of course, this is everyone's freedom, as long as it is not illegal.
Li Xiaolong said: "Yes, I know it too, but something has to change. I believe I can do it. In American martial arts competitions, there are many white people who support me."
Yang Wendong said: "Then I I wish you success in Hollywood, but you can also consider shooting movies in Hong Kong in the future. You should know that I also have a film company in Hong Kong. "
In fact, Yang Wendong knows that Li Xiaolong is in Hollywood. The year is bound to fail. White people just look down on other people. This is especially true for capitalists in Hollywood. And most importantly, there are too few Chinese Americans in this era, with a small audience and limited spending power.
Li Xiaolong’s real fame was actually in the original history, when he went to Hong Kong to shoot a few movies. After he became popular in Asia, Hollywood took a fancy to his value in overseas markets, and then began to favor him. Everything is actually just the choice of capital. If you are valuable, let you be famous. If you don’t want it, stop dreaming.
Of course, this is also true in Hong Kong, especially with the Changxing Group’s focus on movies. With the control of upstream and downstream industries, Hong Kong films in the future may be better than in the past, but they are all in the hands of Yang Wendong.
Li Xiaolong thought for a moment and said: "Okay, but in the short term, I am planning to develop in the United States."
"Understood." Yang Wendong did not force it. Many times, people who do not hit the wall will not look back, so He said: "Keep this business card. If you need anything in the future, you can come to me directly in Hong Kong."
"Thank you." Li Xiaolong also collected the business card.
Yang Wendong looked around again and asked: "How many Zhenfan martial arts schools are there in the United States?"
Li Xiaolong replied: "There are 4 in total."
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"The quantity is too small." Yang Wendong said with a smile: "With your reputation, you should open more, which in turn will make you more famous; if it is due to financial problems, I can invest appropriately."
Li Xiaolong shook his head and said: "Thank you Mr. Yang for your kindness. In fact, other American Chinese have approached me before and want to invest, but the problem is that my energy is limited, and my apprentices also have limited energy. They can't There is no limit to teaching other people.
And people like them also need me to discover and guide them. This is really difficult and cannot be cultivated in one or two years, so Zhenfan Martial Arts School can only teach others. How many rooms can we maintain?"
"That's right." Yang Wendong nodded.
Capitalists generally dislike technology that cannot be copied quickly because it relies heavily on a certain person or group of people.
Martial arts does require a lot of foundation and training time. It cannot be achieved by spending money in a short time. Just like football waste in the previous life, no matter how much abalone you eat, it is still waste.
Li Xiaolong said again: "And even if it can really shake the vibration When there are 40 or 400 feudal martial arts halls, the number of people who can teach them is limited. Only on the screen can millions of people see it. Only in this way can we promote Chinese martial arts. Otherwise, many people will only know the small ones. Japanese karate, but they don’t know the strength of my Chinese martial arts "Big."
"Okay, just say this, I will fully support you in the future." Yang Wendong smiled and said: "Mr. Li, you try it in Hollywood first. If it succeeds, I will use my capital." The power of promoting your popularity; if not, then you can come Hong Kong, as long as you have the ability, I will make you a Kung Fu superstar in Asia.”
If Li Xiaolong becomes a more famous superstar than his previous life under his own promotion, and does not die prematurely, then he will do a lot to himself. It will be of great help to your career.
Especially for industries related to people's livelihood, letting him endorse will definitely get twice the result with half the effort. Moreover, various movies are huge profits in themselves, and can also drive other Hong Kong movies to go overseas.
"Okay, thank you Yang Sheng." Li Xiaolong was also happy.
"Okay, I will wait for your new movie from now on." Yang Wendong said again.
If Li Xiaolong is not allowed to practice in Hollywood, his achievements may not be that high in the future. And for a proud and arrogant person like him, it is impossible to give up without failure. Then he really went to Hong Kong , will also try to leave, which is not good for themselves.
So it’s better to wait a few more years. Anyway, in the past few years, there will be an economic crisis and other problems in Hong Kong. When everything is over, Hong Kong’s economy will take off again, and Li Xiaolong will also suffer a setback in Hollywood. In terms of time, Perfect match.
Li Xiaolong smiled and said: "OK."
After some small talk, Li Xiaolong invited Yang Wendong to have a casual meal next to the martial arts gym, and then they separated.
On the way back, Bai Yujie asked curiously: "Is that person very powerful in martial arts?"
"Very powerful, much better than the martial arts masters in Hong Kong." Yang Wendong said: "You I also know that today’s movies in Hong Kong are mainly martial arts movies. I have used various methods to promote martial arts classes in Hong Kong, but relying on those people is still not enough. It requires the participation of national martial arts champions like Li Xiaolong in order to obtain Famous enough to open up the Asian market for Hong Kong films.”
Many times, an industry needs a game-breaker. Once a very famous Hong Kong movie star appears, he can easily win over the non-profits in Southeast Asia. Chinese market, thereby familiarizing them with Hong Kong movies.
Once the views change, other films of the same type will be accepted locally, and that will be the beginning of Hong Kong's film market dominating Asia. Even TV series and music will benefit.
However, it is difficult for such a person to appear. At present, we can only rely on the Li Xiaolong in history.
"Well, I saw his apprentice's demonstration, and it was really impressive." Bai Yujie agreed.
"If you are interested, you can look for Li Xiaolong's old fighting video. That one looks more exciting." Yang Wendong added: "But there are more important things right now. Christmas is coming soon. Let's go there. We are going back to Arkansas.”
The core purpose of coming to the United States this time is to acquire KFC. This matter has been completed, but since we are here, other American matters must also be dealt with together. good.
The next day, the group took a plane again and arrived in Arkansas, which is also the headquarters of Wal-Mart, a Fortune 500 company in the future.
"Eric, long time no see." After seeing Yang Wendong, Sam Walton said with a smile: "I heard that your development in Hong Kong is getting better and better."
If it is normal circumstances , Walton will naturally not be interested in a Hong Kong company, but Yang Wendong is a major shareholder of Wal-Mart, so he will pay appropriate attention to it, especially some of Carrefour's business methods in Hong Kong, and he is also very knowledgeable about it.
Yang Wendong said with a smile: "It's okay. Wal-Mart has also been developing well recently. I heard that the 30th store is about to open?" In the past, Wal-Mart in history can be said to have started from scratch and borrowed a lot of debt. , in the early days, the development of this kind of enterprise was very slow, and it would be useless no matter how powerful Walton was. Because it was not large-scale or trendy, it was impossible to obtain external financial help. Banks were very cautious even when lending money, and the interest rate was very high. high.
Now, a few years ago, Yang Wendong bought shares and borrowed money at a low interest rate, which has qualitatively improved Wal-Mart's development speed.
“Yes, the development speed is getting faster and faster now.” Walton smiled and said: “So I invite you here this time to discuss the follow-up development plan of Wal-Mart. After all, you are also Major shareholder.”
"Okay." Yang Wendong nodded.
Wal-Mart can develop faster, which is also very beneficial to him. The investment itself is very profitable. He has never thought that Carrefour can enter the US market, at least in the last twenty years, it is unlikely. of.
After everyone came to an internal office in a small building, Walton also made a few cups of coffee himself and said: "Eric, the number of Wal-Mart stores now is close to 30, which leads to I asked a question;
As the store expands outward, our transportation costs are getting higher and higher. Each store has different requirements for what it needs. This brings problems to suppliers in delivering goods. It’s a big trouble.”
“Yes, I know that.” Yang Wendong asked, “So you want to build a logistics center?”
In the supermarket industry, when the scale is small, the transportation cost may not be obvious, but once the quantity is large, the logistics cost will increase sharply;
Because when the quantity is small, the stores are basically together. Transportation can be done at once, and even if a certain store is out of stock, you can still go to nearby stores to mobilize it.
But if there are too many shops, they must be separated, which leads to various problems, especially in the non-Internet era, many things still need to be recorded by phone and paper. The greater the number, the higher the labor cost. It will also increase exponentially, and the probability of making mistakes will also become very high.
This is also the reason why shopping malls were popular in the past, because supermarkets will encounter this problem when they reach a certain scale.
Carrefour in Hong Kong is much better, because although there are many of them, they are basically gathered together. Compared with the United States, which is such a large area, they are much stronger.
Sam Walton nodded and said: "Yes, only by setting up your own logistics center, warehouse and distribution can you reduce costs; more importantly, ensure that there are no problems with inventory, quality and quantity, which is very important for the supermarket industry. ”
“How much money is needed?” Yang Wendong asked again.
Sam Walton said: "It will take about 1 million to 1.5 million US dollars. This amount of funds can build a logistics center and warehouse in Arkansas. In this way, if we continue to open new stores in the future, we can also make good use of this logistics Center."
"Yes, I will invest in proportion," Yang Wendong asked again: "It's just that I only have a small share of Wal-Mart now. Dong, do you have the funds here?”
Walton said with a smile: “I don’t have enough funds here, otherwise I wouldn’t have to ask you. My idea is that Wal-Mart will borrow money from the bank this time. , based on Wal-Mart's previous operating results, banks should also be optimistic about it. You are a shareholder. Although this matter does not require your consent, I still want to inform you. "
"That's okay." Yang Wendong paused and then said, "Walton, maybe I can invest another sum of money into Wal-Mart?"
Walton shook his head and said, "That's not necessary. I think the current equity ratio is pretty good."
"Well" Yang Wendong didn't force it, and said, "Have you ever considered going public? After all, Wal-Mart now has many other small shareholders? They also need the company to go public to make profits.”
Before Yang Wendong got involved in Wal-Mart, Walton sold a lot of shares to repay the money, and the proportion was not very large, similar to early investors.
Although Yang Wendong knew about this, he did not go out to these people to buy it because this kind of behavior could not be concealed. If Walton knew about it, it might cause unnecessary conflicts.
But if it goes public, he can easily acquire shares secretly. Even if Walton is suspicious, he has no evidence. Moreover, once listed, Walton will not be able to transfer Wal-Mart's assets. In this way, Wal-Mart's shareholders will not be able to transfer their assets in the future. The rights and interests will be stable.
Historically, Wal-Mart went public in 1970, but history has changed a lot, and it doesn’t matter if it changes a little more.
Walton said: "If we go public, I would like to wait a little later. When we become larger, we can raise more funds at once."
"That's OK." Yang Wendong smiled and said: "There is one more thing on my side that I never thought about, but since you have prepared a logistics center, you might want to give it a try."
"What's the matter?" Walton asked.
Yang Wendong said: "You also know that I have a supermarket in Hong Kong. Although the Eastern and Western cultures are different, many things in the supermarket are similar, and my Carrefour also has a stable low-cost industry chain in Hong Kong.
Once your logistics center is built, I can directly deliver Hong Kong’s cheap daily necessities to the logistics center. In this case, it will definitely reduce your procurement costs.”
Although he had also arranged for Changxing before. Trade cooperation with overseas supermarkets is very difficult, because in this era many supermarkets are sent directly from suppliers, and they need to replenish goods at any time. If you want to do this business, you must have a nearby warehouse.
But the supermarkets are separate. How does this work?
Therefore, only a few products can be shipped to overseas supermarkets, and others are simply not feasible.
But if the supermarket itself has a warehouse and logistics center, that would be perfect. Overseas suppliers can just send a large amount of goods directly to the warehouse here. How to transport them to various supermarkets later? The logistics center itself does this.
"Hong Kong goods? Can they be cheaper than those in the United States? The transportation costs are not low?" Walton asked rhetorically.
Yang Wendong said: "I know this. I will also calculate the cost in the early stage, and only the most cost-effective ones will be shipped to the United States; and you also know about containers. There are many container warehouses in the United States, etc. When Hong Kong has it, it will be more convenient and cheaper.”
“Okay, let’s try it like this first,” Walton agreed.
Anyway, I only want bargains, and I will wait until I see the price later.
PS: Ask for monthly tickets at the end of the month
(End of this chapter)