In Hong Kong, we build a global business empire

In a quiet villa community near Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo.

At this moment, Lin Haoran put down the phone, feeling somewhat surprised that the president of Nintendo would actually invite him to attend a dealer celebration banquet.

However, strictly speaking, he can indeed be considered a Nintendo distributor, and his sales channels do sell Nintendo products.

It turns out that the sales of Nintendo's new portable game console Game & Watch, which was released last year, exceeded five million units, which broke the record for a single model of game console since Nintendo was founded.

However, precisely because of this, Nintendo's president, Mr. Hiroshi Yamauchi, also had the ambition to sell 10 million units.

This is also the reason why he has been traveling to Hong Kong, Southeast Asia and other places to expand sales channels during this period.

In the game console industry, although Nintendo has developed rapidly, the American company Atari has always been far ahead.

The sales of the Game & Watch console gave him hope of catching up with Atari.

After returning from Southeast Asia, Mr. Hiroshi Yamauchi decided to hold a celebration banquet in Tokyo to thank the dealers for their support.

Although Nintendo's headquarters is not in Tokyo but in Kyoto, the Tokyo metropolitan area is clearly Nintendo's largest sales area.

The Tokyo metropolitan area made the biggest contribution to Nintendo's new product's sales exceeding five million units.

It happened that he learned from the newspaper that Lin Haoran had come to Japan, so he used his connections to get Lin Haoran's phone number and then called to invite this famous Hong Kong tycoon.

Lin Haoran walked out of the study and came to the terrace outside the house.

The central area is very prosperous, but this villa area is very quiet. Security guards patrolling with flashlights from time to time on the roads outside the villas.

Lin Haoran spent nearly 80 million yen to buy this place as a temporary residence. Converted into Hong Kong dollars, it is only about two million, which is quite cheap.

If this were put in the next 20 or 30 years, it would be worth at least 10 billion Hong Kong dollars.

After all, although Japan experienced an economic bubble in the 1990s and housing prices plummeted, this is still Tokyo after all. Even if it falls, it won't fall too much. This is still the core area of ​​Tokyo's city center, not much different from the Central area of ​​Hong Kong.

This place is close to the Tokyo Imperial Capital, at the junction of Chuo Ward and Chiyoda Ward. It is only separated from the Imperial Capital by a street. The public security is very good and those violent gangs dare not cause trouble here at all.

This is also the reason why Lin Haoran chose to set up his temporary residence here.

The villa is 5 stories high, has 10 rooms and is equipped with an elevator, which is more than enough for Lin Haoran's 15 bodyguards to live in.

Standing on the terrace, Lin Haoran could clearly see the Tokyo Tower three kilometers away.

At this time, the famous Tokyo Skytree had not yet appeared, so Tokyo Tower is also a landmark building in Tokyo.

Lin Haoran took a deep breath of the cool night air and his mood gradually calmed down.

He looked at the twinkling lights of Tokyo Tower in the distance and turned back to the bedroom.

I spent the whole night in deep sleep, and in the blink of an eye, it was the next day, February 2th.

In the morning, under the leadership of Sato Shimono, head of the Landmark Group's Japan office, Lin Haoran inspected several properties of the Landmark Group in Tokyo.

Through inspection, Lin Haoran also discovered that the Swire Group did not have many industries here.

Three Wellcome supermarkets, one trade transit station, and five Mannings beauty chain convenience stores are gone.

In other words, the only industry that the Swire Group had previously owned in Japan was basically the retail trade industry.

"Boss, actually more than ten years ago, in addition to these retail trade businesses, the Swire Group in Japan was also involved in finance, logistics, and real estate brokerage. However, because it could not compete with other local competitors in the industry, it had to be closed down one after another, leaving only these supermarkets and beauty convenience stores." Sato explained while standing in a Wellcome supermarket in Shinjuku's commercial district.

This Wellcome supermarket had a very average flow of people, perhaps because it was morning. Lin Haoran could clearly feel that.

"Is this supermarket making money?" Led by the supermarket general manager, Lin Haoran came to his office.

"Of course, boss. Last year, the profit of our business in Japan was about 200 million yen, of which the profits from the three Wellcome supermarkets accounted for more than 130 million yen. Our supermarkets still have a large flow of people at night, especially on holidays," Sato explained.

Two hundred million yen is actually only about five million Hong Kong dollars.

With this little profit for the year, it’s no wonder that the Swire Properties Group only had an office here and didn’t even bother to set up a branch.

Lin Haoran nodded and continued to visit.

The Wellcome supermarket at that time was actually not much different from later supermarkets. They were all self-service and had a wide variety of items.

If chain stores want to make big money, they still have to expand their scale to control costs and have the power to negotiate prices, so that they can ultimately make higher profits.

However, the Swire Group currently has very few supermarkets in Japan, and for these few, it is already quite good if it can make money. It is simply impossible to make huge money.

However, now that the Swire Group is planning to develop rapidly in Japan, it will certainly have to expand its scale.

Real estate alone is not enough.

The retail consumer industry must also be covered. Nintendo's dealer celebration party is at 7 o'clock tonight.

At six o'clock in the evening, Lin Haoran took Huo Jianning, Sato Shimoye, and Zhao Xin in a private car and went to a commercial plaza in the Ikebukuro commercial district.

The address that Mr. Yamauchi Hiroshi mentioned is right there.

Since Lin Haoran's bodyguards were not familiar with the roads here, after buying the villa, he asked Sato Shimoye to recruit a few local drivers for him, and only retained them after confirming that there was no problem with their loyalty.

Therefore, traveling around Tokyo is no longer a problem.

"Mr. Lin, welcome. It's my honor to see you again!" Nintendo President Mr. Hiroshi Yamauchi was quite enthusiastic when he saw Lin Haoran.

"It is my honor to be invited by Mr. Yamauchi Hiroshi." Lin Haoran said politely with a smile.

Under the guidance of Mr. Hiroshi Yamauchi, Lin Haoran finally arrived at a high-end sushi restaurant.

"Mr. Lin, tonight's banquet will not disappoint you. I believe you will like it!" Mr. Yamauchi Hiroshi said mysteriously.

"Oh? Then I'll wait and see!" Lin Haoran responded with a smile.

In fact, he disagreed in his heart.

It’s just eating sushi. No matter how high-end it is, what new tricks can be done?

Most of the ingredients are just more expensive.

For Lin Haoran, he actually had little interest in sushi.

The purpose of coming here was just to bring Huo Jianning and others to communicate and get to know these top Japanese businessmen.

This sushi restaurant is indeed luxuriously decorated and is obviously a high-end store. Those who can come here to eat are obviously either rich or noble.

Lin Haoran was taken to a box of more than 100 square meters.

At this moment, there were more than a dozen people gathered in the box. I guess they were Nintendo’s main distributors in the Tokyo metropolitan area.

The dealers did not show much enthusiasm for Lin Haoran's arrival. No one was even willing to greet him. Instead, they chatted with their own things and left him aside.

Lin Haoran didn't care. He was not well-known here, unlike in Hong Kong, where he had such a huge influence that almost everyone complimented him.

As for the Japanese side, at the government's reception banquet a few days ago, those businessmen were probably so polite to Lin Haoran for the sake of the government's face.

"Hey, look at that 'big shot' who came from Hong Kong. He chose to come to our Great Empire of Japan to join in the fun. His business in Japan is just a few insignificant supermarkets. Mr. Yamauchi Hiroshi actually invited him. It's really surprising."

Lin Haoran sat leisurely in the chair, chatting and laughing with Huo Jianning and others. The deliberately embellished English sarcasm faintly coming from the next room was like a clown's chattering, which did not diminish their joy at all.

Then, everyone in the circle burst into laughter.

From time to time, some people even looked at Lin Haoran with an unspoken smile.

Except for Lin Haoran and a few others in the private room, everyone else was Japanese. They had been talking in Japanese before, but suddenly they spoke English at this moment, and said that there were only a few inconspicuous supermarkets. Obviously, these words were specifically directed at Lin Haoran.

Huo Jianning, Sato and others frowned when they heard this and were about to open their mouths to refute, but were stopped by Lin Haoran who gently waved his hand.

Lin Haoran still had a faint smile on his face, as if he was not affected by those provocative words at all.

In fact, he was also wondering, he should not have offended anyone here, so why would they provoke him for no reason?
Obviously, these were not instructed by the president of Nintendo, who is still outside welcoming guests.

He looked at Sato and asked, "Mr. Sato, do you know the person who just spoke?"

"Boss, that's Mr. Ito, the owner of Ito-Yokado Department Store. Our two Wellcome supermarkets in Koto District and Shinjuku District are competing with their Ito-Yokado Department Store. We even had a price war with them two years ago, and we were at a disadvantage." Sato Shimono explained in a low voice.

Lin Haoran suddenly realized that it was a competitor, no wonder.

However, he was not familiar with Ito-Yokado Department Store and thought it was an ordinary retail company in Japan.

But Sato's next words made Lin Haoran guess about the Ito-Yokado Department Store.

"Their company is one of the top retail companies in Japan. Their business not only covers department stores, but also convenience stores, large-scale comprehensive supermarkets, hypermarkets, specialty stores and discount stores. Among them, they have more than one thousand 711-Eleven convenience stores in the first two months, making them the company with the most convenience stores in Japan," Sato continued to explain.

711 convenience store?
Suddenly, Lin Haoran had a certain understanding of the Ito-Yokado Department Store.

711 convenience store is the world's convenience store giant and the world's largest convenience store chain brand. When Lin Haoran traveled here, he had read news reports that 711 has more than stores worldwide.

This is a scary statistic.

“I remember that 711-Eleven convenience stores originated in the United States and were acquired by a Japanese company in the 90s. This is a very famous merger and acquisition case.

If nothing unexpected happens, the company that will acquire the 711 convenience store chain in the future will obviously be the power behind the Ito-Yokado Department Store. "At this moment, Lin Haoran has already guessed it. (End of this chapter)