Mingming Henmang scaled snack discount to 30,000 stores — then hit the scale

Packaged snacks in China reached county-town shelves through layers of distributors, and someone paid for every layer. The model that dismantled this started in Hunan in 2017 as Lingxing Henmang ('Snack Super Busy') and merged with Jiangxi rival Zhao Yiming Snacks at the end of 2023, combining about 7,000 stores into Mingming Henmang. The format is deliberately plain: bins of loose snacks weighed at the counter, small 150–190 square meter franchise shops, concentrated where big retail ignores — 60% of stores sit in counties and townships across 1,401 county-level districts.

The economics are unusual in franchising. Since 2024 the group has charged no franchise fee and no management fee; nearly 99% of revenue is selling goods to its own stores. The money comes from supply-chain depth: 2,500-plus direct factory ties, 56 automated hubs delivering within 300 km in 24 hours, 12.6-day inventory turns, logistics at 1.6% of revenue — so the same goods run about 25% below supermarket prices. Stores average 481 orders a day at a 30-yuan ticket, repurchase runs at 76% across 210 million members, and the 2025 closure rate was just 1.2%.

Scale followed. In July 2026 the group became China's first snack chain past 30,000 signed stores, up from 21,948 at end-2025 and 7,000 at the 2023 merger. The China Chain Store & Franchise Association ranked it third nationally at 93.569 billion yuan of 2025 sales, up 68.5% — behind only Walmart China and Hema. Listed in Hong Kong in 2025 (1768.HK), it reported 2025 revenue of 66.17 billion yuan with gross margin up from 7.6% to 9.8% and adjusted net profit up 194.9% to 2.692 billion; its first interim report showed half-year revenue of 44.997 billion yuan, up 60%, at an 11.5% gross margin.

Then the scale broke the story. In August 2026 a Cangzhou customer's four pieces of beef jerky rang up at 0.299 kg (64.58 yuan) but re-weighed at 0.08 kg (17.29 yuan), with similar cases nationwide. On September 7, 2026 it apologized, set up an advance-compensation fund, and lifted refunds to ten times the price difference — rival Wanchen Group matched within a day. Stores must now calibrate scales each morning before registers can open, with tamper-proof weighing logs streaming to HQ; a regulator sweep in Baotou found no rigged scales — but shoppers cannot tell an error from a cheat.

In weight-priced retail, the scale is the brand

Zero franchise fees turn headquarters into the franchisee's supplier rather than its landlord, so head-office profit depends on keeping every store worth visiting.

Direct factory sourcing and custom SKUs fund the 25% discount out of removed distribution layers instead of squeezing suppliers into poverty.

Dense small stores in county clusters make the 24-hour delivery radius economical and keep 210 million members returning weekly.

Weighing is the moment of truth for loose-goods retail — the same scale is checkout, receipt and brand promise, which is why the scandal hit the whole model rather than one store.

When your product is cheapness itself, your real product is measurement. Price every promise into operations — a tenfold refund fund costs less than one viral video of a rigged scale.

The group had begun tightening before the scandal: from late 2025 it replaced vertical headquarters management with 20 regional subsidiaries, hired 1,000-plus operations staff, and put some 30,000 store managers under headquarters programs. After the tenfold-refund pledge, it and rival Wanchen Group — the duopoly holding over 75% of the mass-snack market — jointly pledged 'anti-involution' in June 2026: compete on supply-chain efficiency, not price wars. Next per trade coverage: hot-food and short-shelf-life categories, AI store inspection, and retrofits of older stores for same-store growth.