HotMaxx' soft discount broke when hard discount swept 2025 — per-store sales -88%

好特卖 (HotMaxx) rode China's soft-discount boom to a nationwide chain — 815 stores in 2023, revenue ¥3.64 billion (+51.5%), then ¥4.85 billion in 2024 (+33.4%) and 941 stores by Q4 2024. The pitch was simple: buy leftover brand stock cheap and resell it at a discount in busy city locations.

The model was thinner than it looked. Around 70% of goods were unsold brand 尾货 whose supply was unstable — run out and the shelf simply went empty. Gross margin was only 25–30%, and stores sat in prime core-city locations with high rent. The whole engine depended on foot traffic staying high enough to turn thin, irregular stock fast.

In 2025 the market turned. 美团 and 京东 launched discount supermarkets, 鸣鸣很忙 passed 20,000 stores by December, and Aldi's 奥乐齐 ran 13,000+ stores globally — hard discount that could undercut 好特卖's prices on a stable supply base. Soft discount stopped looking cheap. New store openings collapsed from 74 in Q4 2024 to 44, 26, 37 and 46 across 2025's four quarters.

好特卖 retreated in late 2025: it closed stores in Beijing, Guangzhou, Hangzhou and Changsha, halted new franchises in some cities, and cut its franchise take from 2% to 1.5% of turnover (1% for multi-store operators). Per-store daily revenue, over ¥90,000 on day one in 2020, fell to about ¥10,000 — down roughly 88%. The company called it a normal adjustment and said annual closures stayed under 5%.