Vì sao ngành F&B lỗ mà người ta vẫn làm?

Why F&B (especially coffee shops) can look easy to start but often loses money

Market reality vs. business survival

• Industry growth doesn’t equal profitability
  • Vietnam F&B 2024 revenue: 688,800+ billion VND, +16.6% YoY
  • Only 14.7% of businesses grew revenue vs. last year; the rest broke even or lost money
• Cost pressure is the core stressor
  • Nearly 45% of businesses are in a “critical situation” where raw materials > 30% of selling price
  • Some see raw material costs rise >50%
• Customer spending is declining
  • 52.3% of Vietnamese consumers spend < 35,000 VND per drink
  • Willingness to spend 100,000 VND on coffee fell from 6% → 1.7%
• Implication: opening is easy; staying profitable long-term is the battle. Restaurants not aligned with these realities get removed by the market.

Closure trend (example):

• First 6 months of 2024: 30,000 stores closed
• By 1H 2025: expected 50,000 closures

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Core execution problems (costs, operations, and cash management)

1) Fixed costs crush early-stage cashflow

• Rent dominates location-based models
  • Ideal rent benchmark (international standard): 10–15% of revenue
  • Reality described: often 25%–55% of revenue
  • Example cited: Han Thuyen St (District 1, HCMC) rent 750M VND/month
• Rent is often required 3–6 months in advance + deposit, causing immediate burn before sales start.

2) Online delivery platforms create “fake revenue”

Restaurants rely on apps (ShopeeFood, GrabFood, BFood) to access demand—but pay heavy commissions.

• Typical app fees: 20%–30% of order value
• Example math (bubble tea 50,000 VND):
  • App discount/charge: ~25% = 12,500 VND
  • Ingredients cost: ~30% = 15,000 VND
  • Packaging: ~4,000 VND
  • Total cost (excluding rent/staff/electricity/water): ~31,000 VND
  • Remaining to cover other ops: ~18,000 VND
• Promotions further destroy margins
  • To appear in search, shops join discount/free-shipping campaigns (e.g., 30% off + shipping subsidies)
  • Result: profit per order ~0 or negative
• Operational takeaway: app-driven sales can inflate topline while keeping actual take-home margin near zero.

3) “30/30/10” margin rule no longer works

Traditional framework mentioned (30/30/10 ratio):

• 30% raw materials
• 30% personnel
• 30% fixed & operating costs (rent, utilities, marketing, depreciation)
• 10% owner’s net profit

Why it breaks:

• Food services price index +4.03% in 2024
  • Food prices +12.19%
  • Other food items +2.7%
• Electricity/water/labor rising +12% to +15%
• When:
  • raw materials > 40%
  • rent ~35%
  • wages ~25%
• → the model no longer balances, and profit gets eroded
• Target/timeline referenced: nearly 50% of businesses may need price increases in 2025 to survive (but risking demand drop).

4) Hidden costs and profit leakage

• Raw material loss/overuse
  • Up to 35% of stores face shortages/over-consumption of 18%–25% of raw material quotas
  • Example: syrup poured out 5–10 ml extra; multiplied across stores → major loss
• Spoilage & rework
  • Poor storage → spoilage waste
  • Staff mistakes → remakes and added costs
• Theft risk without controls
  • Without management systems/cameras, owners may suffer gradual disappearance of goods

5) HR is structurally hard (turnover + KPI ambiguity)

Staffing is heavily part-time, with very high turnover:

• Industry workers: ~3 million
• ~78% (≈2.3 million) are students aged 16–22

Turnover expectation mentioned:

• ~35% consistent turnover rate
• In HR terms: quitting after 1–2 weeks is “normal”

Operational consequences:

• Hiring costs (ads)
• 1–2 weeks retraining
• Lower productivity → worse service → customer complaints
• Idle labor waste:
  • Example: 5 waitstaff needed, but only busy 2 hours lunch + 2 hours evening
  • Rest of day staff are idle, yet salaries still paid.

KPI challenge:

• It’s hard to set clear performance metrics for carrying/serving work, so pay may rely on minimum hourly rate and intuition rather than structured development.

6) Legal and depreciation mistakes can end businesses

• Legal compliance gaps lead to recurring fines:
  • sidewalk encroachment
  • missing food safety certifications
  • not meeting fire safety standards
• Depreciation/reserve fund neglect
  • Example: 100M VND Italian machine, 3-year usage
  • Should set aside ~3M VND/month for depreciation
  • If it breaks without reserves → shutdown risk

7) Confusing cashflow with profit + thin cash buffer

• Customers pay immediately, so owners can feel “rich” from daily cash inflow.
• But real profitability must account for the timing and size of cash outflows.

Cash buffer day metric

• Other industries average: 27 days
• F&B average: 16 days
• Consequence: a short shock (rain/road works/epidemic) can trigger inability to pay next month’s rent + salaries → bankruptcy risk.

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Owner labor is treated incorrectly in “profit” thinking

A common mistake described:

• “Revenue minus rent/raw materials/utilities/salaries/ads = profit”

But the owner’s labor is not counted as an expense. If an owner’s labor would otherwise cost ~20–25M VND/month as an employee:

• Example given: reported “profit” 20M VND
• Subtract owner labor 25M VND
• → actual business is ~5M VND loss per month

Takeaway: being the boss can mask underpayment of your own work (“exploiting your own labor at a very low price”).

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Why people still enter: the “illusion” and the business-model variety

A) Tempting unit economics (but incomplete)

Example smoothie:

• Ingredients cost: ~12,000 VND
• Menu price: 40,000–50,000 VND
• Appears as 3–4x ROI

Missing piece:

• Ingredient cost is only COGS
• Ignores rent, staff, utilities, depreciation, marketing, packaging, etc.
• So headline “gross margin” can be misleading.

B) Trend-chasing and FOMO (moat erosion over time)

• Trends mentioned: homemade lemon tea, salted coffee, soursop tea, cheesecake, etc.
• Claims:
  • Trend lifespan: 3–6 months
  • Low barriers → rapid saturation
  • Late entrants risk being stuck with machinery + long lease + outdated menu

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How big chains manage losses (high-level business execution)

Big brands (e.g., Highland Coffee, Coffee House, Phuc Long) can open prime locations despite high rental costs because they play a macro/finance game.

Strategy described for venture-backed chains:

• Optimize for market share and user data, not immediate monthly profit
• Use “burning money” / OPM (Other People’s Money) to expand footprint
• Raise funding rounds (Series A, Series B) to grow valuation

Example case: Soya Garden

• Raised significant funding; accepted that large stores won’t break even due to high costs
• Risk surfaced when the core model couldn’t adapt quickly (pandemic + depleted capital) → system collapse and mass closures

Scale advantages referenced for chains:

• Bulk purchasing discounts (thousands of tons vs small shops)
• Centralized operations reduce per-store costs (shared grinding mill, marketing team)
• Cross-subsidy: profits from mature stores offset new store losses

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Alternative model example: franchise-heavy B2B monetization

Example: Miuê

• Cheap end-customer prices (ice cream cone 10,000 VND, bubble tea 25,000 VND) while still renting prime locations

Business-model explanation:

• Profit comes mainly from franchise and supply chain control:
  • initial franchise fees
  • selling equipment/machinery
  • packaging sales
  • requiring franchisees to source raw materials exclusively
• Franchise stores may have thin margins; parent company captures margin upstream.

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Playbooks / frameworks explicitly mentioned

• 30/30/10 cost-structure rule
  • 30% raw materials / 30% personnel / 30% fixed+operating / 10% net profit
  • Stated as no longer reliable when input and rent/wage costs exceed thresholds.
• “Cash buffer days” metric
  • F&B described at ~16 days vs 27 days in other industries
  • Used to explain vulnerability to short shocks.

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Actionable recommendations implied by the discussion

• Do rigorous financial planning with all real costs (including depreciation, owner labor, promotion/commission impacts).
• Build controls to reduce raw material leakage, spoilage, and theft (process + monitoring).
• Plan staffing for turnover risk:
  • don’t rely on informal “minimum hourly” logic; invest in training and measurable performance where possible.
• Treat delivery apps as a margin decision, not a “sales guarantee” (avoid promotion structures that drive profit to near zero).
• Ensure survival planning using cash buffer days rather than “daily cash feels good.”

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Presenters / sources

• Presenter: Nóng
• Sources referenced (general): “overview report on the food and beverage business market in Vietnam” (as cited), General Statistics Office (GSO) report, and several food delivery app commission/discount rates presented as “our research” (ShopeeFood/GrabFood/BFood).