Haidilao: When Extreme Service Becomes the Marketing Budget

You are eating alone in a restaurant. On the chair opposite you, there is a teddy bear.

You did not order it. The server saw you sitting alone, noticed the empty chair, and decided you should not feel lonely.

That is not a joke. That is Haidilao.

Around 1,490 locations across four continents. Roughly USD 6 billion in annual revenue. About 415 million guests served in 2024 alone. Founded by a welder who could not cook.

He knew his hotpot was not the best. So he made the service the best.

A free manicure while you wait for your table. Noodles thrown through the air like a lasso. Servers dancing on your birthday. A teddy bear if you are alone.

Every one of those moments gets filmed. Posted. Millions of views. Free.

Advertising budget: close to zero.

Service budget: everything.

I have worked with restaurant operators for 25 years, and Haidilao is the clearest example I know of a principle that most operators in Europe and North America still underestimate: in a world where good food is available on every corner, the meal is no longer the differentiator. The experience is. That shift turns your service team into your most important marketing channel — and your marketing budget into something you barely need.

What you'll learn in this article:

• How a welder with USD 800 in starting capital built the largest hotpot chain on earth — and why that matters for your 80-seat operation
• Why Haidilao spends close to nothing on advertising and still goes viral on a global scale
• The staff system that produces roughly 10% annual turnover in an industry that runs at 70–100%
• The dark side: cameras, control, and where the model hits cultural limits in Europe
• Five concrete lessons you can implement starting tomorrow — without a manicure station

1994: A welder who could not cook invents the future of service

Zhang Yong worked as a welder in Jianyang, a small city in China's Sichuan province. He was not a chef. He was not a restaurant operator. He had no business degree. His total starting capital, in today's money, was roughly USD 800.

What he did have was an insight: his hotpot was not better than the hotpot of a hundred other shops in Sichuan.

"I could not cook. So I had to make sure people came for the service."

That was 1994. Today, Zhang Yong is reportedly worth around USD 6.7 billion according to the Forbes 2026 World Billionaires list – one of the ten wealthiest residents of Singapore, where he has held citizenship since 2018.

His restaurant empire spans roughly 1,490 locations in 14 countries on four continents, listed in Hong Kong, with a market capitalization of close to USD 10 billion.

And here is the remarkable part: Haidilao serves hotpot. Not a Michelin-chasing tasting menu. Not a fusion plate reinvented every season. Broth at the table, where you cook your own meat and vegetables. It is the simplest possible concept.

What makes Haidilao unique is not the product. It is everything around it.

That is why the story matters for you. If a welder with USD 800 and an average hotpot can build a USD 6 billion chain, the honest question is: what could you do with your restaurant if you stopped thinking only about the food and started thinking about the experience?

Zhang Yong's insight is simple and most operators miss it. Where good food is everywhere, food alone is no longer a differentiator. The question is not "does it taste good?" anymore. It is "how does it feel?"

After 25 years of advising operators, I have learned one thing: the restaurants that thrive do not sell meals. They sell experiences that happen to include a meal. Zhang Yong understood that in 1994 without ever reading a marketing book. In-N-Out does not sell burgers — it sells consistency. Texas Roadhouse does not sell steak — it sells noise and rolls. And Haidilao does not sell hotpot — it sells the best night out you can have for about USD 30.

What you can do now: Answer honestly — is your food the reason guests come back, or is there something else around it? If the only answer is "the food," you are reading the right article.

The service that sounds unbelievable — and is real

Let me walk you through a typical Haidilao visit, from the sidewalk to the exit.

The wait

You arrive at peak hour. No free tables. In most restaurants that means annoyed waiting, a corner chair, a glance at your watch every 30 seconds. At Haidilao it means a free manicure, hand massage, fresh fruit, snacks, soft drinks, board games, chess boards, Wi-Fi with charging stations.

The average wait at Haidilao is 45 minutes to an hour. At peak times, up to two hours. And guests wait voluntarily — because waiting at Haidilao is better than dining at many of the competitors. Behavioral research has confirmed for decades that occupied waiting feels shorter than unoccupied waiting. Haidilao did not read that literature. They built it into the floor plan.

At the table

You sit down. Before you open the menu, you receive: an apron to protect your clothes. A hair tie. A phone cover so your device does not get damp from the steam. A lens cloth for your glasses.

All free. Without asking.

The noodle show

When you order hand-pulled noodles, no plate comes out of the kitchen. A chef walks over and pulls the noodles at your table. Two-meter-long ribbons of dough whipped through the air like a lasso. Performance art with food.

Every table in the vicinity pulls out a phone.

Dining alone

You are alone. The server notices. Without a word, a teddy bear is placed on the chair across from you — so you are not staring at an empty chair back.

In a world where 42% of German households are single-person and the share is similar across many European countries, that is not cute. It is strategic.

Birthday

You mention your birthday. Suddenly the lights dim. Music starts. Three servers arrive with a cake, clapping, singing, lights. The whole room watches. You die of embarrassment — and love it.

The bathroom

Someone hands you the towel. Cream. A choice of scents. Like a five-star hotel. For a hotpot restaurant.

This is not an isolated flourish. This is every visit, in every one of the 1,490 locations, 415 million times a year.

What you can do now: You do not need a manicure station. But ask yourself: what happens in your restaurant when a guest has to wait 15 minutes? Do they get an aperitif and a genuine smile, or an annoyed glance?

Why every service moment is a marketing moment

In 2018, Haidilao launched a campaign on Douyin (the Chinese TikTok). No paid placements, no media buy — they simply encouraged guests to film their own off-menu creations. The result: 1.8 billion views, zero ad spend, more than 15,000 guests ordering the DIY option, and a 17% revenue lift on the featured dishes.

A single teddy-bear clip on TikTok: millions of views. A noodle show: millions of views. A birthday dance: millions of views. Haidilao pays nothing for any of it. Guests film voluntarily, because the service is so extreme it almost has to be shared. That is user-generated content in its purest form — free, authentic, and exponentially scaling.

There is a principle behind this that I have been teaching for 25 years: the best advertising is the advertising your guests make for you. Every Google review, every recommendation between friends, every shared photo is marketing you cannot buy. You can only earn it.

Haidilao has turned that idea into a system. Every service moment is engineered to be filmable. The noodle show is the ad. The teddy bear is the Instagram post. The dancing server is the TikTok clip.

That is not an accident. That is design.

There are two kinds of marketing in hospitality: paid (ads, flyers, sponsorships — costs money, stops working when you stop paying) and earned (word of mouth, reviews, guest posts — costs effort, keeps working). Haidilao chose earned. And earns billions doing it.

There are three specific levers that determine whether a service moment is actually shareable: visibility, surprise, and emotional charge. The short version: the moment has to be visible to other tables, it has to be unexpected, and it has to carry real feeling — joy, relief, belonging. Get those three right and the phone comes out on its own.

What you can do now: Walk through your own restaurant with a guest's eye. Identify one moment unusual enough that a guest would pull out a phone. If you cannot find one, invent one. It does not need to be expensive. It needs to be surprising.

The staff system: why the servers actually smile

Here is where the Haidilao story gets interesting. Because the obvious question is: how do you get 137,000 employees in 1,490 restaurants to deliver that level of service consistently, every day, at every table?

The answer is not "training." The answer is the system behind the training.

Pay: about 68% above competitors

Haidilao pays its people, on average, roughly 1.68× what comparable restaurants in China pay. Not 5% or 10% more. 68% more.

Housing, meals, family

In China, standout performers receive subsidized housing near the restaurant. Every employee gets three free meals a day. Twelve days of paid vacation plus train tickets home for Spring Festival.

Then there is something no other employer in hospitality offers at scale: subsidies for the employees' parents — roughly 200–600 RMB per month. Plus education subsidies for their children.

Haidilao does not just pay the employee. Haidilao invests in the employee's family.

Career path: from server to regional director

The promotion ladder at Haidilao is transparent and real: server → shift leader → restaurant manager → regional director. Possible in three to five years. Zhang Yong himself was a welder with no formal training, and he expects the same floor-to-leadership climb from his executives.

The result: ~10% turnover

In a global industry running at roughly 75% annual turnover — 70–100% in Germany, similar in the US and UK — Haidilao holds around 10%. Even against Chinese industry averages (19.3%), that is half.

The math is the same math I have documented for In-N-Out, Chick-fil-A, and Texas Roadhouse: pay more, attract better people. Better people deliver better service. Better service brings more guests. More guests bring more revenue. The additional revenue pays for the higher wages.

This is not idealism. This is Haidilao's USD 6 billion proof.

Haidilao turns its tables on average 4.1 times per day. Its regular-guest share is 45%, against a Chinese industry average of 27%. And 81% of guests recommend Haidilao to someone else.

Those numbers do not come from the hotpot. They come from the people who serve it.

In 25 years of advising operators, I have seen this truth confirmed hundreds of times: employees who are treated well treat guests well. It is not a philosophy. It is a measurable pattern. The operator who binds staff properly and leads them well simultaneously solves the marketing problem, the review problem, and the revenue problem.

There is a specific investment formula I work through with clients — how much extra money into the team produces how much extra revenue through reduced turnover and better service. It always starts with an honest look at what turnover is already costing.

What you can do now: Calculate what your current turnover costs you. At roughly EUR 5,000 per replacement and ten employees with 70% turnover, that is EUR 35,000 per year going up in smoke. Now ask: what would happen if you put half of that into better conditions and halved your turnover?

1,490 locations — and expansion into Europe

Haidilao is long past being a purely Chinese brand. Through its subsidiary Super Hi International, the group operates around 122 restaurants in 14 countries — from Singapore to Japan to the United States. In Europe, Haidilao runs three UK locations: two in London (Piccadilly Circus and The O2) and one in Birmingham. The queues outside the London restaurants look like nightclub queues — waits of more than an hour, in London, for hotpot.

Bloomberg reported in September 2024 that Haidilao intends to accelerate expansion into the US and Europe. Germany is not yet on the public roadmap, but the direction is clear.

And that is where it becomes relevant for operators in DACH, the UK, and the US.

What happens when a chain enters your market offering a service level that simply does not exist there? In many European restaurants, you get a curt "what do you want?" instead of a greeting. At Haidilao, you get a manicure before you even sit down.

That does not have to be a threat. It can be a wake-up call.

The question is not whether Haidilao shows up in your country. The question is whether, by then, your guest experience is on a level that does not shrink from the comparison.

What you can do now: Next time you are in London, visit a Haidilao. Not to eat — to observe. Take notes from the moment you enter to the moment you leave. Then ask yourself at each touchpoint: what of this can I translate to my restaurant?

The dark side: cameras, control, and the question of sustainability

I would not be an honest advisor if I skipped the shadows.

The 2017 hygiene scandal

In August 2017, investigative journalists at the Chinese paper Legal Mirror exposed rats in the kitchens of two Haidilao locations in Beijing. Staff had used soup ladles to clean drains. For a brand built on service excellence, that was a disaster.

What happened next, though, is the instructive part. Haidilao issued a public apology within three and a half hours and a full rectification plan – including named individuals responsible for implementation – within six and a half hours. The affected locations were closed and reopened with webcams in the kitchens — streamed live onto large screens in the entrance area of the restaurant. Visible to every guest.

The crisis became a trust signal. Not through cover-up. Through radical transparency.

Sixty cameras in one restaurant

In 2021, it emerged that a Haidilao location in Vancouver had installed more than 60 surveillance cameras. The official explanation: quality control and employee safety. The criticism: surveillance beyond reasonable limits. In China, that may be accepted. In Europe and North America, it causes serious discomfort.

Customer data without consent

A guest in Shanghai discovered that Haidilao maintains detailed profiles on its regulars, including descriptions of their appearance ("slim," "healthy complexion") and personal preferences. The public backlash was significant.

The honest question: is this level sustainable?

Extreme service has a price, and it is not only a financial one. Haidilao servers work under enormous pressure — not just to be friendly, but to be extremely friendly. Not just attentive, but surprisingly attentive. Every day. At every guest.

In a culture that treats intense work effort as virtue, and where above-market pay and real promotion paths soften the load, that holds. In German work culture — with different expectations around work-life balance and data protection — a 1:1 copy would not be possible or desirable.

That does not mean the principles are wrong. It means you have to translate them, not copy them.

What you can do now: Treat Haidilao's intensity as inspiration, not as a template. Find the level that fits your culture, your team, and your guests. A genuine "it's good to see you" from the owner is worth more in Hamburg or Manchester than a free manicure.

Five lessons for your restaurant

Lesson 1: Your service is your marketing

Haidilao spends essentially nothing on traditional advertising and harvests billions of views in user-generated content. Because every service moment is engineered so guests will voluntarily share it.

The question for you: what is the moment in your restaurant that a guest would film? If you do not have one, you are throwing away the cheapest and most effective marketing channel that exists.

You do not need a dancing server. You need a moment that surprises. A small, unexpected greeting from the chef. A photo the server takes of the couple — without being asked. A small gift at the table for a first-time guest.

Lesson 2: Find your "teddy-bear moment"

Haidilao does not have one surprise moment. They have dozens. But every single one follows the same principle: do something small the guest did not expect.

For your restaurant, that does not mean manicures and massages. It means: what can I do that costs nothing or almost nothing but surprises the guest enough that they tell someone?

A free aperitif on a guest's birthday. A handwritten card for a regular. A loaner umbrella at the coat check when it is raining — take it home, bring it back next time. A digestif that nobody ordered — "on the house."

The teddy-bear moment does not have to be expensive. It has to be unexpected.

Lesson 3: Waiting does not have to be a problem

Haidilao guests wait up to two hours and enjoy it. Because the wait is an experience, not a punishment.

What happens in your restaurant when someone waits 15 minutes for a table? Do they get a glass of prosecco and an honest "we're about ten minutes out — here's something to start you off"? Or an annoyed glance and a vague "shouldn't be much longer"?

The difference between a guest who leaves frustrated and a guest who waits patiently is EUR 2 worth of sparkling water with lemon and one honest sentence.

Lesson 4: Happy team = happy guest = happy bank account

Haidilao pays 68% more than the competition. Runs 10% turnover instead of 75%. Turns tables 4.1× per day. Has a 45% regular-guest share.

That is not a coincidence. That is a loop — and it does not start with marketing and it does not start with the guest. It starts with the employee.

I have documented the same pattern at In-N-Out, Texas Roadhouse (38% turnover against an industry mean of 83%), and Chick-fil-A (highest average unit volume in QSR, paid to the best-paid staff).

The formula is universal: investment in team → better service → happier guests → more revenue → more budget for team. Start the loop and you cannot stop it. Do not start it and you fight turnover, bad reviews, and empty tables every single day.

Lesson 5: The best service is the service the guest does not expect

Good service is when the server is friendly and the food comes on time. That is the minimum.

Surprising service is when the guest receives something they did not expect and did not pay for. That is the moment they tell someone about. In psychology, it is called reciprocity — when you receive something unexpectedly, you feel obligated to give something back. In hospitality, "giving back" means coming back, recommending, reviewing.

Haidilao turned that principle into a system. You can turn it into your own system. It starts with a single question, asked before every service: "What does my guest get today that they do not expect?"

Clients who build surprise moments in systematically consistently see 30–60% higher recommendation rates. Not because the food got better. Because the experience became unforgettable. And when you think about the four growth levers that drive any restaurant's economics — more new guests, higher check, more frequent visits, longer retention — you realize quickly that more frequent visits and recommendations are the cheapest and most powerful of the four.

FAQ

Does Haidilao's service model actually work outside of China?

Not 1:1 — but the principles are universal. A free manicure would not land culturally in a German or British restaurant. The underlying principle absolutely does: surprise your guest with something they did not expect and that costs little or nothing. A free digestif, a handwritten thank-you card, a personal goodbye at the door — that works in Freiburg and in Manchester exactly as well as in Shanghai.

How can I afford higher wages when I am already running tight margins?

The question is framed backwards. The right question is: what is your current turnover costing you? At roughly EUR 5,000 per replacement and 70% turnover, a ten-person operation is burning EUR 35,000 per year just on churn. If a EUR 150 gross raise per month cuts turnover in half, you save about EUR 17,500 — and get better service on top. Most operators never run this calculation. The ones who do never go back.

Do I really need "viral moments" in my restaurant?

You do not need a TikTok strategy. You need moments guests tell someone about — whether online or at the next dinner party. 81% of Haidilao guests recommend it. Not because of the hotpot. Because of the experience. Word of mouth is the oldest and strongest marketing channel there is. Haidilao has just translated it into the digital age. Your version can live entirely offline and still produce the same effect.

What is the simplest "teddy-bear moment" I can introduce immediately?

Three ideas that cost almost nothing. First: when a guest is eating alone, bring an unasked-for newspaper or magazine to the table. Second: when you see a guest taking a photo of their food, offer to take a photo of the guest with the food. Third: if a guest is leaving while it is raining, offer a loaner umbrella — "bring it back next time." You create a surprise moment and a reason to come back.

Does Haidilao have weaknesses I should be aware of before I copy anything?

Yes. The surveillance culture with 60+ cameras per location is not acceptable in Europe — it would not survive a GDPR review. The detailed customer-profile practice without consent would be a clear GDPR violation in Germany and the UK. And the intensity of the service pressure on staff can lead to burnout. The lesson is not "copy Haidilao." The lesson is "understand the principles, translate them to your reality, and leave the parts that do not fit where they are."

Why do guests voluntarily wait up to two hours?

Because Haidilao turns the wait itself into an experience. The psychology is well-documented: occupied time feels shorter than unoccupied time, explained waits feel shorter than uncertain ones, and when the wait itself becomes a highlight — manicure, snacks, games — the wait stops being friction and becomes part of the visit. You do not need manicures. A glass of prosecco and an honest time estimate already move the needle enormously.

Can a small independent restaurant really compete with service like this?

You do not have to compete. You have to surprise. Haidilao has 137,000 employees and a nine-figure service-infrastructure budget. You have something Haidilao will never have: a personal relationship with your guests. The owner who greets a regular by name and asks how their trip to Italy went — that is a service level no chain on earth can replicate. Your smallness is your advantage.

How did Haidilao survive the 2017 hygiene scandal?

Through speed and radical honesty. Three and a half hours after the story broke: public apology. A full rectification plan with named accountability within six and a half hours. Immediate closure of the affected restaurants. Installation of live kitchen webcams visible to every guest. Haidilao did not cover up — they made transparency the new standard. The lesson: a crisis plan plus a willingness to be radically honest can turn a catastrophe into a trust signal. Most operators have neither a crisis plan nor the instinct for radical honesty. Build both before you need them.

I run a 30-seat restaurant. Is this still relevant?

Especially for you. Thirty seats means thirty guests per service, each of whom you can greet by name. That is an advantage, not a disadvantage. In a 200-seat operation, personalization is heavy lifting. In a 30-seat operation, it is the natural state. You already know your guests. You just need a light system — a notebook, a spreadsheet, a booking-system note — so the knowledge does not disappear when you are not on the floor.

What does "extreme service" cost per cover, realistically?

Far less than operators assume. Most of Haidilao's famous touches — the phone cover, the hair tie, the apron, the teddy bear — cost cents per guest. The manicure is the outlier, not the standard. If you add EUR 0.50–1.50 per cover in small, surprising gestures and that lifts your recommendation rate by 30%, the math is not close. At EUR 80,000 monthly revenue, a 15% lift in new guests through word of mouth is EUR 12,000 in new revenue per month — for a per-guest investment of well under EUR 2.

Bottom line: service is not a cost center. Service is your strongest revenue driver.

Zhang Yong could not cook. That was his greatest advantage.

Because he knew his product was average, he had to be extraordinary somewhere else. He chose service. Not good service — surprising, overwhelming, unbelievable service. Service so extreme that guests film it and share it with millions of people.

The result: USD 6 billion in revenue. Around USD 670 million in profit. 1,490 locations. 415 million guests per year. Close to zero in traditional advertising.

You do not need a teddy bear and dancing servers. You need the realization underneath it all: your service is your marketing. Every surprising moment is a recommendation you cannot buy. Every satisfied employee is a salesperson you do not have to train. Every returning guest is proof that your system works.

Something like 80% of German operators name staff shortage as their biggest burden. Similar numbers show up in surveys across the UK and the US. But Haidilao, In-N-Out, and Chick-fil-A do not have a staff-shortage problem. Because they understood that staff shortage is not a market problem. It is an investment problem.

The five lessons:

• Your service is your marketing — Every surprising moment is a video, a review, a recommendation you did not pay for.
• Find your teddy-bear moment — One unexpected gesture per visit, costing cents, beats a full-page ad.
• Waiting can be an experience — A glass of prosecco and an honest time estimate turn friction into hospitality.
• Invest in the team first — Better pay → lower turnover → better service → more revenue → more budget. The loop only works in one direction.
• Design for the unexpected — Good service meets expectations. Great service exceeds them by a margin the guest has to tell someone about.

Invest in your team. Surprise your guests. Build moments worth retelling. And stop believing that marketing is something you buy from an agency.

Marketing is what happens when your guest leaves the restaurant — and tells someone about it.

Make sure they have something to tell.

Related reading

• How to get more Google reviews for your restaurant
• How to respond to negative restaurant reviews
• Retaining restaurant staff: what actually works
• Finding qualified hospitality staff in a tight market
• How to improve the guest experience in your restaurant
• What restaurants can learn from Amazon
• The full series: what restaurants can learn from other industries