Niche firms devise supple makeovers to stay in season

A change in season is always welcome, especially if it is summer following a particularly harsh winter. But to hotpot specialist Little Sheep, the onset of summer is a challenge to its survival.

Many small neighborhood hotpot eateries in Beijing and other cities around the country can just shut shop during the off-season. But that obviously is not an option for Hong Kong-listed Little Sheep, which owns and operates the nation's largest chain of hotpot restaurants.

It cannot afford to send thousands of cooks, waiters and helpers packing for the summer and expect them to troop back to work at the first sign of autumn. Neither can it simply switch off the vast supply chain that extends to the sheep farms in Inner Mongolia and turn it back on at will.