For all the hours I spend on investment research each week, I’m consistently amazed at how many of my best investment ideas start in the oddest, utterly happenstance ways.
每个星期我都花费好多时间在投资研究上。渐渐地，我惊奇地发现，最好的投资想法常在不经意间觅得。
I spent much of this past weekend on decidedly domestic duties. We moved into a new house in February, but between prior commitments and my travel schedule, we hadn’t had time to get everything set up until now. It was amidst the curtain-hanging, box-unpacking, and furniture-moving that an investment idea all but smacked me in the face.
上周末我花了大量时间在家务琐事上。二月份我们刚刚入住新宅，但忙于旅游，在这期间我一直没能花时间好好布置房间。直到现在，就在这次挂窗帘、拆箱子、搬家具时，我突然灵光乍现得到个投资灵感。
It started when the doorbell rang.
一切都门铃响起的一刹那迸发。
Two brawny men announced they were here to deliver our new couch. This was itself a small miracle. The couch was being custom-made in North Carolina and was not scheduled to be delivered for another five weeks. But here it was. The delivery men brought it inside, unpacked it, assembled it for us, cleaned up, and were gone in less than ten minutes. (I did not manage to hang a single curtain rod in that time.)
门外站着两个壮男，说他们是来为我们送新沙发的。这件事本身就比较神奇，因为沙发是在北加州定制的，说好五周以后才会送，但是现在这么快就到了。快递员将沙发搬入房间，开箱组装，再清洁一下，前后不到十分钟。（这点时间还不够我挂个窗帘呢）。
Our new couch. The couch, blanket, rug, and lamp are all from West Elm. (The blanket is the softest, most wonderful thing ever.) Note the Annual Reports on the coffee table -- investing never stops!
这是我们的新沙发。沙发、毯子、地毯和灯都是West Elm买来的（毛毯纤软、舒服至极）。看到咖啡桌上的年报了吗？投资这事无时无刻地占据着我的生活!
The speed and service was delightful. Even more so was the early delivery. When was the last time a company delivered something to you five weeks early? The investor in me perked up. Companies that delight their customers tend to take care of their shareholders, too. Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Tesla -- these are all companies that aim to delight customers.
我很满意服务速度和质量，当然还有提早配发这事。您还能想起哪家公司是提早五个星期发货的吗？这时我的投资灵感就来了:那些善于取悦客户的公司也会让他们的股东满意。亚马逊、苹果、在线影片租赁提供商Netflix和特斯拉——所有这些公司都以客户为上帝。
I had to know more about this company.
于是乎我想更多了解下这家公司。
The name of the company is West Elm. It is a newer, trendy furniture and home decor brand. I’d first learned of it when visiting a friend -- he’s much more stylish than me -- in his swanky Manhattan apartment. Then I started seeing their furniture in other upscale homes. Then, my fiancee -- who also has much better taste than me -- started buying their wares for our home. That’s how the couch came to be in my living room.
公司叫做West Elm，是时尚家居装饰品牌中的后起之秀。在一次拜访一位住在高档曼哈顿公寓的朋友时，我第一次听说这家公司(这朋友要比我前卫得多)。随后，我在其他高档住宅中都留意到了这家公司的家具。接着，我的未婚妻（她的品味要高出我很多）也开始从那儿买东西，这个提前到我们客厅的沙发就是其中之一。
A West Elm store in Birmingham, Alabama. (Not where we live.)
一家位于阿拉巴马州伯明翰的West Elm零售店（我们并不住在那个区域）
I looked up West Elm. It’s a private company. No public stock to investigate. I looked at the shipping label for the couch. It was marked “Delivery By Pottery Barn.” Pottery Barn is another home decor brand. I remembered that Pottery Barn is owned by $Williams-Sonoma(WSM)$ . I pulled up Williams-Sonoma’s 2015 Annual Report. Bingo! Sure enough, Williams-Sonoma owns West Elm.
我研究了下West Elm，这是家私有公司，没有上市交易的股票可供研究。我看了下沙发的运输标签，上面写着“由Pottery Barn运送”。Pottery Barn是另一家饰品牌，我记得它是$Williams-Sonoma(WSM)$ 所持有。于是，我调出了Williams-Sonoma的2015年报，原来如此！Williams-Sonoma也持有West Elm。
Now we’re in business. I started digging into Williams-Sonoma. The business is impressive. It’s a gourmet kitchen and upscale furniture retailer with over 10% operating margins. That’s rare, especially in the days of Amazon.com. Williams-Sonoma’s strategy centers around developing specialized, high-end brands that paint a picture of a way of life that appeals to more affluent -- or aspirationally affluent -- consumers. They’re very skilled at this. West Elm is their latest creation; they’ve grown West Elm sales by 14.8% in 2015, and that was on top of 18.2% growth the year before. In this industry, same-brand sales of 5% would be very strong. Double-digits are nearly unheard of.
这下就对了，我开始深入研究Williams-Sonoma。它的运作状况很不错，作为一家厨房和高档家具零售商，它的营业利润高达10%之多。在一个亚马逊主导的时代下，这样的业绩实属罕见。Williams-Sonoma的策略是集中发展专业高端品牌，吸引富有的或者力争致富的客户群。这家公司在这方面一直做得很好，West Elm是它们最新的品牌，2015年底其销售额继前年的18.2%又增长了14.8%。在这个行业中，同一品牌销售额增长能有5%就不错了，两位数的增长实属罕见。
But what really caught my attention is Williams-Sonoma’s e-commerce strategy. Most furniture brands have struggled to transition online. Furniture is something people want to see and touch in person. Asking customers to shelling out $ 3,000 for a couch without seeing it first is a tough proposition. Yet Williams-Sonoma is doing just that. Online sales are growing more than triple the pace as in-store sales, and they carry more than double the margins. Start doing the math and you’ll see how much room this business has left to run.
但真正吸引我的是Williams-Sonoma的电商策略。大多家具品牌都挣扎地转向线上销售，人们买家具都希望可以亲自看到和触摸，要让客户花三千美金买个不能亲眼看到的沙发是件很难的事。但是Williams-Sonoma却成功做到了。它线上销售比店面销售增长快三倍，利润也高出两倍多。您稍微算下就可以知道它还有多大的商业成长空间。
My research into Williams-Sonoma is not complete. I typically spend about 40 hours researching a stock before I decide to buy it. I’ll call management and ask them questions. I’ll probably interview the managers of my local West Elm and Pottery Barn stores. I’ll listen to the conference call transcripts and build a valuation model. There’s still much to do.
我对Williams-Sonoma的研究还在继续。我一般在决定买一个股票前都会集中花上40小时去研究下，我还会给管理层打电话问一些问题。我很可能也会打给当地的West Elm和Pottery Barn的经理，并且听下他们电话会议记录，再建立自己的估值模型。其实还有很多任务要完成。
To stay up to date with my latest investing adventures, follow me on Weixin (you’ll also receive our latest official stock recommendation, normally RMB 663, free on Weixin).
要想获悉我的最新投资动向，请关注我们的微信（您还可以免费获得我们的价值663元的股票推荐）。
Disclosure: Neither Alex Pape, CFA nor iWaitou owns shares of any company mentioned.
申明：本文作者（特许经融分析师）及i外投均不持有上述任何公司的股票。