The Market Monitor Minding the Nation's Business
By Lito U. Gagni
Shandong, China—Liwayway China Co. Ltd , part of the Oishi business empire, has invested $20 million in a new factory here in a bold marketing move that has characterized the company’s presence in China where it has flourished, earning the coveted Shanghai and China Famous brands.
The new factory, which is located in the 2.4 -square -kilometer Jibei Development Zone in Jinan City, the capital of Shandong, is already churning out Oishi’s snack food although it has yet to finish its expansion in the province which has a growing middle class.
Ambassador Carlos Chan, Liwayway China chairman emeritus, said the Shandong plant will service the eastern region of China and it is well placed as it sits smack in the center of a burgeoning metropolis (eight cities with separate export zones) in a province the size of the Philippines in terms of population.
The Shandong factory is one of 14 plants located in 10 provinces in China and its building plan was conceptualized by Chan himself. An architecture student, Chan put at the center of two manufacturing facilities a packaging area with a 285-meter covered walkway that is at the center of two separate plant facilities producing different varieties of snack food.
Heading the factory is Patricia Lynn Wong, a UST graduate who first started in Oishi’s plant in Imus , Cavite. After a year, she was assigned to the Hubei Liwayway Food Industries and Xuhou Liwayway Food Industries . Most of the plant managers and R & D associates come from the Philippines, a practice that Chan instituted.
Chan said it helps that Oishi has been recognized as a Shanghai Famous Brand in 2001 and then a China Famous Brand five years later. To get the award meant a brand should be in the Top 5 of the industry, it should have earned consumer trust and its standard of quality should be tops.
Oishi was wooed by the Jibei Development Zone to locate in the burgeoning province whose per capita income is the third-highest in China. Incentives were given to the Oishi plant, as having the name brand in the export zone meant it could attract other locators.
The Jibei Development Zone has been trying to attract locators to the area, as it meant that its residents could be gainfully employed.The incentives include even the offer of soft loans.
Chan said the Oishi Shandong factory has 385 employees and the growing middle class is very apparent with half of the employees driving to their office in cars.