End of trip.
Friday, March 14, 2014
Din Tai Fung 鼎泰豐
Day 4 - Last visit of the trip - Din Tai Fung 鼎泰豐 for lunch.
Din Tai Fung 鼎泰豐, an award-winning restaurant originating in Taiwan, specialising in 小籠包 xiao long bao (soup dumplings), is definitely not a new name to me, with its multiple branches in Singapore. It is in fact one of my favourite restaurants to dine in.
The restaurant branch we visited in Taipei is the branch at Taipei 101.
Besides the wonderful food quality, here are some takeaways from my experience at the Din Tai Fung restaurant:
Din Tai Fung 鼎泰豐, an award-winning restaurant originating in Taiwan, specialising in 小籠包 xiao long bao (soup dumplings), is definitely not a new name to me, with its multiple branches in Singapore. It is in fact one of my favourite restaurants to dine in.
The restaurant branch we visited in Taipei is the branch at Taipei 101.
Besides the wonderful food quality, here are some takeaways from my experience at the Din Tai Fung restaurant:
- Quality service, going out of the way - specialized coat cover and bag holder
- Trademark signature dishes, which gives restaurant its strong brand identity
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| Seaweed |
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| Xiao Long Bao |
Yum!
- Hygiene: Like the Singapore branch, the Taipei kitchen was separated from the main dining area by a glass pane so that customers can see for themselves how the food is prepared.
- Global presence: Din Tai Fung is now an international brand, well known for its cuisine standards.
- Creativity: Observed even in small little ways, such as this cut-out crab shaped pastry skin to indictate the crab-meat soup dumplings.
- Marketing: Celebrity endorsement
Even Tom Cruise dines at Din Tai Fung.
Overall, the visit to Din Tai Fung has been nothing short of delicious and inspiring.
Din Tai Fung first started out selling only oil, but eventually ventured into a full fledge restaurant, and is today an award winning chain of restaurant with branches in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, the United States and Thailand.
It is certainly an exemplary example of a successful venture in the Taiwan Service industry and of Taiwan's signature Food & Beverage sector.
Thursday, March 13, 2014
Vigor Kobo
Day 4- Vigor Kobo
-Specialises in baking top of the line Taiwan cakes and pastries
-Target market: tourists
- Insists on top quality, use of fresh ingredients and attractive packaging to ensure great tasting, great looking products
-Takes pride in cakes and pastries and commitment to serve customers
From main website: http://www.taiwan-vigor.com.tw/front/bin/ptlist.phtml?Category=349745
-Conducts a walk tour for customers to see for themselves how pastries are prepared
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-Conducts hands-on pastry baking
Why pastries?
-Value of pastries surpasses that of bread
-Pastries are usually used as gifts and are exquisite, a must buy when travelling for friends and family back home, thus pastries are a marketable product
Leaning points from Vigor Kobo:
-Use of adorable trademark characters to create a strong market identity
-Ensures use of quality ingredients to maintain standards and thus stakehold in the pastry industry in Taiwan
-Focus on attractive packaging to differentiate themself from the rest of the pastry market. I feel this aesthetics approach is an especially important aspect of the business, especially for one which targets tourists as their main market.
-Quality service to enhance the entire experience at Vigor Kobo
-The hands-on walk tour and pastry baking is fun and definitely appeals to tourists who have time to spend. This tour differentiates Vigor Kobo from the other pastry retailers in the Taiwan market.
- Expansion only focused in Asian/ Chinese market.
Vigor Kobo believes in a specialised market expansion direction as it feels that the pastries will not be well received in European countries due to a different culture. I feel this is a good learning point as businesses always need to plan well, and bear in mind not to over-expand too quickly or in an over-ambitious manner and risk jeopardising the business.
-Innovation: variations of pastries with different price points. This is to cater to the uprising China tourists who often prefer to spend more on more exquisite products. This is another great learning point for me as Vigor Kobo has highlighted how innovation and creativity can be applied to cater to changing market needs.
- Media and advertising: does not use advertisements. Instead, Vigor Kobo uses news reports and variety shows to broadcast its company's products and name. Vigor Kobo believes this is cost-effective and is more reliable and persuasive to the consumers. This is a very interesting marketing approach.
- Vigor Kobo also caters to customers by being the first shop to allow change of currency. This gives Vigor Kobo a customer-centric competitive edge, especially with its main market being tourists.
-Specialises in baking top of the line Taiwan cakes and pastries
-Target market: tourists
- Insists on top quality, use of fresh ingredients and attractive packaging to ensure great tasting, great looking products
-Takes pride in cakes and pastries and commitment to serve customers
From main website: http://www.taiwan-vigor.com.tw/front/bin/ptlist.phtml?Category=349745
-Conducts a walk tour for customers to see for themselves how pastries are prepared
-Conducts hands-on pastry baking
-Value of pastries surpasses that of bread
-Pastries are usually used as gifts and are exquisite, a must buy when travelling for friends and family back home, thus pastries are a marketable product
Leaning points from Vigor Kobo:
-Use of adorable trademark characters to create a strong market identity
-Ensures use of quality ingredients to maintain standards and thus stakehold in the pastry industry in Taiwan
-Quality service to enhance the entire experience at Vigor Kobo
-The hands-on walk tour and pastry baking is fun and definitely appeals to tourists who have time to spend. This tour differentiates Vigor Kobo from the other pastry retailers in the Taiwan market.
- Expansion only focused in Asian/ Chinese market.
Vigor Kobo believes in a specialised market expansion direction as it feels that the pastries will not be well received in European countries due to a different culture. I feel this is a good learning point as businesses always need to plan well, and bear in mind not to over-expand too quickly or in an over-ambitious manner and risk jeopardising the business.
-Innovation: variations of pastries with different price points. This is to cater to the uprising China tourists who often prefer to spend more on more exquisite products. This is another great learning point for me as Vigor Kobo has highlighted how innovation and creativity can be applied to cater to changing market needs.
- Media and advertising: does not use advertisements. Instead, Vigor Kobo uses news reports and variety shows to broadcast its company's products and name. Vigor Kobo believes this is cost-effective and is more reliable and persuasive to the consumers. This is a very interesting marketing approach.
- Vigor Kobo also caters to customers by being the first shop to allow change of currency. This gives Vigor Kobo a customer-centric competitive edge, especially with its main market being tourists.
La New
Day 3- La New Footwear Manufacturing company
-Handcrafted quality shoes
-Customized to each customer's needs; caters to colour, style, comfort and health issues;
Health design footwear, catering to health issues such as flatfoot
Triple density soles which aim to absorb shock and propel legs forward
-Focus on comfort and breath-ability
-Market focus: almost all groups, including working adults, outdoors people, mothers, and sportspeople
-Foot research centre, call center for after-sales service and multiple Quality Control tests, so customers are assured of receiving service, technological support and top quality footwear
-Also sells footwear related products- such as anti-bacterial/ anti-odor socks
-ISO 9001 ceritfications
-Promotions and events: Walking activity to test La New products and inculcate healthy habit of walking
- Marketing: Commercials endorsed by celebrities.
My biggest takeaway:
- Focus on quality of footwear: careful selection of best materials, accurate foot measurements of each customer which ensures service standards
- Customer-centric: focus on specialised needs of customers, caters to health issues of customers
- Fusion of science, technology with product and service
- Diversity of shoes- which allows a larger market size
- Active involvement of communitry through events like walkathons
Images from main La New website: http://www.lanew.com.tw/
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-Handcrafted quality shoes
-Customized to each customer's needs; caters to colour, style, comfort and health issues;
Health design footwear, catering to health issues such as flatfoot
Triple density soles which aim to absorb shock and propel legs forward
-Focus on comfort and breath-ability
-Market focus: almost all groups, including working adults, outdoors people, mothers, and sportspeople
-Foot research centre, call center for after-sales service and multiple Quality Control tests, so customers are assured of receiving service, technological support and top quality footwear
-Also sells footwear related products- such as anti-bacterial/ anti-odor socks
-ISO 9001 ceritfications
-Promotions and events: Walking activity to test La New products and inculcate healthy habit of walking
- Marketing: Commercials endorsed by celebrities.
My biggest takeaway:
- Focus on quality of footwear: careful selection of best materials, accurate foot measurements of each customer which ensures service standards
- Customer-centric: focus on specialised needs of customers, caters to health issues of customers
- Fusion of science, technology with product and service
- Diversity of shoes- which allows a larger market size
- Active involvement of communitry through events like walkathons
Images from main La New website: http://www.lanew.com.tw/
Dian Shui Lou 點水樓
Day 3 - lunch at Dian Shui Lou 點水樓
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- Launched by Namchow Group (南僑集團), a soap-making chemical manufacturer-cum-culinary giant.
- High-profile restaurant chain specializing in Jiangzhe cuisine (江浙菜)
- Restaurant design is modeled on tradition
Pointers from the visit to Dian Shui Lou 點水樓:
- Horizontal and Vertical integration of business: diversity of products- soap, oil-based products, frozen dough, ice cream, F&B
- Driven out of Interests and Passion by boss
- Clear market segmentation due to diversified products. Market segmentation is a marketing strategy that involves dividing a broad target market into subsets of consumers who have common needs and priorities and then designing and implementing strategies to target them.
- Knowledge about food: moved into F&B industry because of knowledge about Jiangzhe cuisine
- Customer oriented:
-Deodorise seawater fish to achieve better food standards for customers- by putting fish into freshwater tanks
-Use of specific ingredients for specific dishes to achieve best food standards for customers
- Cleanliness of kitchen and restaurant
- Innovation: different flavours of Xiao Long Bao
- Aims to contribute to Taiwan's rich F&B and service industry
- The only restaurant to be awarded the full five stars by the Northern Taiwan Restaurant Guide (北台灣餐館評鑑)
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| Before listening to the presentation |
Les Enphants
Day 2- Visit to Les Enphants for a factory tour.
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From the Les Enphants website
(http://temp.phland.com.tw/les_en/en/company.html)
' The foundation of the Les Enphants group is built from the notion of human needs. In an effort to satisfy a parent’s desire to care for their children, we have developed a wide range of products that offer the same care and love as the mother. Broaching from children’s needs, we aim to provide children with the best in our product development. The sewing of each garment is bestowed with a mother’s devotion and attentive care. Today’s dedicated efforts bring us to witness the children’s future dreams! '
Here are some insights from my visit to the Les Enphants factory tour.
- Customer-centric: Les Enphants's business philosophy is “Devoting to the children as our lifetime career”.
- Corporation of philosophy and creativity into company logo:
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| Peace and Hope, founding philosophy of Les Enphants. |
- Company responsibility- Emphasis on safety, service and quality standards of products, to ensure customer trust and ease of mind.
- Caters to need-based customers; women and children.
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