Many Taiwanese recall being sent by their mothers to buy some rice at the corner grocery store when they were little, taking their own bag or bucket. Before the 1980s, most rice was sold to customers in bulk without packaging, labels or brand names.
Liu De-long and his wife Joyce Chuang were once traders of such bulk rice. Liu’s family ran a rice mill for three generations in southern Taiwan’s Chiayi County before Liu’s older brother took over the business and Liu opened his own wholesale rice outlet in Taipei County.
Though he grew up in a traditional family-owned business environment, Liu’s idea of doing business is far from conventional. While competitors were still relying on sight, touch and smell to examine rice, he had already imported expensive machines from Japan to conduct quality checks on the rice carried at his store.
Such keenness to take risks and try new things may be the main reason for the couple’s later success in this industry, especially after they began to supply packaged rice, through the brand known as Zhong-xing Rice, in 1986.
The competition was fierce in the beginning as there were more than 100 similar businesses in the market, according to Liu and Chuang. Their company, Union Rice Co. Ltd., struggled to make their brand well-known among consumers, resulting in a few years of above-average performance.
But the turning point came in 1993, when the couple took a leap of faith and spent NT$100 million (US$3.28 million) to produce a television commercial for their rice. The investment, according to Liu, was much higher than their competitors thought was necessary.
“We felt that in addition to quality products, brand recognition would be crucial to the success of a new business.”
Surging sales after the airing of the commercial proved Liu’s point. When famed TV hostess Chang Hsiao-yen proclaims in the advertisement that “Zhong-xing rice is a little sticky—but not too sticky,” the slogan perfectly captures the unique texture of rice produced in Taiwan. “In three months, we saw a 50-percent increase in sales,” Chuang said.
After this first important stride in increasing awareness of their brand, the couple stepped up efforts to ensure consistent product quality. “We chose Pitou Township in Changhua County as the major source of our rice because of its easy access to irrigation water from the nearby mineral-laden Zhuoshui River,” Chuang said.
The couple recruited local farmers there for production and marketing teams, passing on the rice farming know-how they had acquired through their research.
“As long as the farmers follow our standard operating procedures, which control the schedule for transplanting rice seedlings, fertilizing and harvesting, the company purchases all the rice they grow and subsidizes part of the cost of fertilizer, which has to be organic,” she said.
In addition, she noted, the system results in more efficient cultivation as small plots of land owned by different farmers can be combined into larger fields where machines can replace some of the human labor.
Today, the yield from over 1,000 hectares of land cultivated by more than 500 farmers associated with Union Rice supplies most of the needs of the company. The number of farmers cooperating in the firm’s production and marketing groups is still growing, too, Chuang pointed out.
However, the couple’s efforts to upgrade their business do not stop when the crop leaves the paddy. According to Chuang, the company continues to bring in new technology to classify and grade milled rice at their quality control center. These gadgets simulate human taste and examine both raw and cooked rice for freshness, smell, nutrition and taste, she said.
“Having developed a leading brand, we want to keep setting an example for the industry with nonstop innovation,” Chuang said. She estimates that her company, with annual sales revenue exceeding NT$200 million, holds 40 percent of the domestic rice market.
In 2007, the company made another industry breakthrough by introducing a high-tech rice-washing machine from Japan, putting the first locally produced rinse-free rice into the market. “The machine offers state-of-the-art technology to clean rice with a minimal amount of water while retaining all its nutrients,” Chuang said.
With strict control of every detail, last year the company also became the first domestic rice supplier to pass the more than 500 inspections needed to get its rice on the shelves of Japanese retailers. “Our first 108 metric tons of rice exported to Japan sold out in just two months,” Chuang noted.
At home, the company has continued to expand its market by customizing products for specific customers. “Besides our household brand, Zhong-xing Rice, we put out several other brands, supplying rice to major food chains and convenience stores, including KFC, MOS Burger, 7-Eleven and Family Mart,” she said.
Earlier this year, the firm opened Asia’s first privately owned rice museum in Changhua County, presenting the entire cycle of rice planting and harvesting, as well as a Do-It-Yourself area where tourists can make rice products such as mochi, sushi, rice balls and puffed rice. The museum has averaged over 20,000 visits per month.
“Eating habits are changing for the younger generation, which eats less rice than people used to, so we hope the museum can help children become acquainted with rice culture early on and realize that rice can be made into a wide variety of products useful in our daily lives,” Chuang said.
Liu and Chuang’s commitment to producing quality rice and promoting rice culture won them the 2010 National Award for Outstanding Small and Medium Enterprises from the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
The panel of judges commended Union Rice’s quality control and marketing, describing its operations as an improvement on the traditional industry through management concepts similar to those in the service sector.
The company is now calling on enterprises and individuals to join it in a charity organized to feed the hungry in rural areas, starting from Changhua and Taitung counties.
“Businesses and individuals who participate in the program adopt 100 square meters of farmland for NT$36,000 per year,” she said. “Some of the rice produced from the land they adopt will be given back to them in gift packages, and some will be sent to children whose families struggle to put meals on the table.”
As for the company’s upcoming plans, Chuang said biotechnology tools will be applied to produce a new kind of rice that will make cooking rice as easy as fixing a bowl of instant noodles. The couple is also planning to publish books on the history of rice, rice farming, cooking with rice and dinner table stories.
“We believe families bond at the dinner table, and delicious rice is just the thing to bring everyone together,” she said. (THN)
Write to Audrey Wang at audrey@mail.gio.gov.tw