Sitting in Maison de la Truffe in downtown Taipei, entrepreneur Bob Yeh talks about the next step in his career: opening a high-end tea house in Paris. “This is the greatest dream in my life,” says the 56-year-old, sporting shoulder-length hair and a driving cap. Yeh brought the concept of his truffle-themed restaurant to Taipei from France only earlier this year, but the businessman already has his eye on making a move back to the City of Lights.
Formerly a food science major, Yeh shot to prominence in the industry in 1985, the year Sinn Si Industrial Co. produced Taiwan’s first packaged cold tea drink, Kaisi Oolong Tea. It was Yeh who came up with the idea to sell packaged cold tea drinks, which he suggested to the head of Sinn Si, a former schoolmate. Yeh went on to create extremely successful television commercials for the product in the early 1990s, which featured rustic images of an elderly woman with her signature broad grin. Such was the impact of the commercials that most people in Taiwan were familiar with the “Kaisi lady.” “I added a chic touch to the tea-drinking culture that has existed for thousands of years,” Yeh says confidently, noting that the success of the product popularized the idea of drinking cold tea in general. Previously tea was usually served hot in Taiwan and much of Asia. At its peak in 1994, Kaisi tea generated NT$7 billion (US$264 million) in revenue. Subsequently, a number of packaged cold tea drinks entered and now dominate the market, a development that dealt a severe blow to carbonated drink suppliers led by Coca Cola.
Bob Yeh says the marketing of food—be it tea, bread or truffles—has much to do with culture. (Photo by Chang Su-ching)
Kaisi’s peak was also when Yeh, who grew up in the Dadaocheng area of Taipei, began to think of his next challenge. “You have to consider your next step even while you’re enjoying red-hot success; otherwise, you’ll soon be left behind,” he says. This time, he looked to the West, in particular France. “France is the fashion center of Europe. If you can succeed there, it’s easier to explore other European countries,” he says.
“That’s a daring step,” says food critic Hu Tien-lan, “because French people think of themselves as experts about gourmet foods.” With France as his initial target market, Yeh needed to find an impressive name for his products in order to create a cultural feel for them. Thus came the brand Lao Tsu Say, named after the ancient Chinese Philosopher Laozi. Yeh registered the brand with European Union authorities in 2000. “The branding of Yeh’s tea products abroad is 80 percent about marketing their distinctive cultural charm,” Hu says. The brand, which is mainly used for bottled tea drinks made from Taiwan-grown tea, hit the French market in 2004.
Yeh knew that for his culturally based brand to be identified easily, Lao Tsu Say would have to differentiate itself from two other prominent names associated with Asia in the West: Confucius and Zen. Confucius, like Laozi, was a great thinker from ancient China’s Eastern Chou dynasty (770–221 B.C.). In fact, Yeh once considered using the name Confucius, which is even more recognizable globally, but gave up on the idea because he believed mainland Chinese authorities would eventually use it as a symbol of traditional Chinese culture, even though the philosopher had been denounced by mainland Chinese communists for many years. Sure enough, in 2004 the government across the Taiwan Strait began to found branches of the Confucius Institute around the world to promote Chinese language learning. If he had chosen Confucius, his brand would not be as unique today, Yeh explains.
Marketing Philosophy
Lao Tsu Say’s marketing is unusual because it is based on elements of Taoist philosophy. (Photo Courtesy of Bob Yeh)
Moreover, Yeh says Laozi is an appropriate choice because, as a major figure in Taoism, his “let it be” philosophy of “governing by doing nothing” is more attractive to Europeans, who value personal freedom highly. “Confucius places a premium on hierarchy and order and is therefore less appealing,” Yeh says.
At the same time, the ideas of Taoism used to promote the Lao Tsu Say brand have to compete with those of Zen. According to Yeh, the Japanese government has been promoting the concept of Zen for the past 20 or 30 years throughout Europe. As a result, Europeans have gradually learned about the philosophy and also look on Japan as the foremost representative of Asian fashion and aesthetics. Thus, Japan has also been deemed the center of Asian tea-drinking culture. To reverse that trend and create room for his brand in the European market, Yeh had to begin by promoting Taoism and its concepts of yin and yang and tai chi. “Zen is static in nature. It belongs to the 20th century. But the 21st century is an age of mobility, an age of the interaction between yin and yang. It’s the age of Taoism,” Yeh once said at a press conference in Paris, bringing his marketing acumen to the ancient philosophy.
Although Yeh is an advertising veteran promoting his own brand, he could be on to something regarding Lao Tsu Say’s prospects in Europe, as the public there has become more familiar with Taoist concepts in recent years. “Since I started campaigning to popularize Taoism, it has quickly become a trendy thing,” Yeh says with the zeal of a marketing pro. In 2004, when the brand debuted in France, Lao Tsu Say won a Trend and Innovations Award at SIAL Paris, one of the largest food and beverage trade exhibitions in the world. A major reason for the honor was Yeh’s Taoism-centric marketing strategy that promoted the beverage as a chic cultural product. “Food marketing is usually about health benefits or the like. [The marketing for Lao Tsu Say] is not like that,” he says, adding that his strategy is unique because it draws on a philosophy.
The most recent import from France by Bob Yeh, Maison de la Truffe in Taipei hopes to inspire local purveyors of traditional foods. (Photo by Chang Su-ching)
Meanwhile, good packaging design is crucial to the cultural depth of Lao Tsu Say and the efforts the company has made in this aspect have also garnered awards, which in turn have added to the brand’s visibility. In 2007 the enterprise launched a sub-brand, Blushing Blossom, a line of products featuring teabags packaged in colorful paper wrappers. Each package is designed to stand on end in an elegant wooden platter, so that the packages form an eye-catching display. “These products are pleasant to look at,” Yeh says. “They actually become part of the décor in your house.” By mimicking a flower arrangement, the Blushing Blossom line won an iF Product Design Award in 2007 in Hannover, Germany, along with 35 other products from 24 Taiwanese enterprises. Lao Tsu Say was the only award winner from Taiwan’s food and beverage sector at that year’s event.
Tea Takes Time
Lao Tsu Say products are sold in high-end outlets in France and Spain. The company has yet to earn a profit, however, with Yeh explaining that it takes time to crack the European market. “It took seven years for Kaisi Oolong Tea to see any profits,” Yeh says. He believes sales could rise sharply this year after the launch of new items this summer featuring creative flavors such as Chinese wolfberry-flavored pu’er tea and rose-flavored Oolong tea. “The names of the products alone sound exciting,” he adds.
On the other hand, as he explores the Western market, Yeh has begun to introduce Western gourmet foods to Taiwan. France, again, was the starting point. “Taiwan is my mother, but France is my lover,” he says affectionately of the cultural powerhouse. The Francophile thus opened Bon Paul Co. in Taiwan, which, with the authorization from PAUL, a famous French bakery-restaurant chain with a 122-year history, has opened two PAUL bakeries in Taipei in the past three years. This new business venture has proved to be a great success, creating nearly NT$100 million (US$$3.3 million) in revenue in the first shop alone in 2009.
One popular item at Maison de la Truffe features beef filet steak with seasonal truffle mashed potatoes. (Photo Courtesy of Bob Yeh)
Product authenticity is what the Taipei shops are proudest of. “We introduce the real thing to Taiwan, the real taste from France,” says public relations manager Amy Liao. She says that the dough for all bread, pastries and cakes sold in the Taipei outlets is made in France using local ingredients and traditional techniques before it is flown to Taiwan, where it is baked. “Even differences in the quality of water and the degree of moisture in the air can lead to changes in the taste of bread,” Liao says. The bakery, which also houses a restaurant, is noteworthy because it introduces French dining culture to local customers. Not only are waiters required to have good knowledge of French food and dining habits, but the bakery publishes a free booklet about the way the bread and dishes are made and the stories behind them.
“The PAUL shops in Taipei help the city connect to the world in terms of its dining environment, and make it easier for foreigners here to find good French bread,” food critic Hu Tien-lan says.
In January this year, Taipei’s dining scene was graced by Yeh’s Maison de la Truffe, which is part of a small international chain of restaurants that all bear the same name. The chain traces its origins to a small shop in Paris that began selling quality truffles in 1932. That shop was later developed as a restaurant that features truffles on its menu. Today, the chain has two branches in Paris, one in Germany, and Yeh’s establishment in Taipei, while another two are set to open in Switzerland. “People in Taiwan know little about truffles, although they’ve long belonged with caviar and foie gras as one of the three top foods in France,” Hu says, adding that as far as she knows the restaurant is the only one in Taiwan with a truffle theme. The Taipei restaurant is also the first branch of Maison de la Truffe in Asia.
In addition to introducing the luxury taste of truffles to Taiwan, Yeh has even more gastronomic plans in mind. “Taiwan’s government has been talking about internationalizing its gourmet foods in the last few years. I hope this restaurant can inspire vendors of traditional [Taiwanese] gourmet foods in this respect,” he says. Thus in March, Yeh invited 14 longtime business operators selling traditional foods from pineapple cakes to beef noodles to his truffle restaurant in the hopes of creating some “sparks” between Western and local cooking practices.
Cooking Up Possibilities
Yeh’s introduction of the French bakery chain PAUL to Taipei adds diversity to the local dining scene. (Photo by Chang Su-ching)
One of those restaurateurs was Finger Chang, president of restaurant chain Formosa Chang Co. “Bob Yeh stimulated me to challenge cooking traditions and explore possibilities,” says Chang, whose restaurant chain operates 34 shops in the Taipei area. Accordingly Chang experimented with combining braised pork over rice, one of his restaurant’s typical dishes, and truffles. In April, the French chef of Maison de la Truffe in Paris flew to Taipei and met with Chang for further discussions about how to fuse Western and Taiwanese cuisines. The chef left Taiwan with a sample of Formosa Chang’s braised pork, and is developing a truffle sauce to go with it.
“Actually truffles could go well with many traditional Taiwanese foods,” Hu Tien-lan says. The critic explains that truffles go very well with sesame oil, which is a popular ingredient in Taiwanese fare such as three-cup stir-fried king oyster mushrooms. The dish features a cup of rice wine, a cup of sesame oil and a cup of soy sauce. The key is to teach Taiwanese chefs how to release the aroma of the truffle fully. “If we can combine local foods with truffles properly, foreign tourists could be targeted as a first step to introducing the dishes,” Hu says.
It could be quite challenging for Yeh to set a trend this time around, however, since the high cost of truffles, known in Europe as diamonds of the table, would greatly push up the prices of local traditional dishes. But Yeh has shown that he is one who dares to dream, as witnessed by the plans being drawn up for his tea house in Paris. “I need to set up an actual tea house, since just selling tea drinks at retail outlets is not enough to promote Chinese or Taiwanese tea culture,” he says. Still, Yeh aims to express the Oriental concept behind the tea shop only in an oblique manner, with the high-end establishment being designed by a French artist and a French interior designer. “I want our tea culture to blend in with the local culture there. That would make it something with a global view.”
Write to Oscar Chung at oscar@mail.gio.gov.tw