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Still a can-do woman

By Fu Yu (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-03-30 08:01

At 55, Guan Yuxiang was a retired saleswoman for a State-owned gas and electric meter company.

At 70, she is chairwoman of China's largest privately owned can manufacturer, with annual sales of an estimated 1.5 billion yuan ($210 million) and an annual growth rate of 30 percent.

Although she has not been listed in Forbes magazine as one of China's wealthiest women, Guan may be the richest self-made Chinese woman who started a business when she was nearly 60 years old.

Guan's ORG Can Manufacturing Inc now dominates China's metal packaging industry. With more than 10 domestic branches, her biggest clients include Red Bull, the energy drink from Thailand, the JDB Group, a private beverage company best known in China for its popular herbal tea Wang Laoji, and Xinjiang Chalkis Co ltd, the world's second largest processor of canned tomatoes.

Dressed in a light yellow cashmere sweater, Guan looks much younger than her 70 years. Sitting on a pink leather sofa, with a cherubic smile, Guan says aging is not "lost youth" but a new stage for opportunity and strength, so in 2005 at the age of 65, she obtained an MBA degree.

A sharp dealmaker, Guan used her 20 years of sales experience to start a business after retirement. She went to the small province of Hainan, China's second largest tropical island, which had been designated a "Special Economic Province" in 1988. In the early 1990s, the Hainan government initiated a plan to build a "Beverage Kingdom" utilizing local tropical fruits and vegetables, such as coconuts, mangoes, bananas and star fruit.

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The beverage companies had to import the containers for their beverages, because China's packaging industry could not provide high quality cans. Guan started by importing cans in 1991, but then got the idea for producing the cans domestically.

Both her family and her business partners were against it, but Guan ignored them. She dispatched people to conduct market research on the potential development of the can industry in China. Then she shut herself at home for three or four days to analyze the results.

"She's a visionary," said Zhang Ruiheng, who helped Guan start the company and was former CFO. "She doesn't mind putting a lot of money in at the beginning to build the company, to buy equipment and upgrade the technology."

Thanks to the local government's favorable policies toward entrepreneurs, Guan set up her can manufacturing company with a low interest loan of 2 million yuan ($292,710). She used the loan to buy the land and build the plant. She used her own savings to purchase the manufacturing equipment.

"China is a big can making country but not a strong one." Guan recalled. "When I started this industry in China, I made up my mind to target those big food and beverage clients by providing high-technology products and better service."

For example, Guan said, ORG used "double reduced tinplate" which makes the can much lighter, a cost savings for Xinjiang Chalkis Co. Ltd in canning tomatoes.

In 1994, Guan heard that Red Bull was planning to set up a factory in Hainan. A brand new company, she was competing with 100 other can manufacturers nationwide.

ORG won its first big client, Red Bull. Making the most of the opportunity, Guan and her factory workers did not take a day off, even during the Chinese lunar New Year, to fill the order and to deliver the cans to Red Bull on time.

Today, ORG Can Manufacturing Inc. provides more than 90 percent of the cans for Red Bull in China. On Guan's side table in her office, is a framed photo of her and former prime minister of Thailand Thaksin Shinawatra.

"Guan Yuxiang is a very talented businesswoman. She has created a new career after retirement. Other businesspeople should learn from her to make their companies better," said Shi Wanpeng, president of the China Packaging Federation.

To her employees, Guan is the mother of a big family.

Zhang Ruiheng retired from ORG last year, after serving as CFO for 13 years. She said of her former boss: "Besides my mother, Guan Yuxiang is the most important person in my life. We have already gone beyond a boss and employee relationship. We are sisters."

Guan is not only good to her management staff. She also cares about her senior factory workers. She has bought several apartments for them in Hainan.

"We all profit together," Guan said. "I believe this is China's traditional way of doing business".

Guan's latest dream is to put her company to be listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

So what does the petite only daughter of a rural family say about her business success?

"It is essential to learn how to be an upright woman before doing business." Guan said. "A good conscience is a soft pillow".

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