Cailian News Agency (Changsha, reporter Li Yongjun) reported that "the upstream of Blue Ink is the Miluo River". The Miluo River, with a total length of 253 kilometers, flows through Pingjiang for 193 kilometers. Pingjiang County is also named after the tranquil flow of the Miluo River.

The food industry is a local characteristic in Pingjiang, Hunan, with beautiful mountains, clear waters, and rich culture. As early as the Qing Dynasty, Pingjiang dried soy sauce made from soy products was a royal tribute. Since the 1990s, hundreds of thousands of food professionals in Pingjiang have spread throughout the country.

But Zhou Jinsong was the first person in the Pingjiang Food industry to take the company public first. With the annual sales of 1.2 billion packets of Jingzai deep-sea fish, Zhou Jinsong's Chinese food (003000. SZ) landed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange's SME board on September 14th, becoming the "first stock of leisure fish snacks".

Buffett said that his investment decisions are based on people, "We hardly do due diligence, our due diligence is just looking into their eyes. Some successful investors in China also say, 'Buying stocks mainly means buying the chairman.'.

At the time when Huawen Food enters the capital market, understanding its leaders may be the most direct way to judge the company's value. Based on this, a Caixin reporter recently interviewed Chairman Zhou Jinsong, the founder of Huawen Food.

Be a street vendor with clear channels

Zhou Jinsong, born in 1972, started selling local specialty snacks such as Yangmei and candied fruits on the streets at the age of 15. Zhou Jinsong said that his family was poor at that time, and he thought that entering society as soon as possible could reduce the economic burden on his family and also make ends meet.

Looking back, whether it was his initial career as a street vendor or his later entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship, Zhou Jinsong's characteristic of being a Hunan person who "endured hardship, dominated fiercely, and endured annoyance" played a significant role.

More than thirty years later, Zhou Jinsong looked back at the situation and said that when vendors did business, they had to endure hardships first. They were very domineering and said, "Leaving early and returning late is the norm. They go out at five or six in the morning and sometimes only come back after ten at night. They use bicycles to carry goods, and they have to travel on mountain and rural roads. There is no one who is not hardworking. If they are not domineering, they definitely won't be able to do it

He said at that time, he had to carry a truckload of goods every day and sell them out before returning. Hard work is definitely hard work, but young people who earn money don't feel much hardship when they are happy.

Dealing with dealers requires patience. When carrying goods to various small shops by bicycle, you need to introduce the products clearly, persuade them to purchase, and ask them to help with sales. You must be patient“

When it comes to the benefits of being a street vendor, Zhou Jinsong said that the most important thing is to understand the importance of good channels. "Providing good service to small terminal stores is very important. Only by serving them well can we have stable and reliable sales channels and better sales.

He said that Huawen Food has always attached great importance to channel construction and is committed to building a community of shared destiny of "company+distributor+consumer". Winning channels through service is achieving mutual benefit and win-win results

Among the more than 1000 distributors of Huawen Food, many have been following Zhou Jinsong for ten to twenty years. "Mr. Zhou is a kind person" is the evaluation of Zhou Jinsong by many distributors.

Craftsman drilling technique

After working as a vendor for 2 years, 17-year-old Zhou Jinsong ended his days of wandering the streets and went to learn the production techniques of Pingjiang dried sauce from an uncle.

Zhou Jinsong said that he has found that if he wants to expand, having good channels is far from enough. He also needs to have good products and the ability to continue research and development. At that time, I had already traveled all over Pingjiang and had two to three hundred terminal channels in my hands. If I could produce dried soy sauce myself, I would definitely earn more

Dried soy sauce is a popular local snack made from beans, with a long production history in Pingjiang. Zhou Jinsong said that making dried sauce requires more than ten processes, including soaking beans, grinding, boiling, braising, shaping, braising, air drying, and packaging.

Since he was young, Zhou Jinsong often watched his family make it, and he learned it quite easily. "It took about two or three months to basically master all the processes. Of course, practice makes perfect, and he has been studying and learning repeatedly since then

This research habit has been maintained by Zhou Jinsong. He was the main R&D personnel of the company, and spent a lot of time on new product R&D and process improvement, whether he was initially making dried soy sauce or later making dried tofu and small fish.

In Zhou Jinsong's hometown, craftsmen are particularly respected. He has integrated respect for craftsmen and the pursuit of craftsmanship spirit into the company's management culture.

When he later founded the Chinese food production of dried tofu, in order to improve the production efficiency and quality control level of bean products, Zhou Jinsong led his team to go east to Japan, south to Australia, and west to Germany. It took several years to develop a customized automatic packaging machine with equipment manufacturers, which solved the automatic packaging problem that has plagued the industry for many years.

Breaking into the market and building a brand

In the early 1990s, Zhou Jinsong opened his own workshop to produce dried soy sauce. From early 1990 to 1994, Zhou Jinsong spent almost five years making dried soy sauce in his hometown of Pingjiang, which was also quite famous locally.

At this moment, Zhou Jinsong, who was developing smoothly, made a new decision to leave his hometown and go to another city for development.

Zhou Jinsong said that at that time, the market in Pingjiang County was limited after all. In addition, the local soy sauce drying process was relatively mature and common, and the product and technological advantages were only relatively leading, making it difficult to achieve unparalleled success. The national market is so big, I can go and explore it

In 1994, Zhou Jinsong departed from Changsha, passed through Yichang, and arrived in Xiangyang, heading north before finally settling in Luoyang, Henan. Zhou Jinsong said that Luoyang is an ancient capital of several dynasties, and the local area is rich in soybeans. "The quality and price of soybeans in Luoyang are good, and there are no deep processed soy products in the local area. The market can be said to be blank. I think dried soy sauce should have great potential

Sure enough, as a unique new variety, dried soy sauce quickly attracted the favor of Luoyang and even the Central Plains. From the initial terminals such as schools, small shops, and supermarkets, it quickly moved towards distribution channels such as distribution markets.

In 1997, Zhou Jinsong's dried soy sauce production value began to exceed one million yuan. Similar to Lao Gan Ma's Tao Huabi, he chose to register a trademark with his own name and avatar. The original intention of registering a trademark was because there are always people counterfeiting our products and selling them under our banner. 

In order to distinguish myself from them, I went to Beijing to register my own trademark

Zhou Jinsong said that many foreign brands are registered by their founders under their own names, such as Pierre Cardin and Kraft Foods. Chinese workshops also have a tradition of naming their businesses after the surnames of shop owners, such as "Zhang Ji" and "Li Ji".

He said that using the founder's name to register is also a commitment to consumers and a motivation to operators. In 2000, considering the convenience of dissemination and memory, coupled with the popularity of the term "handsome guy" in Guangdong at that time, Zhou Jinsong chose the character "jin" in his own name to establish his brand. The brand "Jinzai" is easy to pronounce and full of vitality, and has been in use ever since.

Compared to the flashy and handsome appearance of the "handsome guy", the "tough guy" has a stronger sense of a fighter who loves to fight to win. Later, Zhou Jinsong also invited celebrity artists such as Wang Han and Deng Lun to be spokespersons for "Jinzai", capturing a large number of loyal consumers.

After successfully conquering Luoyang, Zhou Jinsong also set up factories in Shenyang, Chengdu, Yiwu and other places.

One fish worth seven billion

The first attempt to establish factories in multiple locations and expand nationwide was not successful. Zhou Jinsong summarized, "The good aspect is that multiple blooms can quickly enhance brand influence; the bad aspect is that it disperses energy and the team lacks matching strength at that time

After reflection, Zhou Jinsong did two things: one was to return to his hometown Hunan in 2010 to establish Huawen Food, and the other was to expand the product field from flavored soy products to flavored fish products.

This strategy has been successful. In 2019, Zhou Jinsong's "Jinzai Xiaoyu" sold nearly 700 million yuan in one year, with sales reaching 1.2 billion bags.

Zhou Jinsong said that when it comes to flavored fish products, the inspiration comes from a traditional table food in Pingjiang, roasted fish. I have loved to eat roasted fish since I was young, and I thought upgrading and processing roasted fish would definitely be more popular“

Another supporting point for Zhou Jinsong's idea comes from his duck neck. The leisure snacks launched by breaking down and marinating common dishes on the dining table, such as duck necks and duck feet, were already very popular at that time, and a number of leading enterprises such as Juewei Food emerged. He thinks that small fish also have the opportunity to make products like duck necks.

The key to food lies in the ingredients. Finding suitable raw materials for small fish is crucial. After countless experiments, Zhou Jinsong discovered a wild small fish caught from the depths of the ocean that was particularly popular after being braised and introduced to the market.

It's hard to keep up with everyone's taste, and the food is expensive and delicious. In order to create products that are popular among consumers, Zhou Jinsong led a team to conduct extensive research and combined with the taste preferences of various regions in China, including east, west, north, south, and central regions. After hundreds of repeated research and development, five classic flavors including Nanlu, Beijiang, Dongxiang, Xima, and Zhongla were finally launched. Hard work pays off, five flavors of products are popular throughout the country.

With years of experience accumulation and deep channel cultivation, the unique taste of Jinzai Xiaoyu quickly covered the whole country and became the industry leader. 

Jinzai Xiaoyu became famous overnight and also attracted the attention of investment institutions. In 2016, Lenovo Holdings' subsidiary Jiawo Group made a strategic investment of 300 million yuan in Huawen Food, becoming the largest strategic investment in the domestic leisure food industry in recent years.

Listing has also been put on the agenda as a result.

New goal to reach billions

With an investment of 300 million yuan, Zhou Jinsong mainly focuses on intelligent manufacturing and market expansion. Nowadays, the company's channels have expanded to more than 1000, and its leading product, Jinzai Xiaoyu, has a leading market share in the fish leisure food segment. Jinzai bean products and Jinzai meat snacks have also achieved nearly 200 million in their respective tracks.

The 200 million yuan raised in this IPO is mainly used for the technical transformation project of the flavored small fish production line, brand promotion and marketing center construction project. Zhou Jinsong said that going public is actually a natural progression.

Dongxing Securities' May industry report statistics show that the per capita consumption of leisure food in China is about 60% of that in Japan and South Korea, and about 20% of that in Europe and America. The amount of packaged food consumption is only 10% to 12.5% of that in Europe and America.

According to a research report by Chuancai Securities in April 2020, since 2010, the growth rate of the non branded leisure brine product market has been 5% -10%, while the growth rate of the branded leisure brine product market is 29% -33%.

Zhou Jinsong said that he has already enjoyed cultivating leisure food for 30 years and will continue to expand and develop new varieties and categories in the future, providing consumers with more safe, delicious, and convenient leisure food and becoming a "inheritor of Chinese food culture".

It is interesting that the securities code of Huawen Food has been selected as "003000", becoming the first company on the Shenzhen SME board 003. Zhou Jinsong said that when choosing the stock code, the Shenzhen Stock Exchange's SME board launched the 003 series, which is a new starting point for the company. Therefore, he chose the initial 003000. And the last four digits of the code are 3000, which is in line with the pursuit of "having confidence in life for two hundred years and being able to hit water for three thousand miles".

Zhou Jinsong said that after entering the capital market, the new goal is to create billions within ten years, and he hopes to achieve annual revenue of over billions by 2030.

Obviously, Zhou Jinsong will continue to run. In fact, running is a major hobby of Zhou Jinsong and also his way of relieving stress. He took the lead in forming the Le Run interest group in the company. Last year, he led the team to participate in the Changsha Marathon and even paid 300000 yuan to give different rewards to each employee who completed the race.

Be a powerhouse and never relax. After ringing the listing bell on September 14th, Zhou Jinsong will embark on a new journey with his team.