He used to be a poor boy, but no matter how difficult his life was, he always maintained an enterprising heart that refused to be poor.

At the crossroads of life, he spent 30 years continuously breaking through and transforming from a rural child to a snack king with a revenue of nearly 1 billion yuan.

His name is Zhou Jinsong. On September 14th, he rang the bell for listing, and the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets welcomed the "first stock of fish flavored snacks" - Chinese food. This is the third leisure food listed company in Hunan, following Juewei Food and Yanjinpuzi.

At the age of 15, shouldering the burden of life

Suffering is the stepping stone of life. The more suffering you experience, the higher you stand

Zhou Jinsong is a person who never bows down to fate. In 1972, Zhou Jinsong was born in a poverty-stricken county in Pingjiang, Hunan. The impoverished family situation and environment gave him the idea of seeking change from a young age. At the age of 15, Zhou Jinsong dropped out of school and began a life of wandering the streets because he didn't want to add burden to his family.

Our Pingjiang is a poverty-stricken county, and everyone is very poor. My family is even poorer, and my father's health is not good, so eating is a big problem. In order to alleviate the economic pressure on our family, I decided to go out and do some small business“

The food industry is a traditional industry in Pingjiang with a long history. According to the "Pingjiang County Annals", "During the Kangxi reign of the Qing Dynasty, Changshou dried soy sauce was listed as a tribute to the court." Currently, there are many small workshops in Pingjiang that process dried soy sauce, waxberries, dried fruits, and candied fruits. How to utilize local resources to support one's family? After a simple market research, Zhou Jinsong decided to start with a "flipping" deal.

There is a somewhat famous candied fruit factory in our township, and I decided to help them sell these things. At that time, my companions went to the factory to work and earn two or three yuan a day, but I rode a bicycle, pulled a cart of goods to sell, and could earn more than 20 yuan a day. That year, I could earn three or four thousand yuan, and the income was quite high

Working under the cover of night, and then leaving under the cover of night. "This is the norm for Zhou Jinsong when he first entered the workforce. In just two years, he rode 5 bicycles and broke dozens of pairs of shoes, but he gritted his teeth and survived. When it comes to the motivation at that time, Zhou Jinsong smiled and said that besides allowing his family to live a "good life", his biggest wish was to buy a motorcycle worth a "huge sum" of 3000 yuan.

Gradually, with honest management and full enthusiasm, it gained recognition from customers, and more than 300 small shops established cooperation with Zhou Jinsong. And the sales network created by each punch also laid a certain foundation for his entrepreneurship.

At that time, I thought that since I already had these channels, I could produce and sell it myself, and also solve the employment problem for my family. Pingjiang dried soy sauce is a traditional snack in our local area. At that time, my uncle was also making dried soy sauce, so I decided to go there to learn the art.

After mastering the technique of making dried soy sauce for several months, Zhou Jinsong decided to put his idea of starting his own business into action. However, once Zhou Jinsong's entrepreneurial idea was proposed, it was strongly opposed by his family.

At that time, starting a workshop would cost thousands of yuan, and I was young. My family thought the risks were too high and didn't support me very much, but I had to do what I was determined to do. There was really nothing I could do, so they had to agree. After the product was produced, it sold quite smoothly. Zhou Jinsong recalled.
Although the product is accepted locally, the money earned can only barely sustain one's livelihood. The reason behind this is that the dried soy sauce market in Pingjiang and surrounding areas has become quite saturated.

In a saturated market, business will only become increasingly difficult. Zhou Jinsong soon realized that in order to continue developing in the soy sauce industry, he must change his mindset and find another way to "survive".

Leaving one's hometown and opening up new markets

In 1994, at the age of 22, Zhou Jinsong disregarded the opposition of his family, carried 3000 yuan, put on a simple bag, and went to open up a new market. He departed from Changsha, went to Yichang, Xiangyang, and headed north all the way to Luoyang, Henan. The final decision was made to root and produce dried sauce in Luoyang.

As long as the road is right, I am not afraid of the long journey. At that time, there were not many Pingjiang people in Luoyang, and I had great confidence in my skills
In early 1995, Zhou Jinsong rented a venue of around 100 square meters for a monthly rent of 60 yuan and began making soy sauce. It is worth noting that the rented venue was carefully selected by Zhou Jinsong. The landlord is a tofu maker and can provide him with the raw materials for making soy sauce, so he no longer has to spend time and money to start a tofu factory.

Due to the high quality and affordable price of the dried sauce made by Zhou Jinsong, which is in line with local tastes, it achieved daily production and sales from the beginning. In 1997, Zhou Jinsong's dried soy sauce production value began to exceed one million yuan, and he registered a trademark with his own name and avatar.

As the first person to leave Pingjiang and Hunan with dried soy sauce, many people followed Zhou Jinsong to Henan to engage in the leisure food industry, with a peak of 100000 people. Afterwards, Zhou Jinsong continuously expanded the leisure food industry and established factories in Shenyang, Chengdu, Yiwu and other places.

Because I was the first one to go there, and in just 10 years, I have driven 100000 people from Pingjiang to engage in the upstream and downstream industry of soy sauce in Henan. The addition of so many fellow villagers has had a significant impact on my soy products

Step onto the fish snack track

Poverty leads to change, change leads to communication, and general principles lead to success. Faced with the constant influx of Pingjiang villagers into the Henan market, Zhou Jinsong once again sensed the smell of crisis and decided to make some preparations in advance. In 2009, Zhou Jinsong started his second entrepreneurship. This time, he set his sights on the field of fish snacks.

At that time, in my hometown of Pingjiang, there were already more than 20 factories making fish fry, and the technology and other aspects of dried fish were relatively mature. The market outside Hunan and Hubei was almost blank, and there was great room for development.

With years of experience in seasoning dried soy sauce, Zhou Jinsong quickly produced a batch of fish fry using his own techniques and formulas. The first promotion received unanimous recognition from industry customers, and his business grew and expanded. In 2010, Zhou Jinsong established Hunan Huawen Food Co., Ltd. in Yueyang. The small fish named 'Jinzai' was also born.

I spent five or six years adjusting the taste, opening up channels, and building a brand. It wasn't until 2016 that my product became very mature. At that time, it was basically in short supply

After years of development, Huawen Food has built a complete production and sales network that spans from raw materials to production, processing, sales, branding, and channels, achieving the "fish leaping over the dragon gate" of Jinzai Xiaoyu. In 2019, Jinzai Xiaoyu, a subsidiary of Huawen Food, sold 1.2 billion packs and has been the top selling fish snack for several consecutive years.

The market size of leisure fish products has reached 20 billion yuan, but we are still less than 1 billion yuan, with a market share of 5% to 6%. As a true leader, the market share should reach at least 20% to 30%. Therefore, there is still a lot of room for our future development. "Deeply cultivating the blue ocean market of leisure food, Zhou Jinsong is full of confidence in the future of the industry.

At the same time, relying on mature sauce braising technology, Huawen Food has made efforts in flavored soy products and flavored meat snacks, achieving an annual revenue of nearly 200 million yuan and ranking among the top in their respective fields.

It is worth noting that currently, the offline distribution model is the main sales model adopted by Huawen Food. In 2019, the sales revenue achieved under the company's offline distribution model accounted for 95.76% of the total main business revenue. Zhou Jinsong stated that in the future, the company will follow the trend and accelerate its efforts in e-commerce.

Our audience is mostly young people who enjoy shopping online. Currently, there is still a big gap in our online business. In the next three to five years, our goal is to achieve a 50% market share in our online business

Seeking talents with thirst, attracting talents and gathering wisdom

The wisdom and strength of an individual can never be compared to a team. "In Zhou Jinsong's view, only by benefiting others can one benefit oneself, and sharing value and benefits is his unique way of management.

It has been 20 years since I started my business and became a small fish. During this period, there were several good opportunities that did not develop. The reason was that I was almost fighting alone and the team strength was insufficient. So later, I decided to introduce some sales and production partners to develop together, give them shares, stimulate their talents, and the effect was very good

In addition to introducing partners into the team, Zhou Jinsong has also introduced strategic investors multiple times to complement resources. Among them, in 2016, Lenovo Holdings' subsidiary Jiawo Group invested 300 million yuan strategically to invest in Huawen Food, becoming the largest strategic investment in the domestic leisure food industry in recent years.

On September 14th, Huawen Food entered the capital market and became the first stock of fish leisure snacks. When it comes to future plans, Zhou Jinsong stated that the company's vision is to build a leisure food enterprise with global influence.

Entering the capital market is just the first step. In the future, we will seize the opportunities of the capital market and industry development to create a globally influential enterprise in the field of leisure food