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Since Tao Huabi created the Lao GanMa brand in 1997, she has used most of her life's hard work and hard work to make the Lao GanMa brand bigger and stronger step by step, and even achieved annual sales of more than 4.5 billion yuan in 2016.
Even foreigners are amazed and praised for this mysterious sauce from China.
However, since 2014, when "old dry mother" Tao Huabi took a back seat in the enterprise and handed over the heavy responsibility to her son, this well-known enterprise has fallen into a storm of continuous bad reviews.
How did Tao Huabi's son destroy his mother's decades of hard work step by step? Is the reason related to the "secret of success" of the old mother?
When the seventy-five-year-old chooses to go back to the mountain, can he save the "old mother" who is in turmoil?
When it comes to luxury goods, most people will think of some famous brand bags, jewelry and other expensive items, and some people will also say some expensive jewelry.
But who would have thought that in many overseas markets, the most common old dry mother hot sauce in China, they would be regarded as the world's top hot sauce.
Even on some foreign luxury websites, you can find information related to Lao Gan Ma Hot Sauce.
In some offline physical stores in China, a jar of lao gan mama hot sauce is priced at about ten yuan, and the price may be lower if purchased online.
However, in the German market, the price of a bottle of hot sauce reached about 70 yuan, which was more than seven times higher.
Such selling prices are not unique, and there are similar examples in other countries.
The price on Amazon in the United States is also ridiculously expensive, reaching $11.99, which is almost seven times higher.
Some people may question, will someone buy such a high price?
In fact, there is no need to worry about the sales situation of Lao Ganma, there are fans everywhere in the world who are "crazy" to buy Lao Ganma's hot sauce.
On foreign social networking sites, there is also an old dry mother exchange web page established by enthusiasts, and the netizens here usually talk about only one question.
"Where can I buy the old mother?" The supermarket here is out of stock. ”
New York, San Francisco, Paris, London, Seoul and other places, as long as there are places where Chinese people appear, there must be supermarkets where there are old mothers.
Tao Huabi marketed Lao Gan Ma to more than forty cities, when foreigners were fascinated by hot sauce.
She said lightly to the reporter interviewing: "I am Chinese, and I want to sell my old mother abroad to earn money from foreigners." ”
Speaking of this, this white-haired, emaciated old man showed a hearty smile.
If we can learn more about her story, then her strength and persistence should be what we expected.
In 1989, Tao Huabi bought a very simple small hotel on the street side of Longdongbao in Nanming District, Guiyang City.
She had saved a sum of money before, and some people said that saving money had a sense of security and a future, but she didn't think so.
She believes that only by doing business on her own can we have better development.
Since then, the materials for building the hotel have been bricks she picked up, covered with some waterproof materials like felt cloth.
Because she has been cooking since she was a child, she also sells cold powder and cold noodles that she makes herself.
The small shop is next to a school, and the customers of Tao Huabi's small shop are not only nearby residents, but also the students of the school.
Usually, she can always see some students who are dressed in tatters and have no money to eat, and she can always think of her two children at this time.
Unwilling to bear it, she often invited some children to dinner and helped them sew clothes.
In return for the peach, these children will also work in Tao Huabi's small shop, and these students will call Tao Huabi "Old Ganma".
In 1994, after the construction of Guiyang, Longdongbao Road became the main road.
Tao Huabi's business has become very prosperous, and the daily customers are endless.
She also didn't understand what was going on, knowing that her own cold powder materials were almost the same as other people's homes, why the business could be so much better.
Until one day, an accident made her understand the reason behind it.
One day, Tao Huabi's body was not very comfortable, so the small shop opened a little late.
When she arrived, the customers waited for a long time, but after they had finished buying the cold powder, they strangely asked why the hot sauce inside was not the right color?
Tao Huabi usually boils his own chili sauce, and this day he wakes up late and buys it directly.
After she told the customers about this matter, the customers who were still queuing at the entrance of the small shop directly scattered.
At this moment, she understood that the secret of her own small shop was the chili sauce she made.
After Tao Huabi learned of this secret, he decided to maintain and expand his advantages.
Tao Huabi bought all kinds of chili peppers available on the market to make sauces, and after countless tests, finally decided on the final recipe.
The newly launched recipe attracted more customers, and Tao Huabi began to consider whether to change her career to sell chili sauce.
At first, however, she did not dare to take any risks, and at first she slowly expanded the amount of chili sauce she made, and at the same time sold some chili sauce when selling cold powder.
But no matter how much chili sauce she makes, it can be sold out in a day.
Later, Tao Huabi was even more surprised to find that several shops selling cold powder in the city began to come to their homes to buy goods.
Seeing that the situation was very good, she finally made up her mind: set up a factory!
In July 1996, 49-year-old Tao Huabi simply rented two houses and recruited people to start a factory.
First of all, she had to consider how to package her own chili sauce, which used to be packed in plastic bags and had no problems.
But now that we have set up factories, such simple packaging is definitely not OK.
Some of her friends suggested that she pack it in a specially made bag, which is how many sauces on the market are packaged.
However, this proposal was opposed by her.
She believes that packaging it in plastic will affect the quality of the chili sauce and the time it takes to preserve.
She deliberately found a local glass factory and signed a preliminary cooperation with them, which determined the packaging mode of chili sauce.
Although there is a good reputation among some local cold powder shops and residents, the number of factories and small workshops can not be compared, tao huabi must open more markets.
In order to let others know the taste of his own chili sauce, Tao Huabi carried the finished product that had been prepared in the bag.
As the director of the factory, she ran all the major restaurants and canteens in the city by herself.
At first, no one believed that this middle-aged woman in her fifties could make any delicious sauce.
In order to be able to open the market, Tao Huabi adopted an almost white delivery method in the early stage.
Every time she went to a canteen, she would give them her own chili sauce for free, leaving behind her phone number and the name of the factory.
Who can refuse the benefits sent to the door?
Tao Huabi is also confident that the taste of chili sauce is unstoppable, and she will wait at home after giving the chili sauce to these restaurants and canteens.
It didn't take long for a phone call to Reach Tao Huabi's office.
The restaurant owners who delivered it were full of praise for the chili sauce, and the factory welcomed wave after wave of orders.
Since then, Tao Huabi's factory has completely opened up the local market, and there is no longer any worry about no sales.
In June 1997, Tao Huabi established Guiyang Laoganma Flavor Food Co., Ltd., and the enterprise entered a period of rapid development.
This year, the enterprise output value of Lao Ganma reached 14 million yuan, and even the outside world began to appear in the figure of Lao Ganma's chili sauce.
But just when everyone is immersed in a better future, the company's employees in the field have passed on a bad news, and a large number of counterfeit products have appeared in Guizhou, Hunan, Sichuan, Shaanxi and other places.
They mimic the appearance of the old dry mother's chili sauce, which contains inferior products.
On the one hand, it robbed Lao Ganma's original market, on the other hand, it denigrated Lao Ganma's reputation in the hearts of the masses.
One of the most influential is Huayue Food Co., Ltd., which makes Liu Xiangqiu Lao Gan Ma Chili Sauce.
The company's bottles and labels for making chili sauce are almost exactly the same as those of Lao Ganma, except that Tao Huabi's head picture on it has been replaced by a photo of "Liu Xiangqiu", which can be described as an untouched copy.
Tao Huabi has long wanted to register his trademark, but he has been blocked by various reasons every time.
On the contrary, Huayue Company took down the trademark early.
The lawsuit has not had a definitive answer since 1998, and Tao Huabi does not know how many times she has run to the court and relevant departments.
Liu Xiangqiu old dry mother
It was not until March 20, 2001, that the protracted tug-of-war finally came to an end, and the Beijing Municipal High People's Court ruled that Huayue Company had indeed committed infringement.
The court ordered them to immediately stop using Lao Ganma's trade name, compensate Guiyang Laoganma Company for economic losses of 400,000 yuan, and publicly apologize in the media.
Since then, the old mother company has completely embarked on the right track, and the output value of the enterprise will double almost every year.
In 1997, the company's output value was 14 million yuan, and in 2000, it reached the amount of 150 million yuan.
Everything behind this is inseparable from Tao Huabi's dedication to making chili sauce.
Tao Huabi old dry mother
At the beginning, when he was still in the small factory, Tao Huabi took the initiative to take the workers to do the most difficult process: chopping peppers.
Because she chooses fresh, high-quality peppers, and the quantity is huge, few people can stand chopping peppers.
Tao Huabi led by example and led her employees to work together, which made the employees convinced her.
Although after the company's scale was large, Tao Huabi did not have time to appear in the factory, but her control of product quality still did not dare to relax.
In 2001, Lao Gan Ma had a quality crisis.
At that time, a batch of sauces produced by Lao Gan's mother appeared to leak oil after being sent to various places.
Although not all bottles had problems, Tao Huabi still resolutely collected all the chili sauce in this batch.
Before some hostile enterprises began to publicize the "scandal" of Lao Ganma in the media, Tao Huabi had already solved all the problems perfectly.
In Tao Huabi's view: only word of mouth is the foundation of the enterprise, if the credit is lost among the masses, then the enterprise is not far from bankruptcy.
From an output value of 14 million yuan in 1997 to an output value of 3.72 billion yuan in 2013, Tao Huabi's success is no accident.
Although she is not highly educated, she understands what customers really think, which is why she can make the company bigger and stronger.
But in 2014, after Tao Huabi handed over his efforts to his son, the reputation of Lao Ganma's chili sauce business for more than ten years appeared in crisis.
"The smell of the old mother has changed!"
"The old dry mother is not as fragrant as before, and the taste has become worse!"
More and more comments have appeared on the Internet, and many fans of Lao Gan Ma ChiLi Sauce have expressed their dissatisfaction with the current taste.
Everyone began to wonder, what exactly happened to make the old chili sauce worse and worse?
Lao Gan's mother went downhill, and in the final analysis, it was because of Tao Huabi's two sons.
The eldest son, Li Guishan, was a senior manager of the company in his early years, but he did not focus on ensuring the development of the company.
Around 2005, he began to have a great interest in real estate development, and he was not only a director of the Lao Gan Ma Group, but also a shareholder of several companies.
His industry spans a variety of industries such as economy and trade, real estate, investment, and hotels, and his mind has long been out of the Lao Gan Ma Group.
However, even the real estate company that Li Guishan invested the most in, he did not try his best to do well.
Kunming Guishan Tianyang Real Estate Development Co., Ltd. is Li Guishan's real estate business company, but now this company has become an empty shell-like existence.
In 2012, Li Guishan spent 421 million yuan to buy a piece of land in Yunnan to develop real estate.
This project, called "Yunrun Tianyang", was the first shot that Li Guishan used to enter the market, and it should be made to model the same real estate.
However, until 2021, "Yunrun Tianyang" has still not been fully completed, and many places have become rotten buildings.
This seriously affected the reputation of Guishan Tianyang Real Estate Development Co., Ltd., but because Li Guishan was separated from the influence of Lao Gan Ma Enterprise when he established the company, this time he did not implicate Lao Gan Ma Enterprise.
However, the eyes of the masses are also shining, and the reputation and image of the old mother have also been negatively affected.
The company's manager Li Guishan is so half-hearted, it is no wonder that the management of the old mother company has frequent problems.
In 2016, there was an accident in which trade secrets were leaked in LaoGanma's enterprise.
At first, there were products in the market that tasted exactly the same as the Lao GanMa brand, and after the police investigation, it was found that it was a technical person who left the Lao Gan Ma enterprise Jia Mou.
In the past, as an engineer and quality inspector of the enterprise, Jia Mou leaked all the core secrets of the enterprise to another company after leaving his job, causing an extremely bad impact.
In the summer of 2019, there were two fire accidents in the factory area of Lao Ganma in two weeks, fortunately there were no casualties, but also caused nearly 100 million yuan of economic losses.
Similar things happen frequently, but this is a wake-up call for corporate management that no one cares.
If Li Guishan is not responsible for the company, then the behavior of the second son, Li Miaoxing, can be called digging his own grave.
Li Guishan and Li Miaoxing have a main outside, a main inside, and the younger brother Li Miaoxing is responsible for the production and quality inspection of sauces in the enterprise.
After Tao Huabi retired, in order to seek more profits, he changed his mother's formula without authorization.
In the past, Tao Huabi's recipe required the purchase of Guizhou peppers, but because of the price, Li Miaoxing made a good claim to change it to cheap Henan peppers.
Comparatively speaking, Henan peppers are 4-5 yuan cheaper than Guizhou peppers per kilogram, and according to the production capacity of the old dry mother enterprise, the cost of hundreds of millions of yuan can be reduced in a year.
However, this kind of pepper is made according to the past recipe, and there will be a phenomenon of poor taste and strange taste, but Li Miaoxing is deaf to this.
In the past, Lao Gan Ma Enterprise has always adopted the process of hand brewing, which was also asked by Li Miaoxing to change to the machine assembly line production method.
The change of raw materials coupled with the change of production methods, where is this still the old dry mother chili sauce of the year?
And according to some loyal fans who eat chili sauce all year round, they always feel that there are some added ingredients in the chili sauce.
The most taboo thing for people who do food business is to change the chef and change the recipe at will, and Li Miaoxing's behavior completely smashes the reputation accumulated by the old mother for many years.
In 2016, the annual operating income of Lao Gan Ma reached 4.5 billion yuan, but after two years, the operating income did not increase but decreased, falling to 4.3 billion yuan.
Tao Huabi had thought that she could raise herself for a long time, but she never thought that her children would personally destroy her life's work.
Tao Huabi, an old man in his seventies, can only regroup and officially announce to the outside world in 2018 that he will resume taking charge of the company's management.
She first restored the recipe back, and held a media conference to announce that the recipe of the chili sauce had not changed, or the original taste.
Although Tao Huabi has made the company improve by relying on the credit success laid by more than 20 years, it officially exceeded 5 billion yuan in 2019, and its sales reached a new high.
But at the rate of the past, this goal should have been accomplished years ago.
Because of the mistakes in decision-making, the old mother enterprise has lost the unshakable position of the previous industry boss, and the enterprises that have appeared like new shoots after the rain are frantically impacting the market.
But is it so easy to get back the lost word of mouth?
Lao Gan Ma has been able to "traverse the rivers and lakes" for so many years, relying on strong loyal customers and accumulated word of mouth over the years.
The taste of her original recipe must be desirable, but it is by no means impeccable.
The opponents in the market are all staring at this cake, originally the status of the old dry mother is unshakable, but after the problem of the old dry mother, many similar products have appeared on the market.
The lost credibility may still be able to be regained, but the divided market is not so easy to return to the past.
The bigger question is that Tao Huabi is nearly eighty years old, and how many years can she run the company?
If one day the old man does not have the energy to continue working, then the power of the company will still fall into the hands of the two sons.
If these two people do not change their minds, what Tao Huabi is doing now is nothing more than a mirror flower and a moon, and the symptoms are not cured.
In recent years, people's tastes have gradually enriched, and with them, there are more picky requirements.
On this occasion, more and more "foreign brands" have also begun to receive pursuit. It seems that the products imported from abroad, or with foreign brands, can sell better and be easier to sell.
As a customer, we also do not want the old national enterprises such as Lao Gan Ma to slowly "die", and hope that Lao Gan Ma can have better development and go farther and farther.
What do you readers think about the rise and fall of lao ganma's journey? Do you also like to eat lao gan ma chili sauce? Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments section.