The "Great White Rabbit Milk Candy", which carries the good memories of generations, is really on fire at the moment, and on the evening of September 21, 2020, Taikang Food (Preferred Store) Dabaitu counter located on the east extension section of Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street welcomed a guest - Premier Li Keqiang. While inquiring about the sales situation of the clerk with concern, he also personally purchased three packs of "Great White Rabbit Milk Candy" with different flavors.
Speaking of "Great White Rabbit", it is inevitable to associate it with "Guanshengyuan", a national brand that has been active in the field of Chinese food since its inception in 1915 and still enjoys a high reputation and reputation in China. In 1915, guanshengyuan, which was still a small food store at the time, was officially opened in the "nine acres of land" in Nanshi (about the area of Dajing Road, now Luxiangyuan Road), and the owner, Xian Guansheng (formerly known as Xian Bingcheng), a Guangdong native, gradually broke out of his own world with his beloved "big" image and unique flavor of dried fruit preserves in this area, and the business became more and more prosperous.
Why did Sin Guansheng name the store "Guansheng Garden"? There are two ways to say this:
Explanation 1: After xian Guansheng saw a news in the newspaper that "Hong Kong GuanshengYuan Food Store closed down" before the opening of the new store, he felt that the name "Guanshengyuan" had a good feeling with his own name, so he adopted this name.
Explanation 2: It is said that on the eve of the opening of the new store, Xian Bingcheng had not yet changed his name to Xian Guansheng, and one day, Xian Bingcheng was discussing the name of the new store with the shareholders of the new store (Xia Yueshan, Xia Yuerun, Xue Yaoqing, Xue Shouling, Zheng Zhengqiu, etc.) of the nearby "New Stage"), Zheng Zhengqiu said that "the word Guansheng is good, the crown is the first, the survival of the people, and the guansheng has the meaning of people's livelihood first." But the (Guansheng) store is a little small. According to what I see, half of the shareholders are now children of Pear Garden, and the conversion of the store into a garden not only reflects the close relationship with Pear Garden, but also has more style than the store." As a result, the new store was named "Guansheng Garden", and Sin Bingcheng was renamed Sin Guansheng from then on.
"Guanshengyuan" developed rapidly after opening, until 1923 it was reorganized into a joint-stock company and had built a factory in Jumen Road, in 1928 it raised funds to set up a headquarters in the eight-bay façade under the top of Nanjing Road, and then built a "Guanshengyuan Farm" in Caohejing, and now in the Caohejing area we can still see a road called "Guanshengyuan", which is the best witness that "Guanshengyuan" once set up here.
Why has Guanshengyuan been able to grow from a small snack store to a large food company in just over a decade? In addition to its own continuous enrichment in product types, this is also inseparable from the "three books and three uppers" business philosophy advocated by Xian Guansheng.
On October 16, 2008, the new Great White Rabbit Milk Candy was launched in Shanghai. Zhu Gang photographed
"Three books" refers to "heart, skill, cost"; "three up" refers to "reputation, quality, customer first".
"Ben Xin" requires employees to have the professionalism and sense of responsibility of running Guanshengyuan well; "skill" requires employees to continuously improve their technical level and management capabilities, and to strive to improve product quality and create new products; "Capital" requires employees to jointly open up and reduce expenditure, accumulate funds, and benefit the development of enterprises.
Xian Guansheng is relying on these "secrets" to make "Guanshengyuan" stand out in the customer group at that time and establish a reputation, whenever the company finds that employees are wrong, he will always directly criticize and point out: "Brother, we do business people, without this kind of heart, this store will be closed sooner or later"; and when encountering customers expressing dissatisfaction with their products, he will mostly personally come to the door to listen to customer opinions and strive to improve.
In the "Guansheng Garden" of that year, there was a story that "Xian Guansheng wanted to stuff the director of the bread factory into the hearth":
It is said that one day the customer reflected that the bread produced by "GuanshengYuan" was not hot enough, Xian Guansheng learned of this matter and ordered that this problem need to be solved tomorrow, but did not want the customer to still be dissatisfied with the bread fire problem the next day and reflected it to the main store, which annoyed Xian Guansheng, it is said that he slapped the table after smelling and yelled: "The bread is not baking well, the factory director moved to the factory to live!" If you don't dry well, move to the stove to sleep! In the end, it was not dry, so I had to climb into the hearth by myself. The director of the bakery factory saw that Xian Guansheng was so serious and naturally did not dare to slacken off, and finally improved the quality of bread in the "Guansheng Garden". The author believes that there must have been many such deeds about Xian Guansheng in those years, and it was precisely under his meticulous attitude and spirit of excellence that "GuanshengYuan" finally ascended to the "throne of a well-known national brand".
While improving the quality of products and services, "advertising" is naturally an important position that Xian Guansheng will not ignore, in Xian Guansheng's continuous exploration and practice, a variety of creative and strangely conceived "advertising" from his mind continues to emerge and bring vitality to the external publicity of "Guansheng Garden", and among them, the "Mid-Autumn Mooncake Advertising Campaign" in the 30s is the most well-known. In the Mid-Autumn Festival of 1934, "Guansheng Garden" held a mooncake exhibition in the Great World Playground and specially invited the popular star Hu Die to help on the spot, Xian Guansheng asked Hu Butterfly to recline next to an extra-large mooncake to take a photo and write "Only China has this star, only GuanshengYuan has this mooncake" and then made a promotional picture that was widely distributed, and "Guansheng Garden" became famous. Later, Xian Guansheng continued to advertise his products in the form of tourism and prize redemption while still adopting the star effect, and achieved good results.
In addition, as an outstanding national industrialist, "patriotic feelings" are also vividly reflected in Xian Guansheng's body. After the September 18 Incident in 1931, He Xiangning and others initiated the establishment of the "Northeast Refugee Relief Association" in Shanghai and issued a "Gift Appeal Letter" to the "Guansheng Garden", Xian Guansheng responded positively after receiving the "Appeal Letter", and held the "Tea Dance Conference for The Relief of Northeast Refugees" at the Yiyuan Dance Hall on Yalpei Road (now South Shaanxi Road) in Shanghai at that time and donated all the income from the income, and also donated 10,000 kilograms of mechanism biscuits and 2,000 kilograms of Chen Pimei to comfort the Northeast Anti-Japanese Volunteer Army. To this end, the patriotic general Feng Yuxiang also specially wrote a special book "Modern String Height" to the "Guansheng Garden" to praise their patriotic deeds. Later, after the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Xian Guansheng turned to the interior and contributed his own strength to the War of Resistance, during which Xian Guansheng often encouraged his employees: "As long as you are in the spirit of running guanshengyuan well, you will also have a future for development in the interior, and there will be no way out in the future" From 1938 to the victory of the War of Resistance, the business of "Guanshengyuan" in Chongqing, Kunming, Guiyang, Chengdu and other places in the southwest rear area has developed well, and its business can be described as "blossoming everywhere" in the rear area.
In the Guanshengyuan Great White Rabbit Milk Candy Production Plant, the staff is seizing the time to produce delicious White Rabbit Milk Candy. Photo by Yin Liqin (data map)
After the death of Xian Guansheng in 1952, the legendary story of "Guansheng Garden" is still continuing, and the most popular of them is undoubtedly the "Great White Rabbit Milk Candy" produced by "Guansheng Garden" that year, which was once used as a "tenth anniversary gift" of the National Day in 1959, and was widely popular as soon as it was launched, and the image of the "Great White Rabbit" designed by Wang Chunyan was lively and cute, and it was "countless fans" among the children at that time. The saying that "seven grains of white rabbit milk candy is equal to a glass of milk" once spread throughout the streets and alleys.
After the reform and opening up, "Great White Rabbit Milk Candy" through its own continuous innovation and change not only firmly grasp the domestic market, but also went out of the country to distribute dozens of countries and regions around the world, the variety has also expanded from the original taste to today's yogurt taste, red bean flavor, cool taste, chocolate taste, etc., like the "great white rabbit" more and more customers, an era that allows national brands to show their skills on the world stage has arrived.
Column Editor-in-Chief: Shen Yilun Text Editor: Shen Yilun Title Image Source: Zhang Haifeng Photo Data Chart Photo Editor: Xiang Jianying
Source: Author: Qiu Lili