Chapter 20 SynTao 19 Success requires perseverance

The essence of business: the spirit of never giving up is an important quality in the commercial society.As an entrepreneur, identifying a goal and going all out to work hard is the key to success. Speaking of the lighter industry in Wenzhou, Zhou Dahu and his Dahu Lighter Factory are well-known, but as far as the industry and some consumers who have made friends with "Weili" lighter products, Xu Yongshui and his Weili Lighter Factory are also well-known. Far and near, has a very high international reputation.Xu Yongshui also embodies the entrepreneurial spirit of courage, keenness, pragmatism, tenacity and perseverance.

When Xu Yongshui retired from the army in 1988, he faced the booming period of Wenzhou lighter industry. Any manufacturer with a stand can produce lighters. Although the quality varies, they can make money when they open their doors.Because of the right time, this young veteran took off his military uniform and invested in starting a business. All his capital was a 30,000 yuan loan that he managed to get, but his ambition was much higher than this. Speaking of which, Xu Yongshui's first two buckets of gold were due to his enthusiasm and hospitality.At that time, although there were many manufacturers in the lighter industry in Wenzhou, there was only one purchase channel for the high-voltage ceramic electronics necessary for making lighters.High-voltage ceramic electronics is an indispensable ignition device on lighters, and it can also be said to be the core component of lighters. Without this device, all lighter manufacturers in Wenzhou will cease to exist. In the 1980s, this kind of high-voltage ceramic electronics still had to be imported from Japan, and only Japan's TDK company could produce it in the international market.In this way, whoever holds the agency right of TDK in Japan will have the ability to control the "neck supply" of Wenzhou lighter industry, and of course also have the ability to monopolize and make money.

But few people knew at that time that the general agent responsible for the sales of Japan's TDK high-voltage ceramic electronic products in the Chinese mainland market was She's Dehui Company in Hong Kong. In September 1988, She Defa, the younger brother of She Dehui, a key figure in the She family, went to the Wenzhou market to inspect the sales and usage of high-voltage ceramic electronic products.She Defa came at an unfortunate time. Wenzhou lighter manufacturers had not formed their own chamber of commerce at that time, and the group had no leader, so the reception for him was not warm.Wen Shang not only lacks understanding of the importance of Dehui Company, but also is quite indifferent to this Hong Kong businessman who neither orders nor cooperates with investment intentions. Unaware of the possible danger.At that time, Xu Yongshui, like other lighter manufacturers in Wenzhou, did not know the origin of She Defa.He is a lighter businessman who started out as a salesman, and with his natural hospitality, he knows how to treat people, and he is very enthusiastic about She Defa who came here on a special trip.Because of this, She Defa regards Xu Yongshui as a good friend, and entrusts him with everything in Wenzhou.But She Defa was not obviously grateful for Xu Yongshui's enthusiasm. When he left, he just left a business card for Xu Yongshui and said "call me if you have anything to do".

Three months have passed. In December 1989, in order to control the market and increase the price of high-voltage ceramic electronic products, Dehui Company suddenly stopped supplying the mainland.This is exactly "one man is in charge of the gate, ten thousand is not open", the supply of goods was cut off, and the Wenzhou market, which relied on TDK's products, was hit immediately.Although some manufacturers are still continuing production relying on inventory, others are producing other accessories first to wait for assembly, but the time is not long.In this way, the entire Wenzhou lighter industry suddenly fell into a panic of waiting for the rice to be cooked, and it was completely paralyzed after the Spring Festival.

At this time, Xu Yongshui's life was also difficult. Only then did he think of She Defa in Hong Kong, so he was forced to pick up the phone helplessly.The call was easily connected. She Defa reacted calmly on the phone and only said "Come here", which meant to ask Xu Yongshui to go to Guangdong, which is close to Hong Kong. Xu Yongshui rushed to Shunde, Guangdong, and paid a deposit of 100,000 yuan to a relative of She's family to "open the back door" to purchase high-voltage ceramic electronic accessories.She Defa's relatives asked Xu Yongshui to live in Shunde and wait patiently.Xu Yongshui waited anxiously in Shunde for 9 days, and the days felt like years.She Defa finally called and told Xu Yongshui: The unit price of high-voltage ceramic electronics is 2.8 yuan, a batch of 500,000 pieces is supplied, and the total payment is 1.4 million yuan.Xu Yongshui thinks that She Defa is a real businessman, just like "sunrise in the east and rain in the west", seemingly ruthless and affectionate. 500,000 pieces of high-voltage ceramic electronics is not a small amount, which is interesting enough, but he only has 600,000 yuan in his hand. After hearing this, She Defa said that he could not help, and joked with him: "Then you want half of it, and others are eager to get it." Xu Yongshui immediately He said that he would find a way to buy out all of them, and allow him a few days to find someone to make money.

Xu Yongshui also wants to be a "real businessman". He neither wants She Defa to underestimate his courage, nor does he want She Defa to have the impression that he has no strength.Besides, in the business field, if you want to do it, you must do your own business. If you are a monopoly merchant and let others buy half of the high-voltage ceramic electronics, you will not only lose the price advantage, but more importantly, you will lose the initiative in the market. .But he only has 600,000 in his hand, plus the 100,000 deposit he has paid, he has just made up half of it.Shunde is not Wenzhou, and I have no close friends in Guangdong. Where can I borrow the other 700,000 yuan?

I thought of being in Guangdong, and then I thought of Wenzhou people doing business in various parts of Guangdong.So Xu Yongshui had no choice but to use wisdom, and thought of a good way to raise money quickly in his hometown in Wenzhou-asking for help from the local Wenzhou village. Only Wenzhou people are particularly bold in borrowing money.Therefore, relying on the fact that he had done business in Guangzhou, and that the Wenzhou fellows knew him and knew that he had a factory in Wenzhou, he went to a Wenzhou commercial street in Guangzhou to openly borrow money. The repayment period is 10 days. If you lend out 50,000 yuan, you can earn 10,000 yuan in 10 days. Where can you find such high interest and short cycle?As a result, it is conceivable that many Wenzhou fellow villagers rushed to give the money to Xu Yongshui, and the financing of 700,000 yuan was immediately resolved.

Xu Yongshui rushed to Shunde overnight, paid the payment, and then rushed to Wenzhou overnight, without even having time to take a nap.The high-voltage ceramic electronics were shipped to Wenzhou at 3 a.m., Xu Yongshui explained the matters that should be paid attention to and then went to sleep.And when it was bright and he got up from the bed, the 500,000 high-voltage ceramic electronics had all been sold out at a unit price of 4.2 yuan, and a large amount of RMB was stuffed into the safe.In Xu Yongshui's words, this business made a "very artistic" profit of 700,000 yuan. Good popularity leads to good financial resources. After that, Xu Yongshui developed from a lighter seller to a world-famous lighter manufacturer—Hirota Co., Ltd. for OEM production, until he created his own brand of power lighters. The completion of such a remarkable development is not only due to his good popularity, but also comes from his foresight and foresight that he is willing to spend a lot of money in order to expand his career.

In the autumn of 1989, when Wenzhou was rainy, a Taiwanese businessman went to Wenzhou many times, and went in and out of lighter manufacturers. He also listened here and looked there like She Defa did back then. The cooperation has gradually annoyed the Wenzhou manufacturers who had been somewhat enthusiastic about him.However, Xu Yongshui received this Taiwanese businessman surnamed Wang as always. He not only received Mr. Wang warmly when he visited his factory, but also accompanied him everywhere without being humble or overbearing. In the next two years, the Taiwanese businessman flew to the mainland 16 times and came to Wenzhou, where he stayed for many days, still listening and watching everywhere.During the contact with Xu Yongshui, he never talked about business matters.As in the past, Xu Yongshui didn't expect to seek some kind of "benefits" in his contacts with this Taiwanese businessman, and he didn't want to repay him. He believed that as a Wenzhou native, he should do his best as a landlord when friends come from afar.At the same time, he also believes that the quality of lighter products in Taiwan is close to that of Japan, and better than that of Wenzhou. It is enough to communicate with Mr. Wang to obtain some technical and sales information.Because of this idea, when his lover complained that he spent more time with guests and less with his family, which distracted him from the business, Xu Yongshui still interacted with him sincerely.

Fast forward to 1992.This Mr. Wang went to Wenzhou again, but he was not in a hurry to investigate. Instead, he patted Xu Yongshui on the shoulder. Mr. Wang said: "I keep coming to Wenzhou to listen and look everywhere. Instead, I was entrusted by someone to find a factory that can do OEM business (OEM or OEM) for a Japanese lighter manufacturer to produce Japanese lighters in Wenzhou." When Xu Yongshui heard it, the Japanese lighter manufacturer mentioned by the Taiwanese businessman who wanted to produce OEM products in Wenzhou was Hirota Co., Ltd., a well-known dominant company in the world lighter market.What Mr. Wang said made Xu Yongshui hardly believe it could be true. He felt that this was really a pie that fell from the sky, and such a good thing happened to "fall" on his head.

Shortly thereafter, the representative of Hirota Co., Ltd., led by Mr. Wang, went to Wenzhou to inspect Xu Yongshui's small power factory, and decided to support him in advance.After the formation of the cooperation intention between the two parties, Hirota Co., Ltd. continued to provide materials and drawings, and Weili Factory also sent trial-production samples for commissioning and production to Japan on a monthly basis.After accepting the technical guidance from "Grandland", Xu Yongshui really felt the quality gap between Wenzhou lighter products and world famous brands.Although the quality of Weili Factory has been greatly improved under the technical guidance of the Japanese side, and in Xu Yongshui's opinion, the quality has been improved "very well", but it still cannot meet the Japanese side's requirements.This made Xu Yongshui truly realize that it is not easy to produce lighters of international standards and realize OEM production for Hirota Co., Ltd. In the face of repeated debugging and repeated failures, Xu Yongshui never backed down and advanced despite difficulties, and finally moved the Japanese president Mr. Hirota Ryohei.In this way, he set foot on the land of Wenzhou for the first time, who was deeply admired by Wenzhou businessmen, and went to Wenzhou Weili Factory to have a heart-to-heart talk with Xu Yongshui to understand his way of life and business philosophy, and finally signed an agreement for OEM production.Just after signing the contract, Hirota Co., Ltd. shipped two containers of advanced molds and advanced equipment to Wenzhou Port, and Weili Factory received strong technical support from internationally renowned companies without spending a penny. Xu Yongshui believes that, as a trump card manufacturer of lighters, "Grandland" has many aspects worth learning. The gap between "Weili" and "Grandland" in terms of technology and management is astonishingly large, which Wenzhou enterprises cannot but admit reality.No matter how the Wenzhou lighter production industry will go in the future, it is the only way to learn from advanced enterprises and produce high-quality brand-name lighter products.Aiming at an advanced enterprise and walking with giants is always better than groping in secret.Since there is no harm in cooperating with "Grandland", why not put down the airs and take the road of win-win?Wenzhou people have only run enterprises and produced lighters for more than ten years. Thinking of this, Xu Yongshui willingly accepted the other party's guidance and training. If you straighten out your thoughts, you will be able to keep up with your actions, and you will not be able to bend over Mount Taishan.In the early stage of the cooperation, Xu Yongshui and his Weili factory have endured unprecedented tests - not only did equipment debugging and technical adaptation last for eight months, during which the Weili factory did not produce a single qualified lighter, but also faced Zhou Dahu. And the embarrassment of workers changing jobs when they upgrade their skills in other factories.Before the power factory started producing new products, there were only five workers left in the factory, and the economic loss was huge. Over two years, the power factory not only failed to make money, but also posted more than 1 million yuan.This was an incredible number at the time, and Xu Yongshui almost went bankrupt. However, Xu Yongshui always firmly believes that harsh and even severe technical transformation is the only way for Weili Factory to go to the market and the only way to surpass all Wenzhou lighter manufacturers.In order to pay the wages of the commissioning staff and make up for other expenses, he had to sell his Fukang car. It is said that this is the first Fukang car bought in Wenzhou. It is precisely because of this spirit of learning the most advanced technology at the expense of the family that at the end of 1994, the commissioning of the new production line of Weili Factory was finally successful, and the products produced fully met the requirements of the Japanese side. At the same time as the lighter, Xu Yongshui not only earned the profit of OEM production, but also gained the technical advantage of building an international famous brand. Wenzhou enterprises originally started from imitation. Like many other Wenzhou lighter manufacturers, while doing OEM for foreign companies, Weili Lighter Factory also started to independently develop its own brand by taking advantage of the technological advantages it has mastered.Both OEM products and independent brand products are exported to the Eurasian market, with an annual output value of nearly 100 million yuan.From earning the price difference of lighters in Guangzhou, to purchasing high-voltage ceramic electronics in Shunde, and then cooperating with Guangtian Company, Xu Yongshui’s entrepreneurial experience has gone through three levels: from scratch, from virtual to real, from small to large Jump, thus casting his own extraordinary performance. In Wenzhou business circles, people believe in the power of perseverance.As long as you look for it in business, stick to the green hills and keep moving towards the established goal, you will definitely get good results!