Five young entrepreneurs responsible for the success of Hubei Province's Wuhan-based fruit shop chain Qinqin or "Kiss My Fruit," which earned an enviable 12 million yuan ($1.97 million) in revenues last year, are proving that a business model based on "friendly service" is certainly worth something, even in a country where competition from rivals fill the streets at nearly every corner.
With a focus on providing "warm and energetic" service to customers, Hu Yong, 23, one of Qinqin's founders and the top share holder, said that the company's stores go the extra mile that ordinary fruit stands do not by greeting customers politely, offering to wash and cut fruits for free, providing a home delivery service and informing customers of the nutritious value of specific fruits.
It is a marketing strategy that has earned Qinqin plenty of returning customers and enabled it to open 15 chain shops in the city in just some three years, a feat that has earned Hu and the other founders much respect from their peers nationwide, at a time when nearly 7 million graduating college students are struggling to compete in today's fiercely competitive job market.
Hu, a graduate of agricultural studies and economics from Wuhan's Huazhong Agricultural University, said that the founders take their company very seriously.
"We don't just aim to make money, but hope to become a national brand in the field of agriculture one day, so we approach our business from the perspective of a Fortune 500 company," he told the Global Times.
High pay, 'low-status'
Business is so good these days that the company can even afford to compensate its fruit store managers with as much as 4,000 yuan a month - much more than the average monthly salary of a Wuhan graduate, which is just 2,663 yuan, according to a report published in March by popular job website 51job.
But despite the attractive salary, Qinqin faces challenges in retaining staff and growing the business as it struggles to draw new talent to support existing or future shops.
"Selling fruit isn't the kind of job that enjoys a high social status, and some of our staff have even left because their parents were unhappy about their jobs," said Hu.
But Hu, who has big plans for the company - to grow big enough to harvest their own produce as a major industrial chain capable of filling even overseas orders - said that he's determined to overcome any obstacles ahead.
Learning curve
Like many new businesses, Qinqin saw its share of failures at the beginning. As college students, Hu and his friends, who started their business as a fruit stand on campus in 2010 before realizing the bigger potential of their venture, were much more naive and inexperienced before, he admitted.
"We didn't know about a lot of things and were even cheated many times," he said, with Wuhan-based Chutian Metropolis Daily citing a case in which they were sold 500 kilograms of watermelons, half of which was bad, causing a 700 yuan-loss for the company.
Yet continued support from Hu's university after graduation is helping, he said.
A teacher from the school surnamed Liu, who helped the students secure a 100,000 yuan-provincial grant to get their business off the ground, told the Global Times on Tuesday that he plans to encourage students to join Hu's company as interns.
Liu said that this would not only to offer soon-to-be-graduates valuable on-the-job experience, but also to improve the odds of more students becoming interested in either working at Qinqin's or being inspired to start their own enterprises.
"We encourage students to start their own businesses and hope that related government departments will increase support for students with ambitious endeavors to give them a fighting chance," said Liu.