Have you ever heard the Chinese herbal tea can be a type of soft drink? Imagine that you are drinking a Chinese herbal tea mixed with sparkling when you are tired or after school. It is a fusion of health and appetite which brings you energy and vigor.
It is an unprecedented idea raised by a HongKonger.
The guy who crossover the Chinese herbal tea with soft drinks is Rock, Chau Lok Ki. He puts a traditional Chinese drink into a soft drinks level. You may never be tried that before, nor neither imagine the crossover drinks. However, his products had been launched last year, and receive much praise from the public.
Rock is the director of Seed Softdrinks Limited, his production line is in an office in Kowloon Bay. Once, years ago, the office was a toy factory of his family. Simultaneously, it is an office and a drinks production factory which is 2000 feet, half of the basketball court. There are some machines and it forms a small-scale production line.
Rock works in a small room of the office, there are only a book cabinet, some folders, two desks and a notebook inside. That day, he wore a plain T-shirt with long jeans, everything was simple. He smiled and welcome me, he is really nice.
Rock Chau studied Business and graduated in 2003, backed to Hong Kong from Canada. He experienced the SARS and faced the business failure, he once took over the toy business from his family but the market downturn forced him to give up all the business.
As luck would have it, he met an elderly who sell the Chinese herbal tea for more than 20 years. He started to understand the intangible cultural heritage- Chinese herbal tea, and even germinated the idea of “soft herbal tea”.
Everything is started from 2014. “Under the business environment in Hong Kong, entrepreneurship is not easy. How to make an idea to a real drink, I do not have any direction in the start,” Rock frankly.
Do researches for 2 years, read different reference books, find different raw material companies, crossover different favours and then apply for the licence, it takes much of time and energy.
According to an article, creating a local brand of drinks is not easy. There are many requirements in the quality control and it is strict which does not encourage people to create local drinks. Besides, the slotting fee set by the supermarket is over high, they disturb the free market in HK.
“I don’t mind working whole day long, I just want the citizens would have a try on my drinks,” Rock stands firm of it. The most challenging that Rock have meet is that HongKongers have a fixed taste which is not simple for them to make some changes. They are traditional, they are not willing to try new things. Even the new Chinese soft herbal tea has been launched in the market, they would concern on the taste and quality, and they would choose the drinks they always buy at the end, including the coke and juices. It lowers the acceptability of the drinks.
Another issue beats Rock, the high price of slotting fee in supermarket. “It needs more than 300k to 600k if I want my drinks to list in supermarket chains”, so he can only cooperate with some small shops which makes him difficult to promote the drinks to the public.
Rock is the only staff of Seed Softdrinks Limited, he is responsibility for the sales, promotion and even the production, everything managed by him. “Every stage is the change of learning, I have already developed over 30 favours and they would be launch in the market if the drinks receive good response”. He spent much of time on the drinks, even he does not have many holidays, working around the clock, he would persist till providing more new soft drinks to HongKongers.
From the comments of the Facebook page, we can see that the sparkling Chinese herbal tea have a lot of fans, and they really support this local brand. “Before I try it, I think it is quite weird but my friends ask me to try. This drinks really surprise me, it gives me a fresh feeling and it looks healthier than the normal soft drinks.” the customer commented on the page.In fact, Rock’s drinks is also promoting a concept, natural and additive-free.
In Hong Kong, there is no other cross favoured soft drinks produced in Hong Kong. In order to produce a “special drinks” and a “drinks belonged to HongKongers”, he keep making new tastes of soft drinks, such as jujube, cucumber and flower tea. He hoped his soft Chinese herbal tea would enthuse HongKongers, stave off the negative and energise others.
What Rock brought to HongKongers not merely a drinks, it’s also a “Hong Kong” spirit behind. You would become positive and full of energy after you try the drinks. When you have a deeper understanding of the concept of Chinese soft herbal tea, would you willing to try once?
It's Hailey 