How do you become a China entrepreneur without anything of your own to sell?

Easy: You sell someone else’s stuff, and sell it well.

“I’m not the creative type of person,” said Mike Murphy, CEO of the IQAir Store and Villa Lifestyles, which have offices in Beijing, Shanghai and other China locales.

Mr. Murphy, slated as a panelist for the upcoming Small Medium & Entrepreneurial Enterprises (SMEE) conference this Friday, January 16 in Beijing (and we’re a sponsor - send an email to amycui@yimingconsulting.com or call her at 6509-7776 for the lowest attendee price of 500 RMB), means that he’s not the inventor type. But his mind constantly works at creating new China niches for existing proven products, like the Christmas tree.

Villa Lifestyles actually began as the Beijing Christmas Tree Company several years ago. Mr. Murphy set up shop in a known foreign enclave – the Shunyi area of Beijing – and sold what every Christian and – let’s face it – non-Christian villa should have around the 25th of December: the real tree deal decked out in jingle bling.

The idea took – obviously – but the company’s work also was clearly seasonal. Mr. Murphy needed new products.

“My personal strength is dealing with people and products I believe in,” Mr. Murphy said.

Mr. Murphy can safely say that now, as his groups sell first class outdoor products like the Mosquito Magnet and Weber barbeque grills. Initially, Mr. Murphy, who hails from a landscaping background prior to China living and English teaching once he arrived, had trouble convincing Western executives to hand over their products for him to sell exclusively in China.

“I did go initially with lower quality products in China,” Mr. Murphy acknowledged. “Some of the lesser products I had we bombed out on after too many repairs, replacements and constant headaches.”

Mr. Murphy realized, though, that he had stumbled onto something more valuable than cold cash while selling trees: a mega network.

“I collected business cards I hadn’t been used to collecting,” Mr. Murphy said. He realized, wow, “that’s the CEO of Microsoft…that’s the ambassador of England. And if they need Christmas trees, they must need other products.”

This network formed eventually what would be both a strong customer base, and initially, the key to reaching big manufacturers with his message: Come on, let me sell it in China for you.

Direct emails often didn’t work to the Big Whigs.

“Weber wouldn’t answer my email and wouldn’t take my calls,” Mr. Murphy said.

But Mr. Murphy recalls being at a potential customer’s house who already had an IQAir. He started looking around the guy’s house and realized a barbeque grill was missing.

Gee, I’d love to sell a barbeque grill to you but unfortunately I can’t lay my hands on a good one to sell you in China, Mr. Murphy basically said.

It turned out the guy was a fantastic friend-of-a-friend sort, and put Mr. Murphy in touch with a big executive at Weber. The rest is ancient history, as Mr. Murphy since found executives willing to buy Weber barbecues (which he now sells), but only if the mosquitoes weren’t so bad outside. Enter the Mosquito Magnet, etc. etc.

Today, with 50 employees strong, Mr. Murphy still keeps his nose to the grindstone, and his ear.

Apart from continuing to listen to customers, he checks out blogs, trade shows, magazines and newspapers for other product ideas. Again, he doesn’t trust his own mind’s creativity.

“The times when I have good ideas, the products ended in failure,” he said.

He’s more of a rule-of-four kind of guy: The fourth time a customer mentions the same product need to him, he knows it’ll be a winner.

He has some other rules of thumb too: 1) Understand that a small and medium-sized enterprise isn’t going to build a big brand in China overnight, 2) Start strong with the expat market and work into a Chinese customer base, 3) Don’t expect Chinese workers to think outside the box, but train them to do that.

Oh, and if you’re not a damn good seller, you might as well stick to gardening or teach English. China is no place for products without a serious sales force behind them.

    Channel: Local Wisdom     |