Today we woke up in Hong Kong and got ready for our last day of academic business.  Our first stop was Cafe Coral, a well known food company.  Mr. Sunny Lo, the Managing Director of the group, Mrs. Helen Li, Director of Corporate Logistics, and Mrs. Jennifer Lo, Senior Manager of Purchasing, gave us an in depth presentation, explaining the ins and outs of their well known Cafe Coral fast food business as well as the other business branches that the group operated. 

The family owned company is 42 years old and went public in 1986.  They operate their businesses under the motto of "All Happy Together," which means that when you make the customer's happy it leads to the stores being happy, and overall the shareholders of the company happy. This world-wide firm has 562 units in operation in Hong Kong, the United States, China, and East Asia with such notable outlet names as Cafe de Coral, Manchu Wok, and the Spaghetti House.  One of the reasons the Cafe de Coral group has been successful over the years is their commitment to the customer.  As a result, the Cafe de Coral stores had won top service awards several times over the past few years.  Another key to their success is the diverse assortment of services and brands they offer.  The Cafe de Coral group caters to five different markets: the quick service restaurant, the specialty restaurant, institutional catering, franchising, and food processing and distribution.  One of the most interesting points was the extreme convenience of the unique payment method available in Hong Kong. Nearly every citizen of Hong Kong has an "Octopus Card" which can be used to quickly pay for the food at Cafe Corral.  One of the most influential and memorable points that was made in the meeting was that to be successful and overcome obstacles you must always "Take Challenges as Opportunities."

After lunch we visited a local farmer’s market.  The market provided every sort of food item possible. We walked passed hundreds of stands including every form of produce ranging from sweat corn to the most exotic Chinese fruits.  Butcher shops outlined the outside of the street. Many students were amazed how the meat was cut before the consumers eyes and hung on open air racks.  There were many fresh seafood stands also with every form of live fishery.  Students were also able to walk through a jade market. Jade is a green colored stone that is very common in China.

From there we moved on to eat some lunch at the shopping center.  The restaurant that we went to was well known for its dumplings and did not disappoint as we were all provided with enough food to fill us up. After our meal, we took a short walk over to City Super, a hypermarket that aims to be the true "one-stop shopping" experience for its customers.  Before listening to a presentation on the hypermarket, we were allowed to explore some of the many and diverse stores that the hypermarket contained.  City Super has three core components to its business model: the Food Market, which sells food products a consumer could ever want, a Life Division, which is made up of several stores that sell high quality items that City Super's customers can use in everyday life, and finally the cooked Deli, a fast food court that caters to the busy shoppers that explore their stores. After a short period of time, we were greeted by the manager of the City Super in Hong Kong.  He gave us a quick presentation of what the structure, goals, and history of the City Super in Hong Kong before turning it over to some Q & A.  It was interesting to learn that the Hong Kong City Super was founded in 1996 and had since has expanded into Shanghai as well.  At the meeting, we also learned one of the ways that City Super maintains a good relationship with its customers.  The store publishes a newsletter to all its customers that highlights the deals going on during that period, talks about the store, and provides cooking tips and suggestions.  At the conclusion of the meeting, part of the group stayed to do some additional shopping and learn a little bit more of City Super while the rest headed back to the hotel to get ready for the boat tour that we had scheduled for that evening.

After freshening up at the hotel the group set off to take a boat tour in the Hong Kong harbor which is part of the Pearl River Delta. The boat tour gave the students an opportunity to see the amazing sky line of Hong Kong. We were blown away by the futuristic architecture and the building’s overwhelming size. After the boat tour most students ate in an open air restaurant in the middle of a Hong Kong side street. This was a great opportunity for the students to have one last chance to absorb Chinese culture.