Hong Kong people go to Taiwan to open a coffee shop. The aroma of pineapple oil comes from Wenqing Street in Taipei.

Emigration to Taiwan has been a hot topic in recent years, and many young people from Hong Kong also intend to go to Taiwan to develop or even start their own businesses.

Ken, a post-80s generation, has partnered with several partners to set up a coffee shop called Gung Lok on Chifeng Street in Taipei, where many small Wenqing shops are stationed, with Hong Kong-style foods such as pineapple oil, eggs and milk tea as selling points. Thanks to the lower operating costs than Hong Kong and the joint "blessing" of diners from Taiwan and Hong Kong, there are plans to open branches less than a year after opening.

The company only officially opened at the end of June last year. The boss, Ken, said that the whole business had been planned for about four to five months. In order to preserve the flavor of Hong Kong as much as possible, several partners chose to decorate by themselves: after measuring the location and size, they collected wood blocks in Hong Kong, sawed and waxed by themselves, and disinfected and disinfested them. After disinfection and disinfestation, a whole container of wood blocks were transported to the shop to be assembled into chairs on the spot. It has taken a week or two to assemble desks and chairs, but fortunately, we are also opening a restaurant, so we don't have to spend extra time and money on decorating the kitchen.

Including Ken, there are a total of five founders, four from Hong Kong and one from Taiwan, each of whom is engaged in design work or has his own business, but he has never been in the catering industry. This is also the first time that Ken has started a business. He and another person have been stationed in Taiwan since the trial business started at the end of May last year, and naturally become the main force of this business.

Before coming to Taiwan, Ken, who worked for a big technology company in Hong Kong and loved to cook, was introduced by his friends. After work every day, he learned from the old chef and the "Google god" how to make Hong Kong-style milk tea, cheese and eggs. Later, he even went to the cultural and creative market stall to make milk tea to test whether his gesture was home. In the four-day market, he sold more than a thousand cups of milk tea.

Ken is now based in Taipei, and he is in charge of the daily operation, business development and meal design of the restaurant. (photo by Chen Zijian)

The coffee shop locates the egg to rise too

However, Cafe has always been positioned as a cafe, so Ken, which is responsible for the design of meal plates, has also upgraded these Hong Kong cuisine to cafe cuisine, such as pineapple oil with French fries, eggs with ice cream, and Seedos with fluffy effect. He laughs that in the process, he has somewhat changed his imagination of Hong Kong-style snacks. "it turns out that Hong Kong-style snacks can change a lot. Pineapple bags can be filled with lunch meat, tomatoes or eggs without butter, just like hamburgers." He stressed that Gonglu is not a cafe, "there will be no exhibition and Pop-up store in the cafe."

Having said that, Gongfu is like a tea restaurant, serving dish-head rice in the afternoon and evening markets. Ken explained that because there are many office workers nearby, at first many people came to the communal restaurant during the meal, but found that there was not enough food to supply, so they turned away and left. In order to absorb this group of customers, they added dish rice, but they were all basic styles, such as steamed meatloaf, barbecued fried eggs, and fried potatoes and chicken. Ken's strategy is to try to choose dishes that are relatively simple and easy to cook. "set the quantity and cooking method, and any employee will go into the kitchen and cook the food they can cook."

A total of cafes as the positioning, Hong Kong-style food pineapple oil with French fries, each NT$140 (about 36 Hong Kong dollars). (photo by Chen Zijian)

Pu Luping in Taiwan plans to open a branch in the eastern district.

As a matter of fact, the home-cooked food in Hong Kong is different from that in Taiwan. The most common home-cooked food in Hong Kong is enough to attract Taiwanese diners and Hong Kong people who live in Taiwan and are very concerned about Hong Kong flavor. I have seen Hong Kong people drink two cups of "tea" (milk tea made with condensed milk), and there are also a group of Hong Kong women who marry to Taiwan who gather together every month and order spaghetti and ham. Ken does not calculate the nationality distribution of guests, but laughs that he will encounter Cantonese-speaking guests every day.

At the beginning, Ken started the communist party because he felt that his work was nothing new, and several partners hit it off. Of course, rent is also a major consideration when choosing to develop in Taiwan rather than starting a business in Hong Kong. With a total area of about 1000 square feet, you have to rent a floor shop of similar size in Hong Kong for a monthly rent of $300000 to $400000, while the current rent is only about NT $60, 000 (about HK $15000), a difference of more than 20 times.

At present, the total monthly turnover is about NT $800000 (more than HK $200000), which is in order, but Eslite and Breeze Plaza have been invited to open branches, but Ken says that we still have to consider, "consider the rent and whether there is a place to hold an exhibition. If not, it seems that there is a lack of some of our own characteristics." However, he admitted that he did have plans to open a branch, and that he had found a Xinshui shop in the Eastern District, and that the new branch would show people in the form of a takeaway. "there is no reason to open another exactly the same store to divide up your business."