Export businesses confidently conquer foreign markets during the Tet holiday

Increasing deep processing

As one of the businesses with more than 22 years of exporting agricultural products and deeply processed agricultural products to 102 markets around the world, Mr. Phan Minh Thong, General Director of Phuc Sinh Joint Stock Company, said that after the COVID-19 pandemic, many of Vietnam’s food commodities are extremely favored, and the position of Vietnamese agricultural products is increasingly enhanced.

"Vietnamese enterprises should take advantage of this strength and promote deep processing to improve product value and enhance the position of enterprises in particular and the position of Vietnamese goods in general in the world market. This is a good opportunity for Vietnam in the coming years," Mr. Thong said, adding that thanks to deep processing, Phuc Sinh can overcome market impacts and grow by more than 40%.

However, General Director Phan Minh Thong said that in the domestic market, his business is also "struggling" and finding every way to sell products. Therefore, according to Mr. Thong, to improve product value and serve domestic and international consumption needs, he is investing in building two more deep processing factories in the Cascara spice and tea industries.

Giving advice to businesses, especially startups, Mr. Thong said that businesses need to be more proactive and must self-work to be able to reach out to the world. Modern distribution systems should also select all good products with good exports, good brands, and deep processing to put on the shelves because putting all products on the shelves for sale would be unfair.

According to Phuc Sinh's boss, the trend toward sustainable development is an unchangeable trend. Domestic and international consumers tend to choose sustainable, safe, and green products.

To meet the diverse needs of the market during the Tet holiday, Mr. Thong said, the business has changed the packaging in Tet gift packages to both be convenient, reusable, moderately priced, and still ensure sustainable development. According to calculations, the cost of gift packages this year will decrease by more than 40% compared to the previous three years.

Dream of bringing 100 traditional cakes and frozen vegetarian products to the world

As for Song Huong Foods business, thanks to the transformation to export, along with the initiative in raw material areas of eggplant in Tay Ninh, shrimp, rice, mung bean, etc. and the sensitivity to consumer tastes, the company launched many new products, helping its export revenue be expected to increase by about 50% over the same period last year.

According to Mr. Nguyen Le Quoc Tuan, CEO of Song Huong Foods, exports account for more than 60% of the company's sales, and the main export markets include the US, Japan, and Taiwan.

"According to the forecast of the American partner side, this year there will be fewer overseas Vietnamese returning home than last year. Therefore, export companies like us are like ‘winning the lottery’. This is an opportunity for us to accelerate the preparation of plans and raw material sources for export orders at the end of the year.

Currently in the US, Song Huong Foods' products with the Ut Chinh brand are extremely favored," Mr. Tuan said, adding that Song Huong Foods brought to the US market 19 products, such as flat steamed rice dumplings, Vietnamese pyramid rice dumplings (vegetarian, salty), Vietnamese sticky rice dumplings (vegetarian, salty), ramie leaves rice cake, deep-fried glutinous rice sesame ball, Vietnamese honeycomb cake, Vietnamese sticky rice with mung bean, sweet sticky rice, steamed momordica glutinous rice, durian sticky rice, shrimp cake, eggplant, etc. All are preserved according to FDA standards at a temperature of minus 18^oC.

"In the first phase, we focused on exports to serve overseas Vietnamese so that any Vietnamese living in the US could eat their homeland's dishes. Just open a plate of Vietnamese pyramid rice dumplings or Vietnamese sticky rice with mung beans, etc., and they will feel the delicious taste of the homeland. The second phase is an effort to sign a contract with two partners in Vietnam so that they can sell traditional products exported abroad at their systems. The third phase continues the path of bringing Vietnamese products and brands to the world," the CEO of Song Huong Foods said and affirmed that there will be at least 100 frozen dishes, including traditional cakes and vegetarian foods, for export around the world, and the company will make efforts to bring its products into the Costco supermarket in the US.

"The products are frozen at a temperature of minus 18 oC with almost no use of preservatives. Let’s experience frozen Vietnamese pyramid rice dumplings with pre-steamed ones to see the difference in tastes. This is Tuan's dream of bringing traditional cake products and frozen vegetarian food to the world," said the CEO of Song Huong Foods.