theceomagazine.com | 57According to Susan, the brands that can
go the distance are those that can keep up
with the times and evolve with the market.
“Even the most durable brands have had to
go through many transformations. No brand
in today’s hyper-transparent world is immune
to a surprise,” she says. “We don’t wait for
a crisis to happen in order to put in place
on-the-job training or set socially responsible
company policies.”
Susan is no stranger to crisis after
three decades with McDonald’s.
In June 2013, a McDonald’s
employee in Taiwan
mistook a customer
with Down syndrome
for a homeless
person, before asking
the customer to leave
the premises and
calling the police.
As Operations
Vice President at the
time, Susan’s response
was immediate, issuing a
full apology to the customer
on behalf of McDonald’s. “Our
staff ’s treatment was really inappropriate
and we apologise to the customer for causing
her embarrassment when she was planning
to dine at our store,” she said in a statement.
“We are sorry about our failure to meet the
expectations of the public.”
Thankfully for Susan, this proved to
be only a minor blip in an otherwise
unblemished career. Since being appointed
Group President in mid 2016, Susan has far
exceeded expectations, with Yummy Town
reporting 50 per cent store growth over
the previous year, and an after-tax profit of
67 per cent. But what she has found most
impressive is the long-term sustainability of
the Happy Lemon brand, specialising mostly
in lemon-based iced tea beverages. “The life
cycle of a brand in China is normally less
than two years. Happy Lemon is in its
eleventh year and we are still growing,”
says Susan.
“Pretty much like the way people age,
so does an upstart brand. The challenge is
figuring out how we can succeed when
appearances fade and the competition is
fierce. I believe we have to play the
long game.”
Given the notoriously fickle nature of the
food and beverage industry, Yummy Town’s
response is simple – aggressive
expansion. A key facet of the
company’s business model
is the ‘Yummy 1,000
Initiative’; to have
1,000 shops open
around the world
by the middle of
the year.
“The market
changes very
quickly and we
view aggressive
expansion as the right
approach to take Yummy
Town forward,” Susan says.
“The larger the market share we
capture, the easier it is for us to leverage
our business model in the short term.”
Armed with a deeper understanding
of McDonald’s famous franchise system
than most, Susan hopes to leverage that
knowledge to transform Yummy Town into
an international fast-food leader and become
the entrepreneur’s first choice of tea shop
brand in China.
Taking into account the historically
fraught relationship between Taiwan and
Mainland China, it is especially important to
her that Yummy Town positions itself as a
‘cross-strait bridge’, promoting new food and
beverage brands between the two territories.
What is not disputed is that Susan’s story
puts to bed once and for all the stigma of
‘working at McDonald’s’. There are currently
around 400 McDonald’s restaurants in Taiwan.
One of them could be employing the next
Susan Lu.MORE THAN LEMONADE
Yummy Town has more than 790
Happy Lemon stores since the
brand launched in 2006, with
stores in Taiwan, China, the US,
the UK, Canada, South Korea,
Hong Kong and the Philippines.Interview | INSPIRE