Successful Dreamers
Shanghai is a city that breeds ambition. Its busy streets and high risers on the rise cast a spell on many a foreigner, finding themselves possessed with the idea of pursuing careers that were once little more than dreams. But business is still business even if you're running a nightclub, shop, restaurant or art gallery, and hard work remains essential in the alchemy of success.
Lova Weddings' Lovisa Tedestedt
In 2009, when Lovisa Tedestedt began producing custom-made wedding dresses in Shanghai for export to her native Sweden, she ran her business from a four storey, 500 square metre villa in Pudong. However, she soon realised the importance of the growing Chinese market. " In Sweden, 50,000 people get married, but here in China, nine million people get married every year. The scale is just so huge here."
But it wasn't just China's size that made sense to Tedestedt, it was also its accessibility. “Location is everything. When we first opened, we had no clients visiting us in Pudong." Luckily for Tedestedt, one of her clients was able to offer her the boutique's current location on Nanchang Lu in Luwan District where business is now booming.
Still, it was more that just relocation that brought Tedestedt success. It took over a year of work to find reliable suppliers for the materials for her dresses. "One day your supplier is a factory, the next day it's an auto shop. You can't rely on anyone too much, because the next day they might be gone." And on this issue, and others in the business, Tedestedt recommends finding a mentor or a coach. "Investing in knowledge is something I'd highly recommend. We have many of the same problems that H&M has, but on a different scale, of course."
Lova Weddings. 205 Nanchang Lu, near Maoming Nan Lu. Tel: 5406 6151. Web: www.lovaweddings.com
Art Labor's Martin Kemble
"It's timing; it's luck; it's pure fate. It's meeting an artist randomly at a party and that artist has things going on in his life that come into confluence." These are the words that Art Labor gallery owner Martin Kemble uses to describe the strange brew needed for making a gallery in Shanghai a success.
Of course, there's much more to it than a luck-filled star-crossed meeting between an artist and gallery owner. In the art world, money plays a huge role, and Kemble points to what a tough market it is. "In Shanghai, the rents are like opening up in New York on Fifth Avenue, but without the same clientele base." And when opening a commercial gallery, according to Kemble, the more avant-garde or different you want to be, the more you've got to be willing to lose it all. Deep pockets and financial independence are a must.
"This is much more of a hobby for me than a necessity," says Kemble, "yet at the same time, being involved in the arts is something that requires total passion. You really have to be committed to it." Kemble says he finds himself dealing with the gallery business everyday from 9am to 11pm, no matter what, and there's a reason for this; playing the art game requires learning to price works and understand potential clients and their tastes almost instantly – something that only those interacting with artworks day in and day out can do.
Art Labor. Bldg 4, 570 Yongjia Lu, near Yueyang Lu. Tel: 3460 5331, Web: www.artlaborgallery.com
Madison's Austin Hu
"Lots of people have this fairytale idea about going into the food business, but cooking up a meal for your friends and family is worlds apart from opening a restaurant," says Madison's chef/owner Austin Hu. "Let's say you like baking cookies. A batch to feed you and your friends might be 48 cookies. But for a full-scale operation, you're going to be making 480 or even 1,000 and all of them need to be good."
Due to the size and pressure that comes with running a kitchen, chefs work long and hard hours, and are on their feet for around 12 hours a day. In addition, their lives are the exact opposite of anyone elses not in the food industry. "I go to bed around 3 or 4am after work most nights. I'm busiest on weekends. I haven't celebrated New Year's in eight years because I'm too busy working."
Still despite the rigours of the trade, Hu says that it's the job for him. "My favourite thing about restaurant work is that everyday is fresh. It doesn’t matter what you did the day before. The reality is that the guys who came [to eat] yesterday aren’t going to be the ones coming in today.”
And as for doing business in Shanghai? Hu finds that loyalty and trust is key. “People told me not to trust anybody. But I realised that if I don't trust them, how can I expect to be loyal to my trade? So I choose to trust. Have I gotten burned? Yeah. But 85% of my original staff are still with me. Once you have a certain culture built up, it propagates itself.”
Madison. 18 Dongping Lu, near Hengshan Lu. Tel: 6437 0136
Bar Rouge's Mathieu Brauer
Mathieu Brauer, founder of Bar Rouge says it all began with the official launch of 18 Years Chivas in China on 18 November 2004. "When we arrived here it was a rooftop with nothing. There was just clay here. That was 4 November and we were given two weeks to get everything ready. I told everyone that it would be impossible to make it happen. Two weeks later the party went on. I realised what China is all about in those two weeks."
Almost eight years later, Bar Rouge continues to be one of Shanghai's premier nightspots, with ambitions to set the standard for lounges and nightclubs not just locally, but worldwide. In addition to Bar Rouge's uncanny sense of timing, Brauer attributes the bar's success to knowing the market, making clear concepts, communicating with suppliers, finding the right people and, of course, having a passion for developing new trends and rituals. "This is what I like most about this industry. The only thing you know in nightlife is that you don't know. It's not because you succeeded last night and 1,000 people came, that you're done for the next day. You need to reinvent nightlife every night."
Bar Rouge. 18 Zhongshan Dong Yi Lu, near Nanjing Dong Lu. Tel: 6339 1199. Web: www.bar-rouge-shanghai.com
