Tao Tingting (middle) welcomes guests to her Guifenghuang restaurant. [Photo/gywb.cn]
Guifenghuang (meaning Guizhou phoenix), a restaurant serving Guizhou snacks such as rice noodles, moved its headquarters from Beijing to Guiyang National High-tech Industrial Development Zone (Guiyang HIDZ) in January, according to local media reports.
The founder of the brand is Tao Tingting, who is a Guizhou native and graduate of Peking University. She has made great efforts to introduce Guizhou food to Beijing - and even the world.
After six years of planning, Guifenghuang restaurant opened in Beijing in 2018, serving Guizhou mutton rice noodles and other Guizhou snacks.
The restaurant was a hit among Guizhou people in Beijing, and Tao mostly hired workers from Guizhou province. It became a gathering place for Guizhou people in the capital.
During the breakout of COVID-19 epidemic, the restaurant insisted on transporting its ingredients from Guizhou province to Beijing via air parcels, in order to offer authentic Guizhou flavors to diners.
Now, to promote Guizhou culture further, Tao has moved her company's headquarters from Beijing to Guiyang HIDZ, which has promised to offer preferential policies to entrepreneurs like Tao and introduce upstream and downstream industry chain resources.
Guifenghuang promotes Guizhou food to the market, not only driving employment of people in impoverished areas, but also showcasing Guizhou culture, according to Zhou Ruoping, a director at the Guiyang entrepreneurship service center.
To date, Guifenghuang has opened eight restaurants in Beijing, and is planning more in Shenzhen, Hangzhou and Shanghai. It also expects overseas partnerships. Online boxed rice noodles and fresh food are not only sold nationwide, but also in the United States, Canada, Germany and other countries and regions.