The company is stepping up aggressive marketing strategies and will launch two new products next year. It will also introduce new, smaller packages aimed at attracting new customers, including children.

Richie Confectionery is also considering forming a joint venture with a Taiwanese partner to penetrate the Chinese market.

"We're not yet ready to undertake fast business expansion abroad, so we must study every factor of our investment opportunities," said marketing officer Pawarit Songvirat.

The company's healthy products are being marketed under its own brand, Healthy Buddy, while its other confectioneries have a variety of brands, including Tender Club and Microphone Karaoke.

Pawarit is a second-generation member of the Songvirat family, owners of Richie Confectionery. He said the company had produced confectioneries like candies and chocolate for more than 20 years. However, the 1997 economic crisis created the opportunity to focus on healthy products. The confectionery market contracted, forcing the company to turn to other products.

Another marketing officer, Supassorn Simakornpin, said the new products used milky rice as a raw material, not only to ensure health benefits, but also to differentiate them from other snacks.

"Thailand is one of the world's major rice-growing countries, and rice is the traditional daily meal for Thais, so we must create a higher income for our farmers," said Supassorn.

Supassorn, 27, and Pawarit, 25, have developed the company's business together, focusing on modern marketing and high technology. Supassorn is responsible for both export and domestic marketing, while Pawarit concentrates on raw-material sourcing and technology development.

Pawarit spends about a month every year in the Northeast, during the October harvest season, surveying the quality of his company's milky-rice raw material. Over a year and a half, he has secured sufficient supplies with the quality he needs.

So far, Richie Confectionery has close connections with two villages that supply the company's raw material at a rate of up to 8,000 tonnes per month at full production capacity.

"We've established cold storage in the area, with temperature control at 18 degrees Celsius, in order to maintain high rice quality from the farms to our factory in Bangkok. The farmers are interested in our business and want to gain a higher income by supplying our raw material," said Pawarit.

At present, the company pays Bt35 a kilogram for high-quality milky rice. This compares with Bt12 to Bt15 a kilogram if the farmers sell to other rice traders.

Pawarit said the company's products sold in niche markets like health-food shops and were marketed through modern trade channels.

"We hope the market for our health-food products will stabilise in the next couple of years and that we can offer a greater variety of products, so we can attract more general consumers," he said.

Suppassorn said the company's major export markets included Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore. Australia has a high potential, and the company's trading partner there places regular but small, orders.

Despite focusing on its new products, the company has no plans to stop making its original products. However, it will concentrate on healthy snacks and is developing technology to expand its capacity, to serve future growth.

It has also set up an in-house research and development unit to conduct market surveys and develop new products to serve demand.

In the early stages of business development, Pawarit recalls losing Bt400,000 because of an incorrectly designed package. He soon put that right, but the experience increased his personal concern for the quality of the company's products. He dismisses the original equipment-manufacturing strategy and says Richie Confectionery will continue to produce everything marketed under its brand names.

Achara Pongvutitham

The Nation