The document summarizes research conducted on two Chinese herbal shops in Malaysia - Wan Choon Tong in Seremban and Toon Choon Tong in Semenyih. Interviews were conducted at each shop to understand their history, operations, customers, competitors and challenges. Both shops have been in business for decades and largely serve middle-aged and elderly customers. While Wan Choon Tong faces more local competitors, both shops rely on building trust with customers through affordable prices, friendly service and herbal expertise. The research provides insights into running a successful herbal business over generations in Malaysia.

2. SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, BUILDING AND DESIGN
FOUNDATION IN NATURAL BUILD ENVIRONMENT
ENGLISH 2 (ELG 30605)
LECTURER: CASSANDRA WIJESURIA
SUBMISSION & PRESENTATION DATE: 1st
of JUNE 2015
PRESENTATION TITLE: CHINESE HERBAL SHOP
GROUP MEMBERS:
Names ID
Lai Tze Xiuan 0318056
Tan Yincy 0318355
Ng Kheng Soon 0318946
Hooi Zhao Hong 0318564
Erik Ong 0318056
Tan Ken Ric 0318631

3. CONTENT
1. RESEARCH PROPOSAL
1.1. INTRODUCTION
2. KEY SUMMARY
2.1. LOCATION
2.2. TOPIC
2.3. GROUP MEMBERS
2.4. INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
2.5. METHODOLOGY
3. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE BUSINESSES
3.1. HERBAL INDUSTRY
3.2. WAN CHOON TONG HERBAL SHOP
3.3. TOON CHOON THONG HERBAL SHOP
4. TRANSCRIPT
4.1. WAN CHOON TONG HERBAL SHOP
4.2. TOON CHOON THONG HERBAL SHOP

4. 5. RECOMMENDATIONS
5.1. WAN CHOON TONG HERBAL SHOP
5.2. TOON CHOON THONG HERBAL SHOP
6. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
6.1. COMPARATIVE ESSAY
6.2. COMPARATIVE TABLE
7. APPENDICES
7.1. MEETING MINUTES
7.2. SHOP DETAILS
8. BIBLIOGRAPHY
9. REFERENCES

5. INTRODUCTION
In this report we will be analyzing two herbal industries, both located at different regions of
Malaysia. We would like to do Chinese herbal industry because we would like to know more
about how they are different from modern medications. The two herbal shops we went to
interview were ‘Wan Choon Tong’ Shop, Seremban and ‘Toon Choon Tong’ Shop, Semenyih.
Our objectives to compare the two shops are to find out the background, current situation and if
anyone is planning to open a similar business, how we should start and progress etc.

6. Key Summary
2.1: Location
The Wan Choon Tong is located in Seremban and Toon Choon Thong is located in Semenyih.
Seremban is a capital of Negeri Sembilan. Semenyih is one of the small towns in Selangor.
Seremban is more developed compared to Semenyih thus the business in Seremban is running
better.
2.2: The Topic
Our tasks for this project are to know how the marketing strategies they used for example their
advertisement, services, training for their workers and so on. For such shop that has been running
for over 50 years, we would like to compare how they overcome and outdo the competitors.
2.3: Group Members
 Lai Tze Xiuan
 Tan Yincy
 Ng Kheng Soon
 Hooi Zhao Hong
 Erik Ong
 Tan Ken Ric

7. 2.4: Interview Questions
 What’s your name
 Who’s the founder of the shop?
 Can you tell us more about your shop, for example the history of it?
 Average of how many customers do you have?
 Normally who are the customers that visits your shop?
 How is your business, is it running well?
 Do you face any competitors?
 How do you overcome the competitors?
 Do you face any obstacles when you started running the business?
 How many branches do you have?
 Do you plan to expand your business in the future?
 What advice would you offer us if we were to open a Chinese herbal shop, and what
difference do you see between the 90s and now?

8. 2.5 Methodology
2.5.1 The Interview
We interviewed Leong Yee Fatt who is the son of the founder of a herbal shop Wan Choon Tong,
in Seremban. The next interview was done in Semenyih with Saw Shak Choi, who is the foder of
the business itself. We were toured around the shop then brought to a small table to do our
interviews. While one was more shy then the other, we had a hard time trying to capture what
Saw Shak Choi was saying. But overall both shops were very welcoming and we had a good
time interviewing them.
2.5.2 References
We did not get any references because both the Herbal Shops did not have any websites or any
social media pages for us to refer to. We took some references based on experiences with the
customers of the stores individually.
2.5.3 Meetings
Our meetings were took place in Whatsapp, Class and Skype. Everyone had equal parts for this
project and everything went accordingly so no one did anything less.

9. Brief Description of the Business
3.1: Brief description of herbal industry
Chinese herbs are pretty decent in Malaysia’s industry; there are still Malaysians who trust this
more than the modern medication as it brings up a lot of side effects. Many of the herbs we get in
Malaysia originates from mainly China and Taiwan. They are the most well-known for
traditional Chinese medication. Many of the herbs we get from the shops are findable in the
nature.
3.2: Wan Choon Tong Herbal Shop
Wan Choon Tong Herbal Shop was founded in the year 1942 by the father of the current owner.
It has been 62 years since the business started running and it still remains at the same location in
Seremban. The shop sells many types of traditional Chinese herbs from all around the world. The
business is running well due to the high popularity of loyal customers. The shop ranges from
drugs to alcoholic medication. There is a very wide variety of medications in the shop. Their
customers per day can reach up to 100 because this herbal shop located at the busy town in
Seremban.
3.3: TOON CHOON THONG HERBAL SHOP
Toon Choon Thong has been around for 52 years now, but it is only been 1 generation. The
current owner of the shop is the founder of the shop. He found the shop at the age of 20 during
1963. It has been a great success since then; the shop is built on loyal customers all around the
area and there aren’t many competitions around because it’s in a outskirt of town. Because there
are no competitions around so the loyal customers are easy to get. It has average of 30-50
customers per day.

10. Transcript
4.1 TOON CHOON TONG HERBAL SHOP
 What’s your name
- Saw Shok Choi
 Whos the founder of the shop?
I am the founder of the shop, I have been operating it for 52 years already.
 Average of how many customers do you have?
- 30-50 per day
 Normally who are the customers that visit your shop?
- Middle aged and elderlies.
 How is your business, is it running well?
- The business is still running smoothly for us because we keep in touch with our loyal
customers. We have a good foundation in the past so its not so difficult for us now.
 Do you face any competitors?
- There aren’t many competition around because this is a rural area

11.  How do you overcome the competitors?
- We don’t worry about other modern competitions because we focus on our products
and earn our trusts by being honest. This is our strategy to compete against the
others.
 Do you face any obstacles when you started running the business?
- Not really.
 How many branches do you have?
- Just this branch.
 Do you plan to expand your business in the future?
- Not really because we want to keep it small as money is not main interest.
 What advice would you offer us if we were to open a Chinese herbal shop, and what
difference do you see between the 90s and now?
- It is tougher to join in the business now as the government are fussier about the
medicine that would give negative effects for the consumers. Back then it wasn’t so
strict but because due to some negative effects from the medicine consumers had
reported on the rise.
4.2: WAN CHOON THONG HERBAL SHOP

12.  What’s your name?
- Leong Yee Fatt
 Whos the founder of the shop?
- My dad pass over this shop to me and this shop has been operating for 62 years
 Can you tell us more about your shop, for example the history of it?
My father was the owner of the shop and I continued the business since I was in
secondary school.
 Average of how many customers do you have?
100 per day
 Can you tell us more about your shop, for example the history of it?
- This shop has been operating for 62 years; it has been running for 2 generations
now. Regular customers have been coming in for over 50 years because we have
gained their trusts for us.
 Normally who are the customers that visit your shop?
- Middle and elderlies

13.  How is your business, is it running well?
- The business is running well because I have loyal customers around me, but it
wasn’t easy in the beginning where I didn’t have so many customers. But after a
while of gaining their trusts, the business is now running well.
 Do you face any competitors?
- Yes, there are 4 shops
 How do you overcome the competitors?
- We don’t really care about the competitors as we just focus on our service towards
customer
 Do you face any obstacles when you started running the business?
- The only obstacle we face are some of the competitors around, its very hard to get
new customers
 How many branches do you have?
- 4
 Do you plan to expand your business in the future?
- Yes but depending on the progress of our current shop
 What advice would you offer us if we were to open a Chinese herbal shop, and what
difference do you see between the 90s and now?

14. - Compare to now and the 90s, health department are very strict about the
medication we give and you are needed with a license to open an herbal shop. So
compare to then and now, it would be easier to open one last time.

15. RECOMMENDATIONS
5.1 Wan Choon Tong Herbal Shop
As it is a family business, their workers are mostly relatives so, to maximize work performances,
as well as to better allocate their resources, they should hire more workers for all of their
branches. They should as increase the variety of herbs and herbal medicine.
5.2 Toon Choon Tong Herbal Shop
The owner should take more risk and discuss or consider the possibilities to expand his business.
He could also increase his knowledge about herbs and medicine so that more variety of herbal
medicine could be use in treating patients and continue to treat customers with honesty.

16. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
6.1 Comparative Analysis of two business
As mentioned above, we interviewed two businesses from two different locations. The first
business, which we interviewed in Seremban named Wan Choon Tong was founded by the father
of Leong Yee Fatt. The second business, which had already been operating for 52 years named
Toon Choon Tong and was founded by Mr Saw Shok Choi. By studying and understanding these
two herbal shop, similarities as well as differences were observed.
Both herbal shop‘s main product are herbs, medicine, health consultancies service and
conventional item. However they have different points of view in herbal industry. Wan Choon
Tong , Mr Leong he is an open minded and modern aggressive businessman. What make him so
aggressive is because in his area one block of shop lot it already has four competitor. Toon
Chong Tong herbal shop have operated this shop for 52 year, during his secondary he learned
and started the business himself. His shop is located in Semenyih a small village so he had fewer
competitors compared to Wan Choon Tong herbal shop.
Hence both shops have differences in term of customer. Wan Choon Tong has an average of
100 customers a day, Toon Chong Tong has an average of 30-50 customers a day . But these two
herbal shops had admitted that most of the customers are middle and old age, 20 % of the
customer are young aged. The reason why the number of the customer between these two herbal
shop has a huge difference, Wan Choon Tong is located in Seremban, Seremban is a city where
there many people work stay there. Toon Chong Tong is located in semenyih is a outskirt of
town, the amount of the people is lesser compare to Seremban.

17. The two shops established for different purposes , Wan Choon Tong herbal shop focuses
more into business and in the same way they are also wanted to cure people sickness , for Wan
Chong Tong , they are more experience than Toon Choong Tong , this herbal shop had operated
for 62 year. Wan Chong Tong started during 1953. During that time the economy is bad many
family couldn’t afford to buy medicine, his father opened this shop was to help the town and
cure the villager . After 10 years later the economy is established Mr Leong Yee Fatt continue
his father business when he was in secondary school. On the other side, Toon choon tong was
established in the year 1963 which had operate for 52 years. Toon Chong Tong doesn’t have any
branches he only have one shop. Mr Saw Shak Choi doesn’t have any plan to expand his
business.
Like any other businesses, these two also faced some challenging obstacles operating the
herbal shop, two of these herbal shops have the same problem when they started this herbal shop.
Wan Choon Tong, when Mr Leong’s dad started this business it go very bad for few month
because herbal shop business works more towards trust between the shop and the customer .
During the first few year Wan Choon Tong had difficulties of obtaining regular customer this
causes the owner himself lose confident towards his business. Even thought, Mr Leong had low
esteem but he still doesn’t give up and sell to the customer with the reasonable price, right
product and give trust toward customer. Mr Leong had fight for the trustworthy between him and
customer for the past few years, at last he managed to get regular customer and slowly he expand
his business during his fifth year and now he have four shop in different place , Mr Leong had
fight for many year and now he manage to get 100 customer per day. Mr Leong Yee Fatt father
has been operating Wan Choon Tong earlier than Toon Choon Tong they get regular customer
easier during the early year his father was the one fight the trust between him and customer after

18. he continue his father business, many customer had trust toward Wan Choon Tong herbal shop
so it is easy for Mr Leong to continue his father shop. But it doesn’t mean Mr Leong is having an
easy life he also have to fight and keep the regular customer.
Along with the challenges came the competitors , Wan Choon Tong herbal shop has one
main competitor , which is You Liang and Yin Foh herbal shop is because the owner of the shop
had operate earlier than Wan Choon Tong he had more experience in herbal industry . Toon
Chong Tong had less competitors because his shop is located in one of the rural place in
Semenyih .
In conclusion, two of these herbal shop has been establish and they are equally stable. But to
compare two of these herbal shop Toon Choon Tong had more difficulties than Wan Choon
Tong . This is mostly because Mr Saw open the business later than Mr Leong , Mr Leong have
the hard time to get regular customer .

19. 6.2 Comparative Table
ITEM WAN CHONG TONG
HERBAL SHOP
TOON CHONG TONG
HERBAL SHOP
NUMBER OF
COMPETITORS
There is one main competitor There are no competitors in
the surrounding.
BRIEF DESCRIPTIONS
OF COMPETITORS - There is another
traditional herbal shop
two blocks away
- Identical variety of
herbs and medicine
- Same price and
similar amount of
customers daily
Currently there is no
competitor in the surrounding.

20. STRAEGIES TO COMPETE WITH COMPETITORS
WAN CHONG TOONG
HERBAL SHOP
TOON CHONG TOONG
HERBAL SHOP
PRICE Reasonable and affordable Reasonable and affordable
ADVERTISEMENT Face-to-Face Communication Face-to-Face Communication
QUALITY OF SERVICE Friendly and serve customer
with polite manner
Friendly and always face
customer with smile and with
a polite manner
ATMOSPHERE Crowded, have limited space
for car but overall is a nice
and clean atmosphere
Cooling , chilling and less
people or either traffic
WHAT ARE THE
OBSTACLES FACED BY
NEW BUSINESS?
One of the obstacles faced by the new generation business that
wishes to enter the trustworthy between you and the customer.
Management of the shop and the new trained worker must
reach to quality and demand of the shop and customer.
Communication toward the society demand. Thus, make it
more challenging to start off a new business in herbal industry.
Nevertheless, these difficulties and challenge can be more
during the future when the newcomers are willing to work hard
and overcome the old fashion business. Nowadays Business are
keeping involve many more innovative and creative people
coming and operate a business.

21. NATURE OF BUSINESS Both herbal shop are in Oligopoly market
- These shops are selling identical products which are a
variety of herbal, both are in a relatively small market
and they doesn’t involve big amount of capital. It is also
more difficult for new parties that are interested in this
industry to venture into as the license required to start
up is very hard to obtain. Besides that, some important
aspects needed to operate a herbal shop are trust
between you and your customer, customer loyalty and
interest towards this industry.

22. SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES
WAN CHONG TONG
HERBAL SHOP
SIMILARITIES TOON CHONG TONG
HERBAL SHOP
Herbal and Chinese medicine
And
Conventional item
MAIN PRODUCT
Herbal and Chinese medicine
And
Conventional item
Local WORKERS Local
They expand their business
worldwide see how it goes
FUTURE PLAN No intention to expand their
business
Provide services with polite
and honesty
STRATEGY Provide services and guild
toward customer

23. Wan Chong Tong
herbal shop
Difference Toon Chong Tong
Herbal shop
Mr Leong’s dad established his
herbal shop on the year of
1953. He start to take over his
father’s business 30 year ago
Founder and history
Mr Saw established his herbal
shop on the year 1963 .
Wan Chong Tong located at
Seremban first block Location
Toon Choon tong located at
Semenyih a village with a
block shop lot
4 around Negeri Sembilan Number of branches None
Medicine , treatment and
groceries
Types of product sold Medicine , treatment and
groceries
9 a.m-8:30 p.m Business hour 9 a.m-10:30 p.m
Handle by the owner himself
only hoping to pass to his son
Business operation Handle by the owner himself
and other employee

24. 100 customer per day regular
customer
Number of customer
30-50 customer per day
include regular customer

25. APPENDICES 7.1 Meeting Minutes
Appendix 1: Meetings
Date: 26th
April 2015 Time: 2pm-5pm Venue: Taylors
Lakeside
Meeting Hosted by: Lai Tze Xiuan
Note Taken by: Tan Ken Ric
Time kept by: Ng Kheng Soon
Attendance: Lai Tze Xiuan, Ng Kheng Soon, Tan Ken Ric, Erik Ong, Tan Yincy, Hooi
Zhao Hong
3 Hour Location for interview and questionnaires
Discussion: What types of business we want to interview and the location of the interviews.
After that we discussed about the questions we would like to ask to know more about the
shop.
Conclusion: We decided to interview Chinese herbal shops, one located at Seremban and
the other in Semenyih. We decided to ask about the background, current situations and
future planning for the shops.

26. Appendix 2: Meeting
Date: 3rd
of May 2015 Time: 2pm-5pm Venue:
Taylors Lakeside
Meeting Hosted by: Lai Tze Xiuan
Note Taken by: Tan Ken Ric
Time kept by: Ng Kheng Soon
Attendance: Lai Tze Xiuan, Ng Kheng Soon, Tan Ken Ric, Erik Ong, Tan Yincy, Hooi
Zhao Hong
3 Hour Distribution of work
Discussion: We distributed all the works to the group members equally and made sure if
there were any information left out, we could use skype or whatsapp to ask about it.
Conclusion: Everyone has their task assigned individually

27. Appendix 3: Meeting
Date: 25th
of May 2015 Time: 2pm-5pm Venue:
Taylors Lakeside
Meeting Hosted by: Ng Kheng Soon
Note Taken by: Tan Ken Ric
Time kept by: Lai Tze Xiuan
Attendance: Lai Tze Xiuan, Ng Kheng Soon, Tan Ken Ric, Erik Ong, Tan Yincy, Hooi
Zhao Hong
3 Hour Compilation of work
Discussion: We checked all the works done and checked for any mistakes
Conclusion: We compiled all our works and made some preparation for the presentation

28. APPENDICES 7.2 Shop Details
Interview in Seremban
Interview In Semenyih

29. REFERENCES
Herbal Malaysia. 2015. Natural Herbal Supplier and Herbalist. Retrieved from
http://herbal.my on 31st
May 2015.