Minh “nhua” – the successor of Long Thanh Plastics – is a name that arouses curiosity on social networks with his hobby of collecting supercars. Surprisingly, that passion is inherited from the founder of Long Thanh Plastics, Pham Van Muoi, who built his business from scratch.
One year ago, on the first day of the Lunar New Year, Minh “nhua” posted a “selfie” on social media. The frame showed the garage with rare cars in the car enthusiast world such as the Pagani Huayra, the car known as the “wind god” that can accelerate from 0–100 km/h in 2.8 seconds and reach a maximum speed of up to 383 km/h.
Until now, this is the most expensive supercar rumored to have rolled out in Vietnam. The supercar collection that has passed through the hands of the deputy general director of Nhua Long Thanh has been mentioned: Aston Martin V8 Vantage, Mercedes-AMG G63, Porsche Cayenne, Rolls-Royce Cullinan, Bugatti Veyron, Lamborghini Murcielago SV, Ducati Panigale V4 S…
The luxury hobby of Long Thanh Plastic’s successor makes many people forget the name Pham Tran Nhat Minh, the successor, and simply call him Minh “nhua.” Even when mentioning Long Thanh Plastic, many people often think of the name Minh “nhua” with the hobby of owning supercars rather than pallets, coolers, plastic safes… even though this company has been on the market for 30 years.
The public’s curiosity about the lives of the rich, along with Nhat Minh’s unique interests and personality, has attracted almost all of the press when it comes to the family business. Meanwhile, both Mr. and Mrs. Pham Van Muoi – Tran Thi Bach, the two founders – and the business situation of the family-owned company over the past 30 years remain a mystery to many people. This appearance in Forbes Vietnam magazine can be considered the only one since Long Thanh Plastics was established, when the founders officially contacted the media.
Nhat Minh came to the interview with Forbes Vietnam in a brand new Bentley with a four-digit number plate 9. His entourage of six people and his own photography team. Different from his usual casual style of T-shirts, shorts, and slippers, Minh wore an elegant suit. The 40-year-old businessman said: "It's rare that I can convince my parents to dress up for a photo shoot, let alone for the newspaper. This time can be considered a lifetime photo shoot."
Vietnam’s plastics industry can be roughly divided into four main production segments: high-tech plastics used in the electronics industry, packaging plastics, construction plastics, and household plastics. While the first two segments require technology and FDI enterprises dominate the market, domestic companies dominate the latter two segments due to their advantages in logistics and distribution systems.
Family business tradition, financial accumulation for reinvestment, and a position in a specific industry in the market have helped Long Thanh maintain business efficiency for decades without using external capital. The company built its reputation on exclusive products for industrial production activities of large customers.
Long Thanh Plastic is well known for its plastic crate products for famous beverage brands such as Heineken, Saigon Beer, Tiger, Budweiser, Coca Cola, Pepsi... with two main products being pallets and plastic waves (also known as plastic crates or plastic trays). These are two necessary products for large factories and warehouses, especially in the garment, seafood, logistics industries...
According to the company's self-declaration, pallets and plastic pallets alone bring in 70-80% of revenue. In addition, Long Thanh Plastic is also a supplier of plastic packaging for two leading pesticide manufacturers in the market, Bayer and Syngenta. In 2022, the company's revenue is estimated to reach 1,000 billion VND, a mid-range scale compared to big names such as Duy Tan, Binh Minh Plastic, and Tien Phong Plastic with revenue of 5,000-6,000 billion VND.
The family that owns Long Thanh Plastics: Mr. Pham Van Muoi (right), Ms. Tran Thi Bach and successor Pham Tran Nhat Minh. Photo: Harry Vu
Long Thanh Plastic operates as a family business with 97% of shares held by the founder's family members. Mr. Muoi steers the company, seeks and builds major partners, while his wife holds the keys, controls negotiations and contract execution. Nhat Minh is the only child, the sole heir, responsible for operating some production areas, improving logistics, and automation.
In this rare contact with the media, Mr. Muoi recounted the start-up phase of his family's business, which started by chance, from a small workshop with three plastic bag blowing machines and plastic cans. This was the property of a Chinese family in Cho Lon market that was transferred before they settled abroad. From there, his family gradually switched to many other household plastic products and gradually grew.
The initial difficulties were huge for them due to lack of experience, and having to compete fiercely with families who passed the business down from generation to generation, supporting each other. This business was described by Mr. Minh as “buying by the kilo and selling by the piece.” This is also Long Thanh’s criterion to minimize the waste of raw materials, which accounts for 70-80% of the cost.
He himself actively socialized, and his wife "spent every penny she earned buying more machinery and land." Mr. Muoi's family's land kept growing, from a few houses in District 6 to buying dozens of hectares of land for production in Binh Tan.
The process of accumulating experience and investing in equipment and factories has gradually helped Long Thanh become capable of receiving large orders. From manufacturing pallets, plastic pallets to beer crates, chemical containers... which require high durability, precise techniques and low defect rates. "Because of the high demands of customers, Long Thanh almost 'makes and eats' itself to ensure quality, not using processing facilities like many other units in the same industry," said Mr. Minh.
There was a period in the mid-2000s when Long Thanh Plastics was the largest supplier for Samsung Thu Duc factory, specializing in LCD TV covers and bases. The cooperation went smoothly for a few years before ending due to changes in policies between the two sides.
According to Mr. Minh, processing high-tech plastic products for global partners brings a good reputation to the company but the profit margin is very thin compared to traditional sectors. The reason is that big names control the profit margin of suppliers while the pressure on delivery and the rate of defective products is unprecedentedly severe.
“When we first started, Long Thanh was one of 16 suppliers, and became the largest and only supplier for Samsung thanks to the advantage of abundant capital. Even so, this business was too stressful,” said Mr. Minh.
Meanwhile, Mr. Minh shared that the cash that his parents always saved up for reinvestment was probably because their family was heavily influenced by the business practices of the Chinese community. Mr. Muoi and Mrs. Bach lived simply, worked hard, saved for investment, and always let their children help their parents early. He and his wife still kept the habit of going to the factory 12 hours a day, even on holidays. As the only son, the “golden spoon” child of the family, Mr. Minh still worked as a warehouse worker since he was a teenager, and was sometimes forgotten on the scaffolding in the warehouse when the warehouse keeper thought everyone had gone home.
In his youth, working hard with his hands, the rustic style of the owners of Long Thanh Plastics has not changed even when their assets have grown. For more than 30 years, people have always seen Mr. Muoi in simple clothes, T-shirts and shorts, even in the rare family photos posted by his children and grandchildren. Only when taking the first business-style photos for Forbes Vietnam did Mr. Muoi wear a European suit brought by his son. And he only agreed to buy one suit chosen for the photo!
The mass media mentions Minh “nhua” as a fierce car player in Vietnam. However, few people expect that Mr. Muoi is also a connoisseur of cars and motorcycles, who has inspired and passionately in his son. “Minh’s father had a motorbike and drove Minh from Saigon to Da Lat. For other children, their mother would usually let them sit between them. But Minh refused, he liked to sit in front with the gas tank. Minh wore a warm coat and hugged the gas tank,” Minh once recounted in the press.
Father and son Pham Van Muoi and Pham Tran Nhat Minh. Photo: Harry Vu
The number 405 in Long Thanh’s logo comes from the Peugeot 405, the car that Finnish racer Ari Vatanen used to win the Paris Dakar rally in 1990, the year his family started their plastics business. Mr. Muoi believes that number means victory and luck to him, so he bought a Peugeot 405 version and placed it prominently in the yard of the main factory.
Mr. Muoi did not hesitate to buy his son the most expensive cars on the market. The same passion, but different personalities and ways of expressing passionate love made his son become a famous name on social networks, while he himself is still an extremely secretive "player". Paying attention to feng shui, Mr. Muoi even named the name "Long Thanh" after his father-in-law's shoe store, the famous Long Thanh Cho Lon shoe store of the Tran family, with the hope of having "luck" in business.
The father's emphasis on spirituality and the mother's devotion influenced his son, Nhat Minh, who devoutly practiced the Tantric sect. Mr. Minh said that practicing was also a way to cure his somewhat hot-tempered and difficult-to-control temperament. Long Thanh's successor is only 40 years old, has five sons and daughters, and has had two grandchildren for several years.
Actively participating in the family business, trying to prove his ability to his parents, Nhat Minh understands that he is different from the previous generation. “I value personal branding, and I am comfortable with using financial leverage, investing in land, stocks, and even virtual currency. Of course, the money I use is personal money, not company money.” He said that in the past four years, he has convinced his father to abandon the family's savings tradition and use the money to buy many valuable real estates in Ho Chi Minh City, Da Lat, Da Nang , and Phu Quoc.
Nhat Minh started participating in corporate governance after graduating from Hung Vuong University with a degree in Foreign Trade. With the conditions and business connections from his family, he studied in many places, including a trip to South Korea to study at Samsung headquarters. In management, Nhat Minh admits to having a tendency towards technocratism, streamlining teams and promoting automation.
Thanks to the accumulated financial capital, the company can implement many of Nhat Minh's ideas such as building a semi-automatic factory system, building a distribution center (sorting center) using robots to transport goods and materials instead of workers. "This 10,000m2 center can be said to be typical of the plastic industry, from importing goods to taking goods out, using only 1/10 of the previous labor force," he said proudly.
Since the company implemented its plan to increase automation five years ago, Mr. Minh said it has reduced about 50% of its total workforce of more than 1,000 employees. “There are inefficient departments that I have reduced to automate them to be more efficient. There are also departments that I have recruited for new projects. There is a lot of work to do but the efficiency is not as expected,” he said.
Mr. Minh affirmed that the company's remuneration is always 15-20% higher than the industry average, but the requirements for personnel are also very high, or perhaps because his projects are difficult and complicated. He said that in just the past year, six directors under him have come and gone, including three marketing directors, two sales directors, and one human resources director.
Mr. Minh said he is nurturing many projects, with a new 8,000m2 factory about to open in Da Nang, or a 5-hectare bonded warehouse in Binh Tan being converted into a factory to produce new products. His company website, Facebook page, and personal YouTube channel are actively promoting consumer plastic products such as drinking cups or travel coolers. “In just 2-3 years, Long Thanh’s revenue could triple its current revenue,” the company’s deputy general director confidently said.
Entering their seventies, Mr. Muoi and Mrs. Bach have never wanted to stop working. The efforts and aspirations of the next generation of managers are also supported by their grandparents. Long Thanh’s business results show a steady annual profit margin of 10-15%, a large, long-term, and specific customer base that keeps the company “healthy.”
According to his confession, many partners from Thailand, Singapore, and Japan have offered to buy the entire company or own shares, but all have been rejected. Among them, the offer from Japan in 2020 was "very strong, very attractive", according to Mr. Minh. He affirmed that Long Thanh does not need more capital but also understands that investment from Japan can bring other great benefits, such as new customers and upgrades in management and operations.
Finally, Mr. Muoi and Mrs. Bach decided to keep all the company shares intact for the sole successor Pham Tran Nhat Minh. Considered a lucky son, with parents who cared for him very much, Minh “nhua”’s position in the hearts of the founders of Long Thanh Plastics was probably many times more important than the company’s future.
Forbes.vn
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