Primo Japan has recently entered into a three-way joint venture agreement with our subsidiary company Primo Diamond Taiwan and the Japanese jewelry company K.Uno. Our joint venture company Kuno Primo Co., Ltd. is pleased to announce the grand opening on August 6, 2019 of the K.Uno Taiepei Zhongxiao Store, which is also K.Uno’s first store in Taiwan.

With the opening of the first K.Uno store in Taiwan, Primo Japan offers its expertise on overseas business development, along with Primo Diamond Taiwan’s highly skilled managerial and sales staff, who combine overseas training in Japanese-style customer service with their knowledge of the Taiwanese market, along with a proven track record of successfully opening new stores. Melissa Teng, the store manager of K.Uno’s first store in Taiwan, is an excellent example. Melissa came to Japan from Taiwan as an Overseas Technical Intern participating in two sessions of Primo Japan’s Global Human Resources Development Program over one year from July 2018 to June 2019. While living alongside Japanese employees and attending training programs, Melissa was able to learn about Japanese hospitality in detail. This experience as an Overseas Technical Intern prepared her well for her current role as a K.Uno store manager, in which she is expected to create a store environment that communicates K.Uno’s brand ethos of bringing “Made in Japan” manufacturing to the world. Here, she tells us how she feels about taking the next step in her career, building on her experience as an Overseas Technical Intern, to become the store manager to introduce a new brand to Taiwan.

■You successfully managed the grand opening without any difficulties. Congratulations.

Melissa: Yes, thank you. The days were busy right up until the grand opening doing things such as learning as much as I could about this new brand and making preparations to open the store, so I was relieved when we were able to open the store successfully. Taiwan doesn’t have an “order-made” culture, so I was worried about whether Taiwanese consumers would accept this way of buying jewelry. But so many customers came from the first day we opened, and I could really sense the value that the brand offers while watching customers enjoying the experience of seeing the designs being drawn right there in front of them.

■What kinds of things did you learn as an Overseas Technical Intern in Japan?

Melissa: First of all, I was able to experience various aspects of Japanese culture and hospitality firsthand by living in Japan. In my daily life there, I experienced conscientious, detail-oriented customer service that I had never had in Taiwan, and it made me think again about how to offer excellent customer service that puts customers at ease. In the training program, I was also able to learn various aspects of business management, such as management theory and analytical methods, which I could not learn while working in a store. When I came back to Taiwan, and put what I had learned into practice while I actually working in the same store with the same staff members as we prepared for the grand opening, I felt that I had learned a lot in Japan about ways of communicating and interacting with my team.

Beginning with Taiwan, and expanding into Hong Kong and mainland China, Primo Japan will continue to develop our multi-brand approach in each area and to nurture human resources who can play an active role in various locations and brands through our Global Human Resources Development Program.