3,600 crystal diamonds
His father kept an eye on his doings without coming out in support until eventually website visitors started phoning in lots of orders. His father then realized that the website was effective. Before that point, however, when father and son were still at odds over the issue of branding, Rangting had made an emotional appeal to his father: "This is your last battle, but it's just the first for me and my two older brothers. If we don't establish a brand, how are we going to compete in the future when cross-strait trade is liberalized and mainland goods start flooding in?"
Rangting stresses that a basic no-frills deity outfit made in Taiwan cost NT$500 a few years ago, but makers in the mainland could quickly make knock-offs and sell them at NT$100, so without brand power there would be no way to survive.
The firm renamed itself Shen Fu Creative Embroidery in 2007, and began promoting the idea of "letting the deities have a frequent change of outfits." It sought to differentiate itself from low-priced mainland Chinese competitors by stressing the fact that Shen Fu embroiders completely by hand and offers made-to-order products based on the customer's own specs. In 2008 Shen Fu started selling via a home shopping channel on television, and the stylishly displayed products attracted customers from as far away as Hong Kong and Singapore.
However, branding is no easy task. Rangting often received threatening phone calls from stores that formerly carried his family's goods, and of over 1,000 distributors and stores that they once worked with, only two still stuck by them.
To stay ahead of the competition, Shen Fu had to be continually creative, and worked hard to make deity outfits that broke free from tradition in interesting new ways. Incorporating fashion design elements, they launched a series of eight new miniature deity outfits, each with a different color theme, including a "romantic pink outfit" for the Mysterious Lady of the Ninth Heaven, and a "wise blue outfit" for the Earth God and Hua Tuo the Healer. In addition, baseball is a very popular sport in Taiwan, and provided Shen Fu with the inspiration for six "baseball outfits" for the goddess Mazu, comprising a du dou undergarment, long-sleeved undershirt, short-sleeved outer shirt, imperial robe, cape, and phoenix hat. All these products are sold online, and have been a big hit among younger buyers.
When the birthday of Mazu was celebrated at Peitian Shrine in Puzi in 2008, Rangting hired a craftsman to sew 1,800 Swarovski crystal diamonds onto the imperial robe of "He Who Sees One Thousand Leagues," and another 1,800 on that of "He Who Hears on the Wind" to make the divine generals all the more eye-catching when they took to the parade route to survey their domains. Onlookers were stunned at the sight, and since then a lot of deep-pocketed buyers have asked specifically for deity outfits studded with crystal diamonds.
Since the third generation took over the family business, oldest brother Zhou Weizhong has been running the factory in the mainland, second brother Zhou Huanzhi has been in charge of business promotion in northern Taiwan, and third brother Zhou Rangting has been handling R&D and business promotion in southern Taiwan. The endlessly creative Rangting came up with the idea of decorating their dragon-shaped embroideries with lace, and the high-class feel it imparts has proven highly popular with female deities. For the past two years, moreover, he has been incorporating LED lights into his deity outfits, which makes the gods and divine generals an especially impressive sight while out on pilgrimages at night time, and adds to the excitement of temple fairs.
Embroidery is an extremely laborious process. Shown above is a pattern embroidered from silver and gold thread. The outfit at the lower left is studded with crystal diamonds, while the one at the lower right features four-thread float stitches, the highest quality to be found on the market today.