COPCO is one of the companies which stands out in the packaging production crowd. Sophia Fu provides an insight into how the Chinese company has been setting benchmarks for the beauty industry as it scores with multiple new products, premium quality service and a forward-thinking broad service offering of design and tooling through to production.

Sophia, what's your role at COPCO and what does it entail?

I'm the Marketing Director at COPCO and in that position it is my responsibility to manage the market promotion of COPCO's products as well as key accounts at the company.

COPCO is located in Guangzhou in China, a city which is well known internationally for its manufacturing businesses and benefiting a sea port for world trading, so ensuring that our products stand out and are well promoted is an important position.

What are the products and services which COPCO provides?

COPCO offers a one-stop packaging solution: We provide a complete service from design and tooling all the way to production. Our focus is on quality control and providing on-time delivery to ensure customer satisfaction.

We work with companies from North America in Canada and the United States, as well as in Australia and many European countries. Our products are designed for the beauty and cosmetic industry, with a focus towards personal care and hair lines. Previously we also developed products for the food industry and other fields; but in 2016 we took the active measure to concentrate our focus on the beauty industry to ensure that our service level is notably strong, upscale and superior to that of our competitors.

World famous companies such as L'Oréal group and other international brands choose to work with COPCO because we can provide them with a broad service offering.

How does the company differentiate itself?

At COPCO, we offer the upmost professional and efficient service, which is a very different ethos to that of other Chinese companies. This is achieved as all staff reply to enquiries within a maximum of 24 hours, offering the best possible solution within hours.

Another very important factor is quality control management. We only work with good quality, reliable suppliers, that ensure their quality through their own certified operation systems, control and management. This was achieved in 2015 and now COPCO has very strict requirements for all of its suppliers.

You stated that you work with famous international brands. How does COPCO attain new business?

It's because of the company's extensive product offering. Within the beauty market we explore new business and opportunities by attending many international exhibitions and events each year. We also promote ourselves on Webpackaging to achieve this goal.

Many of our customers return to us. We service them with very specific products and over a period of time the relationship develops to that of a stable business partner as we are able to offer them a wider range of products. It is also to our merit that many of our customers recommend our products and services and we have increased our business. COPCO has seen very stable expansion and benefits from remarkable sales figures which continue to go up. It's really positive company growth.

The company web site and identity has recently been updated. What was the reason behind that?

It was time to make a change as the company is differentiating itself from being "Made in China". The new focus for the company is to be branded as "Design and development in China" and "Premium quality in China".

The concept of "Made in China" has been world recognized for decades; however, it has garnered a reputation as being low price and cheap quality. By rebranding ourselves and updating our company identity we are stating to the world that "Made in China" is also good quality. International business is essential to the Chinese economy and the country has been transforming to offer a better and higher quality image.

The new logo color is based on traditional Chinese elements and is in the form of a "P" for packaging. It incorporates the 5 major Chinese element colors: wood, fire, earth, gold and water, and it is a positive life cycle representing sustainability. COPCO is a trustworthy and sustainable company which provides a great place of work and offers positive growth for those of us who work here.

It's also important to recognize that while the current global economy and Chinese domestic economy are somewhat down, the packaging business is not. Hence at COPCO we will continue to work on giving better service, solutions and designs so that we can satisfy customers.

What is the COPCO working towards at the moment?

Human resources and financial management are the company's current focus and we are lucky that we already have positive solutions in place in order to resolve these issues.

To expand our current business model, we have been hiring more professionals and bought a new office building which is scheduled to be ready for use in the first quarter of 2019. COPCO has excellent business credit in China so expansion based on our positive growth has been easy to secure. We have also been using a staff education system, particularly when we hire new members of staff, to share our knowledge and business know-how with new employees to ensure that they are professional and continue to grow in a highly professional manner.

With regard to products, is there anything new on the horizon?

We're always exploring the expansion of our product ranges and introduce a new product every week.

Our new product development strategy is defined as "Collection Design". By collating a customer's requirements, we can source and gather a complete line of packaging solution for any new project within time and budget limitations.

In May, Collection Design will be presented at the Interpack exhibition in Düsseldorf, showcasing new products which haven't been seen at the event before. We will also be introducing several of our well-designed and patented products to the German market as it is renowned for its adoption of smart packaging solutions.

In November, we will be at Cosmoprof Asia which is the biggest beauty event in Asia, taking place in Hong Kong and visitors can see our latest creations there.