揭秘中国首富宗庆后的"娃哈哈"生活

Despite being one of China's most prominent businessmen, Zong Qinghou still uses the gritty metaphors that bear the mark of a youth spent tilling rural fields during the Cultural Revolution.

身为中国最知名的商人之一，宗庆后仍然会使用一些粗俗的比喻。这是青年时期的宗庆后在文化大革命期间下乡耕田的经历在他身上留下的印记。

When discussing the succession plans at his multibillion-dollar Wahaha empire, he notes that Kelly Zong, his 31-year-old daughter, has already taken over some of the corporate responsibilities, before adding: “If she has any problems, I'll go and wipe her butt.”

他的娃哈哈(Wahaha)帝国价值数十亿美元。在讨论接班计划时，他提到31岁的女儿宗馥莉已经接手企业的部分职责，随后补充道：“如果她出了问题，我会去帮她擦屁股。”

However, with or without the earthy Chinese phrase, talk of succession is much too premature for the 67-year-old beverage tycoon. Ranked as China's wealthiest man, with an estimated fortune of $13bn according to the Hurun Rich List, Mr Zong has no desire to let go of the company he founded in the near future. Outside of work, he says with a raspy laugh, his only hobbies are drinking tea and smoking cigarettes.

不过，无论用不用这类粗俗的中文表达，讨论接班计划对这位67岁的饮料大亨还为时尚早。在胡润百富榜(Hurun Rich List)上，宗庆后以130亿美元的财富位居中国首富，而他还无意在短期内放手自己创立的公司。他以粗嘎的嗓音大笑着说道，工作之余，喝茶和抽烟是他仅有的爱好。

Yet it has been a tough six months for Mr Zong. In November he began a strategic shift in his business, branching into retail operations with the opening of WAOW Plaza, a boutique shopping mall in his home town of Hangzhou, near Shanghai. He plans to open 100 malls over the next five years, with a view to bringing affordable luxury to middle-class Chinese in the form of less well-known European brands such as Groc from Spain and Gregory from Italy.

但过去六个月，宗庆后过得并不轻松。去年11月，他开始实施业务的战略转型，进军零售业务，在位于上海附近的家乡杭州开设了精品商城——娃欧商场(WAOW Plaza)。他计划在未来5年开设100家商场，销售西班牙Groc、意大利Gregory等知名度较低的欧洲品牌，旨在为中国中产阶级提供“买得起的奢侈品”。

But WAOW has had a bad start. The name, which is short for Wahaha Europe, has been mocked, few customers have passed through the mall's doors and analysts have questioned the wisdom of entering bricks-and-mortar retail when online shopping is booming.

但娃欧商场开局不佳。寓意为“娃哈哈欧洲”的商场名称遭到外界嘲笑，生意门可罗雀，分析人士则质疑：在网络购物蓬勃发展的背景下，进军实体店零售是否明智？

If Mr Zong is worried, he is not showing it. “It's no problem,” he smiles. “It just takes time to build a brand. I like this kind of thing. After all, I got my start selling ice cream and I built a brand through the hard work of selling my product.”

即便宗庆后担心，他也没有将担心流露出来。“这不是问题，”他笑道，“打造品牌需要时间。我喜欢这种过程。毕竟，我靠卖冰激凌发家，通过努力销售产品打出了品牌。”

The start of his career in commerce came after enduring Mao's Cultural Revolution. In 1966, Mr Zong's high school closed its doors and he, like millions of students, was sent to the countryside to work alongside peasants.

熬过毛泽东文化大革命的苦难后，他开始了从商生涯。1966年，宗庆后就读的高中关门停课，他同其他数百万学生一样被下放农村，与农民一起劳动。

When he returned to Hangzhou 15 years later, it was in the throes of a very different kind of revolution: China had begun to roll back the powers of the state in the 1980s and the city was a hotbed for private enterprise. He began in business in 1987 with a licence to sell snacks at schools. Mr Zong sold ice cream and soft drinks, and nearly a decade later hit upon mineral water as his prized offering when many Chinese still lacked running water in their homes.

当他15年后回到杭州时，这座城市正在经历一场截然不同的剧变：上世纪80年代，中国开始削减国家权力，杭州成为私营企业的温床。1987年，他获准在学校售卖零食，开始做生意。宗庆后卖冰激凌和软饮料，将近10年后，他开始主打矿泉水产品——当时很多中国家庭还享受不到自来水。

The experience of going from survival mode to richest man in China perhaps explains Mr Zong's supreme self-assurance. It has also coloured his views of the world.

从勉强糊口到中国首富的经历，或许能解释宗庆后为何具有超人的自信。这段经历也丰富了他的世界观。

For 11 consecutive years he has attended the annual session of China's parliament as a delegate. Within the parameters for free speech that exist, he relishes the opportunity to make his voice heard. “You've got to cut taxes to make room for ordinary people,” he says between drags of cigarettes in a hotel suite that doubles as his office during the two weeks of this year's parliament in mid-March. “The government is taking too much money and leaving too little for the ordinary people.”

宗庆后连续11年以代表身份出席中国一年一度的全国人大会议。在允许的言论自由范围内，他十分珍惜发言的机会。今年3月中旬左右为期两周的人大会议期间，他在足有自己办公室两倍大的酒店套房内，边抽烟边说道：“为了减轻老百姓的负担，一定要减税。政府拿走了太多钱，老百姓得到的太少。”

As much as a multibillionaire can, Mr Zong tries to maintain a modest image. In the past, he has worn a $48,000 Vacheron Constantin watch, but when we meet he is not wearing it. After a series of scandals in which government officials were exposed as corrupt simply because of their expensive watches, bare wrists are suddenly de rigueur in Beijing.

尽管身为亿万富翁，宗庆后却尽力保持低调。过去，他一直佩戴着一块价值4.8万美元的江诗丹顿(Vacheron Constantin)手表，但与我见面时他并未将表戴在手腕上。之前接连有政府官员因为戴高价手表被揭出腐败丑闻，于是不戴手表突然成了中国官场的规矩。

His hotel is comfortable but hardly luxurious, he wears a simple jacket with a zipper front and he chain-smokes Davidoff cigarettes – a midrange brand in China.

他下榻的酒店舒适但不豪华。他穿着朴素的拉链夹克，不停地抽着大卫杜夫(Davidoff)的香烟——这在中国属于中端品牌。

He wags his finger disapprovingly as he extols his view of the state's role in business. “Europe has high social benefits and high tax, and this has led to no one working, it has created your economic problem,” he says. “We need to maintain equality of opportunity here, to let people pay their way through their own hard work.”

他一边赞扬着国家对商业的作用，一边不以为然地摇摇手指。“欧洲社会福利高、税收高，所以没人工作。这导致了你们的经济问题，”他说，“在中国我们需要维持机会平等，让人们通过辛勤的劳动挣钱。”

Wahaha, which means “laughing baby”, established itself as China's top drinks company after it formed a joint venture with Danone of France in 1996. Their partnership soured in 2007 when Danone accused Mr Zong of running parallel companies that competed directly with the joint venture, in which Danone had a 51 per cent stake, under the same trademark. Mr Zong denied all of Danone's allegations and said Wahaha's success was thanks to his understanding of the market.

娃哈哈名字的寓意是“笑哈哈的孩童”。在1996年与法国达能(Danone)组成合资企业后，娃哈哈确立了中国头号饮料公司的地位。2007年，双方合作关系恶化：达能指责宗庆后同时经营平行企业，使用相同的商标与合资企业（达能持有51%股份）直接展开竞争。宗庆后否认了达能的所有指控，并表示娃哈哈的成功得益于他对市场的了解。

Some of the rhetoric used by Mr Zong and his supporters during the dispute brought to mind his formative years in the tea fields and rice paddies during the Cultural Revolution. In one public letter to Danone, employees calling themselves “Chairman Zong's army” said the French directors were “rascals”, and Chinese who co-operated with them were “traitors”.

在纠纷中，宗庆后及支持者的言论令人想起文革时他在茶园和稻田的成长经历。在致达能的一封公开信中，员工自称为“宗总的子弟兵”，将法方董事称为“无赖”，将与法方合作的中国人称为“汉奸”。

A settlement was reached in 2009 after a partial award in Danone's favour. Under the terms of the deal, Mr Zong bought Danone's stake for about 300m ($440m at the time).

2009年仲裁机构发布了有利于达能的“部分判决”，双方达成和解。根据和解条款，宗庆后支付3亿欧元（当时合4.4亿美元）收购达能在合资企业中的股份。

The fight with Danone appears to have put one lasting dent in his otherwise formidable confidence. Wahaha has plenty of cash – its net profits last year were Rmb8bn ($1.3bn) – and Mr Zong says he has asked advisers to recommend overseas acquisition targets. But he is wary of trying to sell into foreign markets.

与达能的纠纷似乎对宗庆后本来无与伦比的自信造成了持久的伤害。娃哈哈现金充足——公司去年净利润为80亿元人民币（13亿美元），宗庆后亦表示已请顾问推荐海外收购目标。但他似乎不愿将产品销往国外。

“I've told them to find me companies making products that China is unable to produce,” he says. “I'll buy the companies and then bring the products into China. Otherwise I'd be buying companies that are still just competing in their own countries, and sooner or later others will catch up.”

“我让他们帮我寻找其产品中国无法生产的公司，”他说，“我要收购这些公司，再将产品引进中国。不然的话，我买的就会是些还在本国市场竞争的公司，它们迟早会被别人追上。”

Wahaha did make a foray of a kind into Britain this year. In January it signed a three-year sponsorship deal with Manchester United, paying for the right to use the football club's name and images in its soft-drink advertisements in China. Wahaha's adverts now feature pictures of Wayne Rooney next to cans of Qili, an energy drink. “Chinese people love football, but the quality of Chinese football itself is very poor, so the deal made sense,” Mr Zong says.

娃哈哈今年确实做出了进军海外的努力，在英国进行了一笔投资。今年1月，它与曼联(Manchester United)足球俱乐部签署三年赞助合同，根据交易，娃哈哈出资赞助，换取在中国的软饮料广告中使用曼联名称和肖像的权利。在娃哈哈现在的广告中，韦恩??鲁尼(Wayne Rooney)的形象出现在功能饮料启力的一侧。宗庆后说：“中国人热爱足球，但中国足球本身水平很低，因此这笔交易是有意义的。”

For the super-rich in China, gaining the government's blessing is essential for continued success. Academic studies have found that those who make it on to China's rich lists are more likely than ordinary entrepreneurs to face investigations and arrests because their high profile attracts greater scrutiny. Mr Zong, however, has been spared any such trouble.

对中国的富豪而言，获得政府撑腰是不断取得成功的关键因素。学术研究发现，跻身中国富豪榜的人比普通企业家更容易遭到调查和逮捕，因为他们“树大招风”。但宗庆后却完全没有惹上这样的麻烦。

A sign of his established position within the country's corridors of power came during China's parliament: Wahaha beverages, from milk drinks to mineral water, were being dispensed for free on the sidelines of the meetings.

他在中国权力走廊的牢固地位，在人大会议中得到了印证：在会议间歇，娃哈哈的牛奶饮品和矿泉水等饮料向代表们免费发放。

Mr Zong also knows how to flatter those in power, another essential survival skill. So it is hardly surprising to hear him heap praise on Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang, China's new leaders. But his choice of compliments is telling – he brings it back to their hard-working youths as students who, like him, were sent to toil on farms.

宗庆后还懂得如何讨好当权者，这是另一项基本生存技能。因此，他对中国新任领导人习近平和李克强的盛赞并不出人意料。但宗庆后的措辞很有他的特点——他将时光拉回习李艰苦的学生时代，二人也曾像宗庆后一样被下放农村干活。

“These are guys who have been up mountains and down to the countryside,” he says. “They have also eaten bitterness.”

他说：“他们是上过山下过乡的人。他们也吃过苦。”