Targeting the Chinese New Year festivities, when sweets are in high demand, in the 1970s, Ed. A. Keller designed a special Lunar New Year aluminium box for Sugus candies, imported from Switzerland. Auspiciously painted red, the Chinese color for good luck, and filled with candies, this item quickly became a sales hit, with the Keller group selling more than 1 million kilos of Sugus per year in Hong Kong.

People in Hong Kong eagerly snapped up all the boxes they could find as presents for family and friends. Many were exported to China, and some even traveled to San Francisco. Even dentists were regular customers as they used the sweets to reward well behaved children for their bravery at their clinics.

It all goes to show: being truly interested in people and in determining what drives them allows us to understand local consumers and successfully exploit business opportunities.