Lionel is from Zurich, Switzerland. He was the first person I interviewed for this blog. Before we sat down for the interview, all I knew about him was that he has a house in Hong Kong. I asked him, "Has Hong Kong been good to you?" His answer was a resounding "Yes!"
I thought, perhaps he was going to tell me how he did well from buying and selling property in Hong Kong. During the interview, he quickly corrected me. He is not a property speculator.
Lionel says he likes Hong Kong because of the ease of communication and the Hong Kong currency being freely convertible and that there's free speech.
Lionel came to Hong Kong in the 1990's as a student. He studied Finance at the Hong Kong University Of Science And Technology. Even before graduating, he was already looking at businesses he could go into. Before long, he had a plan. He was going to be a publisher of glossy magazines that focused on luxury products.
"What made you go in to publishing?" I asked him. "I studied the locals behaviour of conspicuous consumption. Then I saw that no one addressed it via publications geared at luxury consumers. Coupled with the fact that it's an instant cashflow business. People pay you in advance if necessary," said Lionel.
As soon as he graduated, Lionel started to work on setting up his business with the help of only one personal assistant.
He started publishing Talkies in 1999 followed by Winners in 2001. In 2007, Lionel made a name change to one of his magazines. Talkies became Baccarat. Lionel mentioned another magazine that focused on tobacco.
Soon, he was also in the production business. His advertisers needed glossy photos of their latest products. Rather than have a full time crew doing photo shoots, what he did was hire part-time professional photographers to do the photo shoots when needed. He also hired part-time professional writers to write for his magazines.
When sales from advertising started to come in, Lionel said he of course, started to hire full time staff specially for the sales department. Over the years, one thing Lionel said he has learned on the job was that he preferred to employ women over men. Women tend to be more loyal and stay with the company way longer. Women are very good workers according to Lionel. "The important thing is to train them," said Lionel.
I asked him if he had to work hard. "It was hard work!" he said. "Everyday I was at the offices of advertisers, pitching my print magazines and taking them out for lunch or dinner!"
Lionel said business was good right from the start. And advertisers were willing to pay more for ads that were wrapped around his magazines. This way, readers saw the ad before they even saw the front page of his magazine.
When asked how much money he had to put as capital at the start of his business, Lionel said he's forgotten. "It was twenty years ago!," he exclaims, throwing his hands up in the air.
To get more info, I decided to use Google. I dug up an old online article from The Wall Street Journal (Asia Edition) dated Nov.15, 2001 that mentioned Burberry, Emporio Armani and Ralph Lauren as regular advertisers of Lionel's magazines.
The same article also mentioned that Talkies had a circulation of 20,000 with half of it given free to Cathay Pacific Airlines and Dragonair. Winners, the newly-launched magazine in 2001 was priced at HK$40.00 also had a circulation of 20,000 copies and again half of it was given away free to upmarket restaurants, clubs, Cathay Pacific, and Dragonair.
That fact that Lionel was able to get Cathay Pacific and Dragonair to agree to put a copy of his magazines in the backseat of every passenger seat of their aircraft cabins was I believe his biggest advantage.
Lionel had successfully identified a niche. Of course he wasn't the first to find that niche but that didn't worry him. I asked him if there was anything he learned in school that he found useful in business. "Nothing," he said, then after a second added, "except of course the basic stuff."
Later, Lionel realized that his magazines would be more interesting if he had well-known TV and movie personalities on the front page. Soon, movie actors and actresses were gracing the front cover of his magazines.
But by 2008 Lionel became concerned about the growing popularity of online advertising and how it was going to affect his business.
So, when a regional publishing house made an offer to buy him out, Lionel said he made a purely business decision and accepted the offer. This was in 2008, ten years after he founded his publishing business.
I asked him if he has ever regretted his decision. "No, never," he replied.
I asked him how long it took him to earn his first HK$1M after launching his magazine. "One year," he replied. And how long did it take to earn his first US$1M? He replies, "Four years".
I never asked him his age, but I found an old online article about him published in 2001 that said Lionel was 30 years old that year. Which means he was only 37 years old in 2008 when he sold his publishing business. Imagine that, retired with millions at 37!
Lionel told me that after selling his company, he agreed to stay on for three years and left at the end of the third year.
I did asked him how much he sold his publishing business for but he refused to disclose it.
Nowadays, Lionel is consultant and broker to people in the tobacco industry.
