Before the market crashed, in 1987, Mr. Lam bought a troubled hotel in Philadelphia and managed to t

Dear fellow Chinese students, cheap car rental in new zealand this article shares with you an inspirational story that will make you so proud. It is a true American Dream story of a Chinese immigrant who worked in a restaurant when he just arrived at the US at 17 and worked all his way up to the real estate king of NYC if not the US. It is the legend of Mr. John Lam, CEO of the Lam Group , which is one of the largest US real estate companies, and one of the most successful hotel developers. We are lucky to do the interview with Mr. Lam and take a peek of what make him so successful. It's a longer article than what we usually do but I assure you it's worth it.
Mr. Lam was born in Taishan, Guangdong and started helping with the family business since a kid. At 17, his family moved to NYC. He got a job in a restaurant. At that time, it was a job sought after by lots of Chinese immigrant because there were too little choices. The career path would be working hard to be a cook and then perhaps opening his own restaurant cheap car rental in new zealand one day. In 2 weeks, Mr. Lam decided that this was not his career because he's not particular about food hence wouldn't make a good cook. And the investment would be too high to learn the business because it would require him to try each restaurant.
Meanwhile, garment industry was booming in NYC. With no background, Mr. Lam walked into a factory and asked for a job. Impressed by his courage, the owner employed him. Shortly, Mr. Lam got himself familiar with the garment business inside out. Although he was promoted quickly, he figured he wouldn't be able to support his family if he kept working as an employee. So he decided to start his own garment factory.
Mr. Lam managed to gather $5000 from his own saving and his family's, cheap car rental in new zealand and got a $5000 bank loan. With this $10,000, Mr. Lam started his own garment factory. Not long after he started his own business, his former boss got sick and wanted Mr. Lam to go back help manage his business. Grateful to his former boss who brought him into the industry, Mr. Lam accepted cheap car rental in new zealand the request. By enhancing the manufacturing procedure, Mr. Lam was able to greatly increase the productivity. After his boss recovered from illness, Mr. Lam had already doubled the profit of the factory. The boss hoped Mr. Lam to stay but Mr. Lam was determined to start his own business. The boss then offered to sell his factory to Mr. Lam. This was an opportunity that Mr. Lam had to obtain. So he made an offer that people couldn't reject. Instead of negotiating with the boss on the quote, Mr. Lam doubled the quote. cheap car rental in new zealand I believe this was also how Mr. Lam say thank you to the boss.
In order to compete, cheap car rental in new zealand Mr. Lam worked hard on developing new fabric by himself. He flew around the world to source materials. He also spent a lot of time reverse cheap car rental in new zealand engineered fabric from Europe. In each season, he could come up with new product or marketing ideas. Later on he created his own clothing brand. Within less than 10 years, his company became the largest garment cheap car rental in new zealand company in NYC. At its height in the garment industry, the Lam Group employed over 2,000 employees. At the age of 27, he was elected president of Greater Blouse, Skirt Undergarment Association. As president, Mr Lam represented owners that employed over 30,000 people. He still remains as the honorary president. This position was dominated by Jewish people until Mr. Lam came.
Later China opened up and lots of clothing business went to China. cheap car rental in new zealand Sniffing out such market change, Mr. Lam started entering into other businesses like banking (He's the cofounder of the EastBank NA), fast-food chain, and real estate. Mr. Lam went into the real estate business in the 80s, when the real estate in NYC was low. Unlike the garment industry, Mr. Lam didn't have a boss to work for and gain experience. But he never failed to learn a new industry. cheap car rental in new zealand He started by purchasing buildings that have already cheap car rental in new zealand been built. But like when conquering the garment business, cheap car rental in new zealand Mr. Lam grew his real estate business extremely quickly using a so called "Chain Strategy", which involved in purchasing a building and use this building to get a bank loan which was used to buy the next one. In 1988, Mr. Lam already had 12 buildings and felt that the market was too hot and he sold half of his portfolio. The next year, the real estate market crashed.
Before the market crashed, in 1987, Mr. Lam bought a troubled hotel in Philadelphia and managed to turn it around. It's legendary. Moral was at the low point when Mr. Lam purchased the hotel because business was bad. In order to evoke the passion of his employees, cheap car rental in new zealand Mr. Lam invited all the family members of the employee's to stay at the hotel for one night on a holiday. Of course all the employees work hard and happy to impress their families. And the families now understand what their moms, dads, wives, and husbands were doing and felt proud of them. Moral was at the peak after this event. But moral don't last long if there's no rewards. Mr. Lam then told the employee to treat each customer the way they treat their families and their salaries would increase if the occupancy rate went up. Not only did he manage to double the occupancy rate in a few months, Mr. Lam brought this hotel to Top 10 from the lowest ranking in the local area.
In order to enhance quality, Mr. Lam had to know what customers cheap car rental in new zealand want. During the interview, he asked us "What do you think people come to NYC for?" "Tourism?" asked Gary. "Fashion!" said Mr. Lam. (The difference in the two answers is that "Fashion" better cheap car rental in new zealand described those long-term customers.) Lot's of people who came to NYC are those who want to experience the boutique cheap car rental in new zealand hotels but couldn't afford them. So Mr. Lam decided to give them affordable boutique rooms.
Because Mr. Lam uses brand like Hilton and Sheraton, giving what customers want sometimes meant to break the standard of the franchise. Mr. Lam was not afraid to do it even if it could cost him the license. The hotel rates in NYC was much higher than elsewhere so Mr. Lam wanted to offer the guest the best experience cheap car rental in new zealand at the lowest possible price. As a result, he upgraded the standard of his franchised hotel. Sheraton's CEO once threatened Mr. Lam not giving him the license because Mr. Lam didn't follow their standard unless he could be persuaded. Mr. Lam invited him to stay in the hotel for one night to experience the service and chat with customers. After that night, the CEO not only gave Mr. Lam the license, but booked hundreds of rooms there and asked owners cheap car rental in new zealand from other Sheraton hotels to experience and told them not to be afraid to make small changes cheap car rental in new zealand if they enhance quality.
Other than good quality, cheap car rental in new zealand Mr. Lam attributed to "Buy low and sell high" as the other reason of rapid growth. This is of course easier said than done. After the market crash in 1988 mentioned earlier, because Mr. Lam have already sold 50% of his portfolio, he not only was not greatly affected by the crisis, but also had the money to buy more when the price was cheaper and when competitors cheap car rental in new zealand have hard time obtaining bank loans.
Another example was after the 9/11, people feared that no one would come to NYC for tourism. So lots of hotel developers changed their hotel rooms to condo apartments and sold them. Mr. Lam saw opportunities again. He confirmed the worried tourism bureau that he would fill in the hotel rooms and started to heavily invest in the hotel industry. Everyone thought that he's crazy. But Mr. Lam looked at history cheap car rental in new zealand and said there were all kinds of crisis to NYC but the occupancy cheap car rental in new zealand rate had remained 85%-90%. Even at the low time, people used to be pushed out to hotels in NJ came back to live in the city. In less than 3 years, all the tourists came back. Mr. Lam not only expanded his business cheap car rental in new zealand but also strengthened the connection with the bureau.
Of course, opportunities like these didn't appear all the time. Most of the time, there were competitions. Mr. Lam's strategy is making sure that your proposal is better than the competitors and always prepare enough cash. Sometimes there's extortion from the sellers. Some seller would increase the price when they learned that Mr. Lam wanted to buy the property. Mr. Lam's strategy is never over-pay and only develop what he can obtain.
Being asked about future plan, Mr. Lam said he would still focus on NYC, which is still No.1 in the global hotel industry. Flying 6 hours to CA for a 5 minutes conversation didn't make sense to him. Also, his connections are all in NYC. So only after building a team in another target city will Mr. Lam consider entering that market. However, this does not mean that Mr. Lam will be waiting and doing nothing. He already built a shopping mall in CA. The Lam Group is also talking with NJ according to information on its official website. More over, the new entity Lam Generation allows Mr. Lam to bringing in management team first before cheap car rental in new zealand bringing in the investment. This is a genius strategy, which allows Mr. Lam to learn the new market and establish connections.
Of course China is also in Mr. Lam's plan. But Mr. Lam thought that although it's fun to do business cheap car rental in new zealand in China, unless you have strong "Guanxi" there, about 80% of the people cheap car rental in new zealand lose money. He said and I quote: "No matter how rich you are, you are going to lose them all before you can come back". To Mr. Lam, in 10 years, maybe it will be a good time. But again, he is already cheap car rental in new zealand planning for this opportunity, mainly cheap car rental in new zealand through two channels. One is bringing in management before investment. The second is the EB5 program .
For those who are not familiar with the EB5 program, it allows non-US investors to invest in the US and get green cards. Here's an article on EB5 with a local lawyer . The Lam Group is serious about the EB5 program. Mr. Lam and his team went to Shanghai, cheap car rental in new zealand Beijing, Guangzhou and Hong Kong to promote their EB-5 project. The picture on the right is Mr. Lam making a keynote speech taken at the Invest in America cheap car rental in new zealand Summit last December in Beijing. This program will bring the Lam Group safe and cheap money with n