Herbmedic was established in 1994 by Mr. Xiao Xuan Chen and Ms. Li Mao, the company founders and directors. The first branch was opened in Kilburn High Road in north-western London. Unfortunately the first venture was a failure due to location problem. Lessons were quickly learned and the second branch in East Ham, London proved to be a great success. Within three years, Herbmedic became a famous name in Chinese remedies in East London covering all best high street locations in East Ham, Barking, Bethnal Green and Barkingside.

Herbmedic did not stop there and decided to take a big step forward in 1999 by aiming to enter the major shopping centres in Britain such as Bluewater in Dartford and Metro Centre in Gateshead. We have succeeded in this. We now have presentations in over 90 main shopping centres in Britain including Bluewater in Dartford, Lakeside in Grays, the MK Centre in Milton Keynes, Metro Centre in Gateshead, Bridges Centre in Sunderland, Festival Place in Basingstoke, West Quay in Southampton, Chequers Centre in Maidstone, Victoria Centre in Nottingham, Queensgate Centre in Peterborough, Dolphin Centre in Poole, Gallerries Centre in Washington, Overgate Centre in Dundee, St. James Centre in Edinburgh, St. Enoch Centre in Glasgow, Priory Meadow in Hastings, Shires Centre in Leicester, Cascade Centre in Portsmouth, Forge Centre in Glasgow, Kingdom Centre in Glenrothes, Paisley Centre in Paisley, St. Johns Centre in Perth, Forum Centre in Wallsend, Flagship Centre in Bangor, Connswater Centre in Belfast and Bow Street Mall in Lisburn.

We have now expanded to Republic of Ireland with a flagship store in the newly opened work-of-art Dundrum Centre in Dublin. We have just opened another store in Grafton Street, Dublin, the most prestigious shopping street in Ireland.

The successful story of Herbmedic relies on three factors. They are quality of services, quality of images and quality of locations.

♦ The Herbmedic store in Milton Keynes Shopping Centre

♦ The Herbmedic store in Bluewater Shopping Centre

Quality of Services:

Herbmedic has the strongest team of TCM practitioners. All our practitioners are qualified to at least first-degree levels in major TCM universities in China. They also have at least five years' clinical experience in big state-owned hospitals in China. Many of them are TCM Practitioners-in-charge with over 15 years' working experience.

The high quality of our practitioners comes from our strict selecting procedures. Our examining centre in Beijing holds ten examinations a year where our appointed nationally known TCM experts will examine all applicants on both theories and practices.

Herbmedic also has the strongest team of branch managers. All of them are qualified to master degrees in both China and Britain with at least two years' working experience at managerial levels. They are Chinese-English bilingual and are able to communicate well with customers from both cultures.

Herbmedic provides comprehensive training system, both on and off site to its TCM practitioners as well as managers.

Quality of Images:

The overall images of Herbmedic have changed over the years. We started with green and white colour representing the natural element of herbal remedies. Our competitors soon began to follow the suit and green-white quickly became the brand colour for TCM business in this country.

Being the market leader and image setter, Herbmedic is not prepared to be just one of the "green-white" shops. We had since created a new image of golden and burgundy. Our logo character means "medicine" in Chinese and is artistically written by a very famous Chinese painter and calligrapher. Burgundy is a colour widely used on ancient Chinese furniture representing history and traditional value. We think this is exactly what we are doing here, to introduce part of the most precious knowledge and wisdom of Chinese culture to the West so the whole world can benefit from it.

Quality of Locations:

Herbmedic is forward-thinking and is always a step ahead of our competitors -- we are the first company in TCM that aimed at prime locations in high streets at times when other operators were still far from been seen even in secondary locations. Not only are our locations superior, our high level of management is also second to none among all TCM companies in Britain.

♦ Answering customer's enquiry

♦ Ms. Mao is presenting a certificate to a new staff who has just passed a Herbmedic training programme

♦ Some of Herbmedic staff at
a company gathering

♦ Herbmedic Norwich Branch in"old" green-white style

♦ The Herbmedic store in Festival Place Shopping Centre, Basingstoke in our current golden-burgundy style