Hua-Tiau Chiew Chicken Noodles (花雕雞麵) produced by Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor Corp (TTL, 台灣菸酒) became the top-selling instant noodle brand at RT-Mart International Ltd (大潤發) last year.
The product rose six places from a year earlier to top the sales list, passing Wei Wei A-series Chicken Noodles (味味A排骨雞麵) produced by Vedan Enterprise Corp (味丹) and Wei Lih Jah Jan Men Noodles (維力炸醬麵) made by Wei Lih Food Industrial Co (維力食品).
TTL, which is the only producer of Hua-Tiau Chiew in Taiwan, uses 15-year old liquor made from fermented rice as a major ingredient in the instant noodle broth and the special flavor has pushed up sales, analysts said.
According to RT-Mart, one of the leading hypermarkets in Taiwan, almost 1.5 million packs of Hua-Tiau Chiew Chicken Noodles were sold at its outlets nationwide last year, generating more than NT$30 million (US$1.01 million) in sales.
On the online Good Market operated by Kuobrothers Corp (創業家兄弟) in Taiwan, Hua-Tiau Chiew Chicken Noodles earned 4.42 points from consumers on a five-point ratings scale.
TTL has said Hua-Tiau Chiew is light in flavor but rich in amino acids, making it a perfect food ingredient and a good match for instant noodles.
Wei Wei A series Chicken Noodles came in second place, up one from the 2016 rankings, with RT-Mark selling 1.4 million packs last year, while Wei Lih Jah Jan Men Noodles fell from the top position in 2016 to third with almost 1.3 million packs sold, according to RT-Mart.
The top three took advantage of their familiar flavors to beat imported products from Japan and South Korea. In addition, intensive promotional campaigns during the Ghost Festival also boosted sales of food items, including instant noodles, for worship.
The Ghost Festival falls on the 15th day of the seventh month of the lunar calendar, which last year was Sept. 5.
TTL, Vedan and Wei Lih Food were the three largest winners in the RT-Mart instant noodles sale rankings last year, taking three, two and three spots, respectively, on the top 10 list.
TTL’s Sesame Oil Chicken Noodles (麻油雞麵) and Hua-Tiau Chiew Beef Noodles (花雕牛肉麵) with pickled cabbage were the fourth and fifth-biggest sellers in the rankings with about 800,000 packs sold each, RT-Mart data showed.
Vedan’s Wei Wei Premium Beef Noodles(味味一品原汁珍味牛肉麵) came in sixth ahead of Wei Lih Jah Jan Men heavyweight pack (110 grams vs. the standard 90 gram size), Ve Wong Instant Beef Noodles (味王牛肉麵) produced by Ve Wong Corp (味王), Wei Lih’s Yuanzu Chicken Noodles (原祖雞汁麵)and Wei Lih’s I Duo Zang Beef Noodles (一度贊紅燒牛肉麵), according to RT-Mart.
Meanwhile, PX Mart Ltd (全聯實業), one of the largest supermarket chains in Taiwan, said local consumers on average spend NT$89 to NT$100 per instant noodle purchase.
In 2016, the production value of instant noodles in Taiwan rose 20 percent from a year earlier to NT$11.5 billion, according to data released by the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
The ministry has not released the figures for last year.
On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump weighed in on a pressing national issue: The rebranding of a restaurant chain. Last week, Cracker Barrel, a Tennessee company whose nationwide locations lean heavily on a cozy, old-timey aesthetic — “rocking chairs on the porch, a warm fire in the hearth, peg games on the table” — announced it was updating its logo. Uncle Herschel, the man who once appeared next to the letters with a barrel, was gone. It sparked ire on the right, with Donald Trump Jr leading a charge against the rebranding: “WTF is wrong with Cracker Barrel?!” Later, Trump Sr weighed
SinoPac Financial Holdings Co (永豐金控) is weighing whether to add a life insurance business to its portfolio, but would tread cautiously after completing three acquisitions in quick succession, president Stanley Chu (朱士廷) said yesterday. “We are carefully considering whether life insurance should play a role in SinoPac’s business map,” Chu told reporters ahead of an earnings conference. “Our priority is to ensure the success of the deals we have already made, even though we are tracking some possible targets.” Local media have reported that Mercuries Life Insurance Co (三商美邦人壽), which is seeking buyers amid financial strains, has invited three financial
Artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Cambricon Technologies Corp (寒武紀科技) plunged almost 9 percent after warning investors about a doubling in its share price over just a month, a record gain that helped fuel a US$1 trillion Chinese market rally. Cambricon triggered the selloff with a Thursday filing in which it dispelled talk about nonexistent products in the pipeline, reminded investors it labors under US sanctions, and stressed the difficulties of ascending the technology ladder. The Shanghai-listed company’s stock dived by the most since April in early yesterday trading, while the market stood largely unchanged. The litany of warnings underscores growing scrutiny of
OUTLOOK: Among the six sub-indices, only the stock market confidence sub-index rose due to strong equity performance and expectations of a US Federal Reserve rate cut Consumer confidence weakened further this month, sliding to its lowest level in two-and-a-half years as households grew increasingly uneasy about the economic outlook, job security and big-ticket spending, a survey by the National Central University showed yesterday. The consumer confidence index fell 1.07 points from last month to 63.31, the weakest number since May 2023, said the university’s Research Center for Taiwan Economic Development (RCTED), which conducts the monthly poll. “Although the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics recently increased Taiwan’s GDP growth forecast for this year to 4.45 percent, consumer sentiment tells a different story,” RCTED director Dachrahn Wu