Untitled - ICID,NCKU

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Table of Contents
2
Abstract (English & Chinese)
3
AboutFrog
4
FrogEDUCATION
5
FrogWORK EXPERIENCES
6
FrogCLIMB&PHOTO
7
FrogBLOG
10
FrogSHOP
12
FrogCAFÉ
15
FrogVISIT
17
FrogINFO
20
Note: Photos and information are adopted and based on the interview with Frog during the field trip to
Frog Café on May 3, 2008 and his official website http://www.frogfree.com
2
ABSTRACT
Frog Café is a theme café in Taipei owned by Ming-Huang Yang, who is an avid biker,
environmentalist, designer, programmer and photographer. He started his customer base through his
blog where he shares his thoughts, adventures and photos.
In 2007, he made up his mind to focus on his own artwork and henceforth became a freelancer
and entrepreneur. He opened Frog Café in December 2007 and was a tremendous success and
groundbreaker for the café business in Taiwan. He wants to promote Taiwan through his photo
artworks which he took during his adventures and travels throughout Taiwan as well as overseas.
Owning clear understanding about his market and business position, Frog managed to commercialize
his artwork into profitable business to support himself and henceforth was able to establish Frog Café.
Not only for the business, Frog is also an active philanthropist.
Currently, Frog Café is receiving spotlights from the media and has become a hot issue and new
trend in Taiwan because it promotes and encourages people to care for the environment and also
enjoy new life experiences that can be obtained in this beautiful island of Taiwan.
***
摘要
「蛙咖啡」是由楊明愰（蛙大哥）所創立的一家具有特色的咖啡店。與眾不同的「蛙咖啡」是第一
個有提供腳踏車停車站的。蛙先生具有自己的想法，想要推廣台灣美以及環保概念給大家，所以他把這
些概念涉入自己的作品上面。一開始是由 blog 與大家分享他個人冒險的經驗以及攝影作品。利用攝影
作品加上幽默的文字，把他想要做的事情-攝影、　設計、　冒險-跟大家分享。漸漸有了一定的客群以
及同好，蛙先生開始想辦法把自己的作品商品化，然後利用網路販賣。得到很熱烈的反應，蛙先生開始
考慮創業。告別十一年的工作，他決定這一輩子想要當創作人做自己喜歡的事情： 攝影、　設計、　冒險。他認為身為一個設計人，必須把商品可以得到一定的獲利基礎，不然創作只是一個鬼點子，然而
這些獲利是為了下一個的創作經濟基礎。蛙咖啡的存在帶來了新的風潮：多騎腳踏車，保護地球，體驗
生活。蛙先生是一位成功創業者，讓很多人見視了台灣美，讓大家更珍惜、　更愛台灣。
3
+ AboutFrog +
Ming-Huang Yang ( 楊 明 晃 ), born on March 5,
1972, is a creative entrepreneur from Taipei who
established
his
own
brand
through www.frogfree.com in 2004. During his
childhood, he did not like introducing himself because he often pronounced
his name in the slightly incorrect tone and “huang” (晃) is homophonous with
another “huang” (慌), which means flurry. Gradually as he grew up, starting
to realize that his name contained so many “ri” ( 日 ), which expresses
brightness or the daylight. Henceforth, he started gaining confidence to
introduce himself to others.
Since 2004, he was officially known Mr. Frog (蛙先生), because he used
that name as his domain. Before that, he also had been associated with
“frog” (蛙 = wa) when serving the navy during his twenties.
After working for eleven consecutive years with bright and promising
career, Mr. Frog made a brave decision to quit his job in order to concentrate
on his photography, design and adventure—three main things he is truly
passionate into and wants to do throughout his life. Currently, he is a
freelancer and creative entrepreneur with his personal brand—frog—
consisting of frogblog, frogforum, frogwallpapers, frogshop and frogcafé.
His original creative merchandises are available online and in Eslite
Bookstore all around Taiwan.
4
+ FrogEDUCATION +
1978 – Houpu Elementary School, Taipei
1984 – Taipei Municipal Ming Lun Senior High School
1987 – Sze Hai Institute of Technology and Commerce
Highly passionate about art, he was sent to Houpu Elementary School in
his hometown, Taipei. Discovering his eye problem of inability to identify
certain colors, therefore he always had difficulties in mixing watercolors.
Despite such obstacle, he worked hard and kept developing his artistic skills
in drawing.
After finishing elementary school, he took the entrance exam and
succeeded to win a precious seat to study in Taipei Municipal Ming Lun
Senior High School, which is famous for its fine arts. Then, he decided to
continue on learning fine arts, but he did not do well on one of the
examinations—the color identification test—due to his eye problem. He went
back home and told his mother that he did not make it and she burst into
tears. Frog did not give up and he noticed his interests on computers and
information technology, so he applied to Sze Hai Institute of Technology and
Commerce and finished his degree there. Therefore, he mastered the art of
coding and programming. His official website is built on HTML programming
language all by himself.
With his completed undergraduate degree in computer programming
and right after finished his military service, he started a good career in Acer
for the upcoming eleven years with promising future.
5
+ FrogWORK EXPERIENCES +
1994 – Acer / Advertising Planning Division / Designer
1996 – Yuanji / Graphic Design Division / Web Designer
1999 – Acer Network Group / Acer Funtown / Graphic Design Division / Chairperson
2003 - Third Way Publishing Corporation / Funtown / Graphic Design Division / Manager
2004 – Third Way Publishing Corporation / Funtown / Product Operation Division / Manager
2006 – GigaMedia Limited/ Funtown / Taiwan Office / Director
2007 – Freelancer, Creative Artist & Entrepreneur
Mr. Frog’s past work experiences not only give him deep-rooted
knowledge about art, programming and design, but also give him
opportunities to deal with business and management. That is why he is
always very keen and aware of his target market and customers. Besides, he
is also well organized and planned about his businesses. Through the list
above, it can be conferred that Mr. Frog has a smooth, bright, and steady
career that everyone could have dreamed of.
Three years after starting his adventure and photography, he started to
realize what he really wanted to do for a living—photography, design and
adventures. In 2007, he made a tough and brave decision to resign from his
position as a director in GigaMedia Ltd. The rural and peaceful life in Lanyi
captivated Frog and motivated him to listen to what he really wanted to do
for the rest of his life. After making up his mind and be sure of his plans, he
sent a resignation letter to his boss when he was visiting and trapped in the
typhoon days. For him, Lanyi is a very meaningful place.
6
+ FrogCLIMB&PHOTO +
Back then Mr. Frog never really loved
swimming, jogging, running and hiking at all.
But he kept encountering and had to do
those activities during his youth. While
serving the navy, his days were always
started by swimming, and then continued
with jogging and running.
Frog’s adventurous journey of mountain
climbing is summarized as follows:
2003
Mt. Ba-Tong-Guan, Nantou, Taiwan (3245 m)
Mt. Jade, Nantou, Taiwan (3952 m)
2004
First single-lens reflex (SLR) digital camera
Mt. Yu-Shan, Nantou, Taiwan (3952 m)
Official launch of frogfree.com
Mt. Fuji, Japan (3776 m)
Mt. Kinabalu, Malaysia (4095.2 m)
Mt. Chi-Lai, Nantou, Taiwan (3560 m)
2005
Jia-Ming Lake, Taitung, Taiwan (3310 m)
Mt. Syue, Miao-Li, Taiwan (3886 m)
2006
Mt. Syue (3886 m)
Neng-Gao An-Dong-Jun (3346 m)
2007
Mt. He-Huan (3422 m)
Bike tour around Taiwan (1329.28 km)
*) Some of Frog’s artworks (http://www.frogfree.com)
7
In 2003, his love for hiking unexpectedly grew when one of his best
friends asked him to climb Mount Jade, one of the highest peaks in Taiwan.
It was a fact that he did not like hiking back then. But he gave it a thought
for a while and found that it would be very rewarding to reach such high
peak. Eventually, he took up the challenge to climb and conquer Mt. Jade.
In the year of 2004, at the same place—Mount Jade—where he visited for
the second time, Frog produced his first scenic photographs using his newly
bought SLR digital camera.
His first digital camera included with great
lenses and other basic peripherals cost about 150,000 NTD.
Mountain climbing certainly is a super duper exhausting, boring,
depressing, regretful, resentful, dirty and makes you want to kill yourself to
end the torture immediately! But climbing mountain is actually also super
duper beautiful, exciting, breathtaking, touching, miraculous, dilemmatic,
monotonous and expensive! And there is only one goal: to live and survive!
Not only climbing to
the peak of the mountain
and
going
safely,
but
back
home
Frog
does
more than that and always
wants to do more than
that. That is why he always asks his friends to bring something. They will do
some crazy things after reaching the top. He wanted to create memories that
he never forgot. Photography is one way to make those memories from the
past remain eternal. One of his best friends, Gary, even made marriage
8
proposal up on the mountain. He immortalized that proposal picture with his
camera and Gary got married later in the year.
His photography philosophy is not merely taking beautiful images, but
those pictures should contain a little story that can touch our heart,
stimulate and leave a mark in our mind.
9
+ FrogBLOG +
http://freefrog.blogspot.com
Starting personal blog at blogspot.com in 2004, he shared photos,
thoughts and experiences through his journal entries. Frog also compiled his
photos into Flash photo album diary and picked some of them to be free
downloadable wallpapers. He did it all by himself.
Frog’s beautiful photos from his rewarding adventures captivated
readers from different ages, particularly white-collar workers who are
chained and pressurized by their routines and workloads. They feel the fresh
air and see the hope through Frog’s artworks, which encourage them to do
something they like to brighten their lives.
10
Through this blog, Frog shows the beauty of Taiwan and makes people
interested in visiting and loving their own country. Furthermore, it is also a
medium to promote Taiwan to the international world because the blog is
accessible throughout the world. There were readers from Japan, Australia
and United States who came to Taiwan to meet Frog and visit his design
studio and café.
Frogblog is the place where Frog interacts with his readers through the
shout-out box, comments, and articles talking about the adventure,
photography, cameras, and some tips for design and taking photos in the
Frog Style Lesson section. Basically, this blog is the key success factor of the
business models he came up with later on.
11
+ FrogSHOP +
http://shop.frogfree.com
Frog opened his e-shop in September 2007. Products available are as
follows: calendars, greeting cards, t-shirts, and notebooks. He did all the
design by himself and knows well about the production costs and finds the
right manufacturer that can produce his products with good quality and
economic price.
In 2006, he launched his very first product—the Frog calendar. He only
printed 500 of them and were all sold out within a week! The next year, he
made another calendar and printed 4,000 of them. Everything was sold out
in just within four days! Besides the commercial success, Frog also does
charity. He donates 50 NTD from every product he sold. Plus, that calendar
12
is not merely a calendar. We can tear and reuse it as postcard, too, which is
very environmentally safe. In December 2007, his calendar and greeting
cards were officially available for purchase in Eslite Book Store, the most
prominent and elite book shop in Taiwan. All products are also available in
Frog Café.
The black and white t-shirts
were
the
shirts
he
designed
especially for the bicycle tour
around the island for sixteen
days. Made on quick-dry fabric,
very convenient, comfortable and
cool at the same time. Frog never thought that this product would have been
one of his merchandises, but actually many people were very interested in
this t-shirt when they saw it in the pictures taken during the trip. When there
were certain numbers of people asking for that t-shirt, he started to consider
commercializing it as a merchandise to be sold in frogshop. There were two
colors, black and white, with different graphic designs. Black ones were sold
out in a very short time and henceforth those t-shirts have become one of
the major products.
From his point of view, a product should be profitable to make artist
able to create the next product and survive in the market. Otherwise, the
product is merely an obscure idea, because it cannot be commercialized and
gain revenue. Without making profit, eventually artists will “die.” Frog knows
his business core value well. He wants to create ‘something’ with modernity,
13
originality, which has add-values such as environmentally safe, promoting
Taiwan’s beauty, and contributing to the society.
In conclusion, his products are based on his adventures which are
documented in his own original photography, combined with his humorous
words, and then design them with minimalistic and simplistic styles. For the
strategic marketing, he spreads his works through the network and reaches
different people, thus giving them anew living experiences, such as
mountain climbing, bike riding, traveling, and so on. With such business
model, Frog has successfully achieved his own unique brand identity.
14
+ FrogCAFÉ +
Frog Café (蛙咖啡) is located in
Taipei and was officially opened in
December 2007. It took five months
to setting up the café, starting from
the layout design, food & beverages,
equipment, interior, and so on.
In Frog Café, customers can enjoy
delicious coffee and light foods, rent
the venues for conferences or recitals,
access
wireless
internet
for
free,
share photos using the projector and
wide screen provided, ride and park
their bikes there, and even hold their
own art or photo exhibition there.
Frog’s private design studio is also
located in the café, right at the back
of the front desk.
Frog Café opens for the whole
week from 10 a.m. until 10 p.m. and
it is the one and only café which
provides parking space for bicycles. This encourages people to ride bikes for
the sake of our environment. Bike riders usually will visit Frog Café during
15
the weekend and meet up with Frog
and some other friends who have
common interests such as bike riding,
photography, art, and so on.
The layout and interior of Frog
Café
are
flexible
to
suit
different
occasions and also equipped with good
air circulation which keeps the air
conditioning
usage
low
and
saves
energy to prevent global warming.
Frog Café is a groundbreaking
theme café focusing on green lifestyle.
While Frog’s products are also valueadded with this point along with his
own
originality
promote
Taiwan
and
both
intention
locally
to
and
internationally. The concept is derived
from the sixteen-day bike tour around
Taiwan with his three best friends.
Frog Café is a sanctuary for people
to share life and interests with others
and enjoying the delicious light food
and beverages.
16
+ FrogVISIT +
On Saturday afternoon of May 3,
2008, we had a field trip to Frog Café
in Taipei. It was located at Song-Jiang
Road, some blocks from Zhong Xiao
Xin Sheng Station. It is definitely not an
eye-catching
and
quite
mysterious
place. The building is actually a three-floor house and modified to become a
studio-café. The whole interior design is giving people comfortable feeling
because it is minimalist, simple, clean, and spacious. The light food and
beverages are delicious and set on reasonably affordable price. The facilities
and equipment are well maintained and in good shapes.
On the other hand, the photo exhibition gallery was also very captivating
and made us witness the beauty of Taiwan that we often turn a blind eye to.
Frog also welcomes amateur or beginner photographers to exhibit their
works there for free, which is a good opportunity to encourage them to
share their photos with others. Frog Café is the place and gallery to share
art and interests.
In the future, Frog will be concentrating on his artworks rather than the
business. He has business management established which will be dealing
with the operational and financial matters of Frog Café. On this point, he has
made clear-cut between his creativity and entrepreneurship in order to keep
his art pure and honest. Moreover, he is also very clear about his target
17
market—25-45
working
class
years
old
people
who
possess good financial ability to
appreciate
and
purchase
his
design artworks which are well
priced and made in high-quality
materials. He knows that those
people are longing for such adventurous escape from their stressful routines
and they are seeing Frog as the hero who shows them the light of hope. It all
started with Frogblog and more and more readers visited and interacted with
him, then purchased his merchandises and eventually became his loyal
customers when he opened Frog Café later in 2007. This theme-café
business reached its break-even point in merely three months—showing Frog
Café as a promising and growing business in Taipei.
As for collaborations with other sponsoring manufacturers or companies,
Frog is not really looking forward to it due to the reasons that he still wants
to do his own art rather than always considering opinions and fulfilling
demands from other parties. He said that if we got sponsorship, we should
listen to their demands and follow their rules—which would restrain our
creativity, unless he was given full freedom to do completely on his way.
18
In fact, Frog has been thinking of
other possible business models which
can make his business turn into much
more profitable business, but he
currently wants to focus on his art
rather than the business. In the
meantime, he would like to make his website bilingual or trilingual by adding
English and Japanese versions so that he can gather more people from
different countries to visit and understand his thoughts and artwork.
Personally, I think that Frog is a realist and very practical person with
multi personae as artist (photographer and designer), engineer (programmer
and action script writer), and entrepreneur (chair person for Frog Café). As a
pioneer in such theme-café, Frog has big potential to maintain and expand
his
successful
business
model
and
be
the
role
model
for
young
entrepreneurs. I believe that he has already had his blueprint for his next
steps to survive in the competitive market. Furthermore, now the media has
started to notice Frog Café as a new trend for bike riding and being green.
Frog series can be considered as a successful, unique brand identity.
19
+ FrogINFO +
Frog Café | 蛙咖啡
No. 5, Lane 69, Song-Jiang Rd., Taipei City
台 北 市 松 江 路 69 巷 5 號
Monday – Sunday: 10 a.m. – 10 p.m.
+886-2-2506-1716
café@frogfree.com
http://café.frogfree.com
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