Yuelan Shaoqiu · Chief Marketing Officer · China
I would bring an operating understanding of how consumer pricing, claims and channel relationships create or destroy value in Chinese consumer businesses. Boards often see marketing through revenue growth and spending ratios. I can help directors ask what a promotion teaches customers about the regular price, whether a claim would survive a regulator's or a sceptical customer's reading, and what a channel offer means for franchise partners whose margins depend on it. My experience covers agency work, supermarket trade marketing, online festivals, live selling, membership and county-town franchising. It does not cover capital markets, manufacturing engineering or food-safety science, and on those I would rely on colleagues with the right discipline. I have presented to our board since 2022 but have never served as a director. A first seat should therefore give me a defined contribution, such as a strategy or consumer-risk committee, under a chair who expects me to learn the board's wider responsibilities. I would measure my own usefulness by whether management's consumer papers become clearer to the other directors, not by how often I speak.
| Capacity | Committees |
|---|---|
| Ready to join | Strategy · Brand and consumer risk |
I am seeking a first non-executive seat in a consumer food, regional retail or consumer-services company, preferably privately held or family-controlled with outside investors, that is expanding beyond its home region or reconsidering how it prices across channels. I would be most useful where customer trust, franchise or distributor relationships and advertising claims are material risks that the board currently sees only through sales figures. I would prefer to join a strategy or brand and consumer-risk committee rather than chair one. I do not want a seat that expects free marketing advice; management should own its campaigns. I want to help directors judge whether commercial decisions keep faith with customers and partners over several years, and to learn from directors whose expertise in finance, operations or food safety runs deeper than mine. A company that has recently faced a pricing dispute with partners, a claims complaint or a membership change would give me the clearest early test of whether my experience transfers.
Presented to the Board or a committee
Board meetings on pricing, membership and franchise matters
January 2022–present
Presents the annual brand and member review and channel-pricing rules as chief marketing officer; attends as a non-voting invitee and holds no director appointment.
The livestream decision required me to weigh a large, certain-looking volume against harms that would appear in other channels and later seasons. On a board, I would ask management to present any major promotional offer from the position of each affected group: loyal customers, franchise or distribution partners, and the channel offering the volume. I would want to see the clauses, particularly those that constrained the company's future pricing. I would not oppose such offers by reflex. My own decision cost revenue, and I still cannot prove that the audience we declined would not have produced loyal customers. A board's task is to see the trade-off clearly, to know that the people bearing its cost have been heard, and to set a review point if the expected benefits do not appear.
The reduced-sugar range showed how quickly a claim becomes embedded in a product name, a supermarket agreement and a host's script. On another board, I would ask when regulatory review happens in the product process and who can stop a claim that commercial colleagues have already promised. I would ask how creator and host statements are controlled, because spoken claims are harder to retrieve than printed ones. I would also accept that caution has a price. Our honest launch underperformed, and directors should hear that plainly rather than be told that compliance costs nothing. The aim is not a timid company. It is a company in which every claim reaching customers rests on evidence held before the advertisement appears.
I would spend the first two board cycles learning before advising. I would ask the chair for meetings with the chief executive, finance, quality and the heads of the largest channels, and for permission to visit shops or distribution points without a prepared tour. I would read two years of board papers to see how consumer matters have been reported and which questions directors have repeated without receiving clear answers. I would also study the company's ownership, investor agreements and any franchise or distribution contracts that limit its pricing freedom. By the third meeting I would expect to raise specific questions, framed as questions, about promotional depth, claims review or member data. At mid-year I would ask the chair for candid feedback on whether my contribution is useful or drifting into management's work. A marketing executive can easily become a director who redesigns campaigns from the boardroom, and I intend not to.
My employer competes with other pastry, bakery and snack businesses in central and southern China, and buys ingredients, packaging and creator services from suppliers who may also serve a prospective company. Our minority investor holds stakes in other consumer businesses. Before accepting any seat, I would list these relationships for the chair and the company's advisers, obtain written consent from Hemeiqiao's chief executive and board, and decline any seat in a direct competitor. I would not carry pricing plans, member data, supplier terms or creator rates between companies. If a matter involving a supplier or investor connected to Hemeiqiao came before the board, I would declare it and withdraw from the discussion. Should such withdrawals become frequent, I would tell the chair that the seat was no longer workable for me. The calendar matters too: Mid-Autumn preparation occupies July to September, and I would raise that before agreeing to a committee schedule.
I am a full-time executive of Hemeiqiao Pastry Company and would hold any other seat as a non-executive. Whether I could be regarded as independent of a particular company depends on its dealings with my employer, our suppliers and our investor, and on the rules that govern that company. I would ask its advisers to make that assessment rather than assert it myself.
IICA Independent Directors’ Databank: Not yet registered
India's independent-director databank does not apply to me: I work in China and am considering Chinese companies. I am not registered with it and have not taken its assessment.