70 years of curry puffs and counting: Old Chang Kee banks on secret recipe to stay ahead of competitors

[SINGAPORE] Stored in a hidden vault away from prying eyes is Old Chang Kee’s most prized possession – the recipe for its beloved curry puffs.

The fried snack retailer’s most popular product – the Curry’O, which contains a secret sauce that gives it its signature taste – is key to the company staying competitive in Singapore’s notoriously cut-throat food and beverage (F&B) industry.

“We really want to protect this recipe. It’s from this recipe that we have been able to branch out into other secondary products,” said Old Chang Kee’s chief financial officer Song Yeow Chung in a recent interview with The Business Times.

Amid rising operational, wage and rental expenses, Old Chang Kee is relying more heavily on innovation to boost its profit margins – with a heavy focus on the Curry’O puff.

This puff – fried with spices and herbs, curried potato, chicken and a slice of egg – is being adapted to form a line of secondary products for business-to-business (B2B) sales, said Song.

He noted that the company’s B2B sales “remain in its early stage of development”, contributing less than 5 per cent to total revenue today, and that the focus was to build on this segment progressively over time.

“We try to leverage our core identity, which is our curry, to branch out into other products. We want to be able to have different sources of revenue, different sources of curry-based products that are synonymous with our name,” he added.

Over the years, Old Chang Kee has developed products such as the steamed curry chicken bao. There are some location-exclusive items too to cater for different consumer preferences abroad, such as a satay chicken puff at its outlets in London.

Humble beginnings

Old Chang Kee started as a small stall in a coffee shop near Rex Cinema along Mackenzie Road seven decades ago, in 1956, where it sold the Rex Curry Puff – now famously known as the Curry’O.

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In 1986, a businessman named Han Keen Juan pooled his savings and bought over the control of the business, with the aim of expanding the reach and presence across the island.

He moved the production of the curry puffs to slightly bigger premises in Ubi. In 1994, he invested in a 20,000 square foot production facility in Woodlands that could boost volume and ensure a consistent quality of the products.

Old Chang Kee went public in 2008 on the Singapore Exchange’s Catalist board. Today, the brand operates dozens of outlets in Singapore at various places such as shopping malls, roadside kiosks and petrol stations.

Will the chicken cross the Causeway?

In addition to Old Chang Kee’s Woodlands production facility, the company’s acquisition of a halal certification from the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia in 2016 has allowed for products from its Johor factory to be sold in Singapore.

Currently, less than 10 per cent of its total sales come from products supplied from its facility in Johor Bahru, and Song expects this to “remain relatively stable” for the next financial year.

Some popular snacks such as sesame balls and seasonal items such as the Trio Nian Gao Spring’O – launched for the Chinese New Year period this year – are also being produced in Johor.

All the products that are imported into Singapore are non-meat snacks. The popular Curry’O, which contains chicken, is made at the Woodlands facility only.

Song said that Old Chang Kee is waiting for regulatory approval from the Singapore Food Agency to bring in meat products from overseas, as these require the company to obtain various health certificates issued by meat suppliers and the competent authority of the exporting country or region.

Maintaining strong footprint

Apart from the over 80 outlets in Singapore, Old Chang Kee also has branches in Indonesia and Malaysia. The outlets in Malaysia are in Johor Bahru malls that enjoy heavy traffic as they are close to the immigration checkpoints.

For now, Song said the company is sticking with its current presence in Malaysia with its Johor factory and two outlets as these “adequately support existing customer demand, while preserving flexibility to accommodate future growth”. 

Increasing the number of outlets also brings about new challenges as there are specific requirements that need to be met in order to get the green light, he said.

While shopping malls are ideal places to expand in, the store space needs to be linked to an exhaust facility for ventilation of grease, heat and smoke, said Song. 

He added that there are several considerations the company accounts for before it decides where and when to expand.

“(We look at) high traffic flow, a love for curry and a love for fried food. When we look into areas where we can expand further in future, it is not just the rapport we have with business partners, but also whether the particular city has all these qualities in place,” he said.

On its part, Old Chang Kee continues to be recognised for its achievements and contributions to the F&B industry.

In 2012, the US-based Travel + Leisure magazine announced that Old Chang Kee was selected as one of the world’s 20 best fast food chains. This gave the brand the distinction of being the only one from Singapore to be included on the list.

In January this year, the company was the overall winner for the Product Excellence award at the inaugural Singapore Innovation and Manufacturing Excellence Awards organised by the Singapore Manufacturing Federation.

The award recognises companies that achieve outstanding product innovation, superior manufacturing quality and strong market performance, demonstrating excellence from product design to customer satisfaction.