• Guan Yuxiang founded a beverage can empire after retirement
• Company sales exceeded 10 billion yuan (US$1.4 billion)

Chinese entrepreneur Guan Yuxiang embarked on a new business venture post-retirement, earning the titles "Drink Can Queen" and "Greatest Retired Worker"

Born in Shenyang, Liaoning province, in 1939, Guan joined a factory in Beijing at 19 and spent three decades there before retiring at 50.

Instead of a quiet retirement, she started a small company producing measuring devices but initially faced failure.

Believing failure leads to success, she studied the market carefully and decided to enter the beverage can industry.

In 1994, while visiting Hainan, she noticed many soft drink factories relied on imported packaging from Taiwan and South Korea. She raised 300,000 yuan to establish a beverage can manufacturing company, importing production equipment despite challenges in obtaining technical data.

When an international energy drink company entered China in 1994, Guan and her team persuaded them to produce cans using powder coating technology, a global standard unfamiliar to local manufacturers.

This first deal opened doors to contracts with major brands, and the company now holds over 100 patents.

Over 30 years, the company grew from a 16-person workshop into a public enterprise, achieving annual sales exceeding 10 billion yuan (US$1.4 billion) since 2020. Guan also founded a charity supporting underprivileged students, donating over 20 million yuan.

She emphasizes that age should not be a barrier: "Aging is a natural law, but what truly defines a person is attitude, passion, and virtue."