Faces of Moutai: Behind the national liquor

Wang Zhihan, 26, factory worker in the packaging plant of Moutai Company. Photo by Wang Zhuangfei for chinadaily.com.cn

Young graduate on the factory floor

Wang Zhihan, 26, is bright and articulate and poised with an answer to every question. A packing worker on the assembly line of the packaging factory of Moutai, she is a group leader in charge of 100 people on her team. She started working for Moutai three years ago, after graduating from Guizhou University.

The factory workers, mostly young women in their twenties and thirties, sit at the assembly line as white ceramic bottles flow towards them, their fleet fingers tying red ribbons to the bottle necks as they pass by.

In another part of the room, sitting on small stools, women pack the white bottles of liquor into golden cardboard boxes before packing them into larger boxes for shipping. The factory floor is airy and light-filled, and above them targets for the number of bottles packed flash in red characters on a screen.

Wang's team packs over 30,000 bottles a day, working six hour shifts. Depending on experience and number of years at the company, workers take home between 100,000 and 150,000 a year, almost twice that of a fresh graduate in a first-tier city.

"It's a good place to start a career," says Wang. "I feel I can develop to my full potential here. For example, I like drawing and there are drawing competitions I can take part in at the company." The daughter of two middle school teachers who grew up in the area, she now earns more than her parents and is in a position of responsibility.

Although Moutai's business has been affected by the austerity measures put in place for government officials in 2013, Wang is upbeat about the product and the company's prospects, and is proud of her job. "I have confidence in the wine," she says, "and no matter who drinks it we package it as if it were packaged for ourselves."