Red A Plastics Hall

Star Industrial Co., Ltd.

Red A was once a household name in Hong Kong. In the 1950s Hong Kong earned the title of “Toy Kingdom” with its plastic toys, and by the early 1960s plastic flowers were flourishing too. The Red A brand, founded in 1949, became widely known for its inexpensive, well-made plastic household goods manufactured with machinery imported from Japan.

1960

Hong Kong’s population surged after the war, and demand for household goods rose sharply. In the 1960s, Hong Kong’s water supply system was still far from adequate, and territory-wide water rationing was imposed repeatedly — at its worst, water was supplied only once every four days, and for just four hours at a time — so residents needed all kinds of containers to queue for water in the street and carry it home.

The “Red A plastic bucket” rode this wave, building a reputation that became the key to the brand’s success over the following decades. The “Red A book case” (書喼, a hard plastic school case) became another product that took the school world by storm. Its classic advertising line — “Drop it, it won’t break; stamp on it, it won’t flatten; you can sit on it like a stool; and rain won’t get in!” — became a Hong Kong memory for many schoolchildren of the 1960s and 70s.

When avian flu struck Hong Kong in 1997, Red A specially manufactured chicken cages for government use in handling poultry, in support of the government’s disease-prevention measures.

Until Now

Even today, Red A is everywhere in Hong Kong — people simply do not notice its products. The classic red lampshades that egg-stall keepers in the gai si (街市, wet market) use for candling eggs are mostly Red A products. The translucent medicine bottles used by most of Hong Kong’s public hospitals are Red A products too. Red A’s siu gei (筲箕, rice-washing colanders) and plastic crates are also in wide use — retail shops, restaurants and even many hotels all use Red A products. In the local catering trade, as many as 93% to 95% of restaurants use them. Even bank vaults use “Red A plastic crates” to sort banknotes.

Sources:

http://www.com.cuhk.edu.hk/ubeat/050569/story13.htm [archived]

HK01.com finance newshttps://www.lcsd.gov.hk/CE/Museum/History//zh_TW/web/mh/exhibition/current.html

「工」不可沒 - 香港工業傳奇展覽 (“Striving and Transforming: The History of Hong Kong Industry”) @ Hong Kong Museum of History

https://hkindustry2020.com/QR.php?id=24

Published in Aug 2020 by Hong Kong Brand Museum 香港品牌博物館