Woon Wing Yip

OBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(born December 1937) is a Hong Kong-born British entrepreneur, best known for having started the

Wing Yip Wing Yip is a Chinese supermarket chain founded by Woon Wing Yip in England in 1970. The original Birmingham store now also serve as its headquarters, international trading division, property investments, online store (mail order), warehouse, ...

supermarket chain.

Early life

Hakka The Hakka (), sometimes also referred to as Hakka Han, or Hakka Chinese, or Hakkas are a Han Chinese subgroup whose ancestral homes are chiefly in the Hakka-speaking provincial areas of Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan, Hunan, Zhej ...

born in December 1937, in

British Hong Kong Hong Kong was a colony and later a dependent territory of the British Empire from 1841 to 1997, apart from a period of occupation under the Japanese Empire from 1941 to 1945 during the Pacific War. The colonial period began with the Briti ...

. Yip arrived in

Hull Hull may refer to: Structures * Chassis, of an armored fighting vehicle * Fuselage, of an aircraft * Hull (botany), the outer covering of seeds * Hull (watercraft), the body or frame of a ship * Submarine hull Mathematics * Affine hull, in affi ...

, England from Hong Kong in 1959 with £2. He then worked and later started his own restaurants in the East Anglia region of England, in towns such as Clacton and Ipswich.

Wing-Yip

Yip had the ability to speak English and he knew that food wholesale business is more profitable than running a Chinese takeaway. Therefore, in 1969, he founded the

supermarket in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

. The Wing Yip business has since branched out into property development, management and investment, with more than 60 commercial and residential tenants around the country. The property portfolio is now worth around £23 million. With an annual turnover of £80 million, he became the first Anglo-Chinese tycoon in United Kingdom.

Other achievements

Yip is also a philanthropist who has among other acts of generosity, endowed several bursaries and scholarships for university students from both the UK and China, administered through the W Wing Yip and Brothers Charitable Trust. In 2008 Yip was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from

Birmingham City University Birmingham City University (abbrev. BCU) is a university in Birmingham, England. Initially established as the Birmingham College of Art with roots dating back to 1843, it was designated as a polytechnic (United Kingdom), polytechnic in 1971 and gai ...

. He was appointed

Officer of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(OBE) in the 2010 New Year Honours.

Footnotes

1937 births Living people British people of Chinese descent Hong Kong people of Hakka descent People from Dongguan British businesspeople Officers of the Order of the British Empire Chinese emigrants to England Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom {{UK-business-bio-1930s-stub