Tony Zhu, a Chinese salesman who blends comedy with LED promotional signs, has amassed a global online following by transforming ordinary ads into humorous skits.
In the short clips, Zhu promotes signage products with uncanny accents and impersonations, playfully affecting the speech of the American rural south and even the working-class Londoners of old.
Users from all over the world have professed their affection for this young man in the comment sections of his videos, winning him a fandom he never expected.
"It feels very awesome. I could say, yes, I never imagined that I could be like this, even just one year ago," said the young salesman.
Growing up, Zhu's parents worked at a skate shoe factory in Guangdong Province's Dongguan and encouraged him to study hard. In school, his favorite subject was English, which eventually led him take a job in marketing at the signage company in Guangzhou.
Initially, he made conventional product videos like many others. After a year of seeing the videos gain little traction, he decided to draw inspiration from the Western comedians he admired.
Some of these videos garnered millions of views, bringing in new customers.
"It's not as people thought it could be, like five times or 10 times of growth. No. We made a growth from 5 to 10 percent in total. And to me, that's actually pretty good," he said.
Each day, Zhu and his team create about two videos for social media. To maintain the momentum, a lot of brainstorming is required.
While Zhu views himself as just a salesman doing his job, his fans seem to project onto him something far greater. Some internet comments have even said that Zhu could fix U.S.-China trade relations.
His own aspirations may not reach those heights, but the young salesman does hope to foster more exchanges between businesses on both sides.
"I went to America and I found a lot of ideas that we could learn from. And we also have a lot of American sign company customers coming to China, and they look at what we do and they also find something they can learn. I find it a very amazing thing. Rather than treating each other like an enemy, I think it'd be much better if we chose to learn from each other during competition, during cooperation. It would eventually benefit both sides, I think," he said.
Chinese signage salesman wins global fandom through humor
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Friday that both China and the Netherlands being committed to promoting mutually beneficial cooperation in an open and pragmatic spirit is in line with the shared interests of the two sides.
This is also conducive to the sound development of China-European Union (EU) relations as well as the security and stability of the global industrial and supply chains, he said.
Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, made the remarks in a phone conversation with Dutch Foreign Minister Tom Berendson at the latter's request.
Wang congratulated Berendson on his assuming office as the Netherlands' new foreign minister and said that China and the Netherlands are important partners of cooperation to each other.
China appreciates the positive signal released by the new Dutch government of valuing its relations with China, he said, noting that China's foreign policy maintains coherence and stability, and that China is willing to work with the Netherlands to strengthen exchanges and communication, promote mutual understanding and trust, and consistently deepen their open and pragmatic partnership for comprehensive cooperation.
Wang briefed his Dutch counterpart on the outcomes of China's just concluded "two sessions," noting that China will remain committed to opening wider to the outside world and expanding institutional opening-up, bringing more opportunities to countries around the world, including the Netherlands.
China-Netherlands economic and trade cooperation enjoys mutual complementarity of advantages, mutual benefit and win-win results, Wang noted.
He expressed hope that the new government of the Netherlands will take on a new look and new challenges, adhere to independence and self-autonomy, and support the normal economic and trade exchanges between enterprises of the two countries.
It is hoped that the Dutch side would push EU institutions to understand China in an objective and rational manner, and adhere to the positioning of partnership and open cooperation between China and the EU, Wang said.
For his part, Berendson said the new government of the Netherlands speaks highly of the achievements China has made in its rapid development, and regards the relations with China as one of its most important bilateral relationships.
Berendson said his country is willing to keep high-level exchanges with China, leverage bilateral mechanisms such as the political consultation between foreign ministries and the mixed economic and trade committee, increase dialogue and exchanges at all levels, deepen the pragmatic cooperation in climate change, water resource management and other areas, and jointly defend multilateralism, consistently advancing the bilateral open and pragmatic partnership for comprehensive cooperation to new levels.
The Dutch side is willing to play a constructive role for the sound and steady development of EU-China relations, he said.
The two sides also exchanged views on issues including the Ukraine crisis.
China-Netherlands mutually beneficial cooperation in line with common interests: Chinese FM
