Stories from Deli

The largest wholesale and retail store in Medan is undoubtedly that of N. V. Handel Maatschappij Seng Hap, which is managed by Mr. Tan Tang Ho, the capital of the Company being f 200,000 in 200 shares of f 1000 each. The Fine Store of N. V. Handel Maatschappij Seng Hap, Medan-Deli. The visitor is impressed with the line proportions of the building occupied by the Company, which will bear favourable comparison with the largest emporiums of Java, and the well-worn phrase, “from a needle to an anchor” may well be applied to the enormous stock and the opportunity it offers to intending purchasers. The district being largely devoted to the growing of tobacco a few words concerning this industry will be appropriate. 

Seng Hap its head office in Medan, Deli, and branches in Bindjey and Pangkalan Brandan. In 1881, Mr. Tan Tang Ho. the present director of the Company, started business as a diaper under the name ” Hap Seng.” Five years later provisions and liquors were added to the stock-in-trade, and the following year a branch establishment was started at Bindjey, a place about eight miles from Medan. In 1904 a retail store was opened in Pangkalan Biandan —a small thriving town some 55 miles distant from Medan, where the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company have many interests. Two years later another shop was added, but in this same year, 1906, the ” Seng Hap Trading Companv, Ltd. ‘ was formed with a capital of Fl 200.000 111Fl. 1,000 shares to take over these different ventures. Recently the business has increased very rapidly.

And in addition to the retail trade the Company deals largely in sugar, tobacco, Java and China tea, mats, gambier, and numerous products from Europe, America, and Australia, and holds agencies for P. Alma, Azn, Amsterdam, cigar manufacturers ; Krister & Rossman ; the ” Sun ” typewriter ; the Groningen cycle factory, A. Fonger’s. Groningen, Holland ; the Manufacturers Life Insurance Company, of Toronto, Canada ; and the Singer Sewing Machine Company, of New York, U.S.A.

The Company’s premises in Medan cover an area of fully 7,680 square feet, and are lighted throughout by electricity. A staff of over thirty-six packers and seventeen messen gers is employed. The General Manager, Mr. Gan Eng Tjahn, and the chief representative, Mr. Siauw Sin Tjeng, are, like Mr. Tan Tang Ho himself, members of the Tiong Hoa —a Chinese Association, which devotes its energies very largely to increasing the educational facilities for the Chinese in Netherlands India. Apart from the successful undertakings mentioned, however, Mr. Tan Tang Ho has other interests. In 1897 he acquired the contract for the farming of spirits in the East Coast of Sumatra for a period of three years, and in the same year started on his own account a business in ” attap,” for which article there is a great demand in Medan. He is president of the Hoa Siang Hak Tong, of Medan. All his children are being educated in the English language.