Ha Tinh While trading in fertilizer, seeing people cutting jackfruit trees for firewood, Mr. Minh remembered the professor's request to find jackfruit wood to build a church and decided to change jobs.
After more than 20 years, from a farmer starting his business with 15 million VND in advance from customers, Mr. Nguyen Van Minh, 56 years old, residing in Truong Son commune, Duc Tho district, has become the owner of two carpentry workshops in Ha Tinh and Nam Dinh, famous with the nickname Minh "Mit".
Ben Hen village, Truong Son commune, Mr. Minh's hometown has a profession of raking mussels and building boats. From the age of 6-7, Minh held a saw, chisel, and learned carpentry from his father but dropped out. In 1986, after marrying a girl in the same commune, Mr. Minh went into the business of selling phosphate fertilizer. Every day, he ordered phosphate fertilizer, lime... from agents, then contacted agricultural cooperatives, transported the goods to deliver to the people.
In 2003, Mr. Minh happened to meet a professor in Duc Tho who was looking for information on building a church out of jackfruit wood, making a frame and then bringing it to Hanoi to build. The professor asked: "Do you have jackfruit to build?". Mr. Minh replied vaguely: "Nothing, making it out of jackfruit wood is simple." The two exchanged phone numbers, without making any promises.
Mr. Nguyen Van Minh, outstanding Vietnamese farmer of 2023. Photo: Duc Hung
Mr. Minh thought the professor was "joking", because after decades of wandering the mountains of Huong Son, Huong Khe, Vu Quang, he saw people cutting jackfruit trees for firewood, leaving them lying around in the garden because they were worthless. "Why did the professor find someone to build a church out of jackfruit wood, when there is no shortage of expensive wood?", Mr. Minh kept wondering. And he remembered what his grandfather had taught him when he was learning carpentry, that jackfruit wood is light, flexible, and suitable for carving Buddha statues or making spiritual works.
Understanding the value of jackfruit wood, Mr. Minh decided to change his career to making churches and altars from this type of wood. That was in 2007, and his first customer was a professor he had met. After a phone conversation, this person said that for the past 4 years he had not found a satisfactory worker to build a church. Hearing that Mr. Minh had just started his business and had not yet completed his first project, the professor reassured him: "I have faith in you."
The two then met in Duc Tho district, agreed on the total cost of the project to be 120 million VND, Mr. Minh asked to advance 15 million VND because he had no capital. With the money, he went to the mountains to buy jackfruit wood, sawed it himself and brought it home, requisitioned the family's small yard as a workshop. He hired 4 workers in the village, paying them 25,000 VND per day.
Starting a business without capital, without a workshop, machinery, or workers, Mr. Minh was questioned by his wife: "Why don't you keep your old job? Doing it big will only make things harder. If it doesn't work out and they demand compensation, where will the money come from? I'm afraid they'll suffer if they have four young children." When his neighbors saw him change jobs, they gossiped, saying "no one else does this." They even asked if the workers who worked for Mr. Minh were paid.
Workers at Mr. Minh's facility build the frame of a church out of jackfruit wood. Photo: Duc Hung
After having the site and workers, Mr. Minh cycled around the district every day, taking pictures of beautiful church models, bringing them back to study and learn about architecture to gain experience. After 6 months, he and 4 workers completed the frame and items, and brought them to Hanoi to build a church for the professor. Receiving the remaining 105 million VND, Mr. Minh looked at the workers and burst into tears.
With little initial capital, Mr. Minh invested in more machinery, and in addition to building churches, he also made stairs and furniture. The bank lent him 120 million VND. In 2012, the government leased him 1,500 square meters of land near the center of Truong Son commune to build a workshop, but he only rented 550 square meters "because he was afraid of losing money and getting a bad reputation". At this time, Mr. Minh only specialized in building churches, because he found that long-term interior design would be difficult to compete with many other establishments.
When a customer places an order, he prepares the wood, studies the structure, then cuts, carves, and creates the frame and patterns. A church has an area of 70-100 square meters, 6 meters high, 7 meters wide, and 12 meters long. The carpentry workshop will prepare the materials, make the frame in one to two months, then use a truck to transport it to be erected. It takes about 3-4 days to erect a house. In addition to making it from jackfruit wood, he can accommodate requests for other types of wood.
Mr. Minh shares about the profession of making wooden churches. Video: Duc Hung
According to Mr. Minh, the most difficult part is assembling the wooden blocks into a unified axis. This requires the worker to have high technical skills when cutting and making the rafters. If the chisel is not in the right position, it will never fit when erected. With this stage, Mr. Minh often observes the workers working, only approving when he is satisfied. To date, he has built more than 300 churches, none of which have been faulty.
Each year, the facility builds more than 20 churches, costing from 300 million VND to 1 billion VND, many for 4-5 billion VND. After deducting all expenses, after completing a project, the profit is 10%, on average, about 4 billion VND per year. The workshop currently creates jobs for more than 20 workers. Carvers earn more than 1 million VND per day, assemblers earn 500,000 VND, some people work 28 jobs per month and earn nearly 30 million VND.
From nothing, Mr. Minh has now built a spacious house, bought a car, four children have moved out, and is financially well-off. In addition to his existing facility, Mr. Minh opened a furniture workshop in Nam Dinh, hiring a relative to manage it.
As one of 100 people who have just been awarded the title of Outstanding Vietnamese Farmer 2023 by the Central Committee of the Vietnam Farmers' Union, Mr. Minh was surprised and said: "This honor also creates a lot of pressure. Customers always have high demands, so we have to constantly research and innovate new products to meet them."
Workers at Mr. Minh's facility. Photo: Duc Hung
Mr. Tran Thanh Sang, Chairman of the Farmers' Association of Truong Son Commune, assessed that member Minh is persistent and has great will, despite coming from a difficult background. "Truong Son is a famous carpentry and boat building village, but it has faded away due to competition for its products. Mr. Minh has taken a new direction when making wooden houses and worshiping objects, so there is a large market, creating jobs for people, and maintaining the traditional profession of the commune," said Mr. Sang.
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