Man in late 40s finds new success in business

How many people in their late 40s could give up a decent and well-paid job at a local bureau to start a new business? Veteran Lu Xianrong, located in Changshui village of Jiangxi province, is one of the few who have.

Retired from the army in 2018, Lu passed up a job opportunity arranged through preferential policies for soldiers, and decided to start a restaurant and homestay business after discussions with family.

"My family was very supportive. We saw big opportunities from local government's promotion of nature-based tourism, so we were very optimistic about the industry's future and wanted to ride the wave," Lu said.

"We started planning the business in 2019 with two of my brothers and a sister. We invested over 1 million into it. The local government helped us with the exterior decoration," Lu said.

Lu started running the restaurant and homestay business in April.

"It has gone well so far. On normal days there are about 50 people eating in our restaurant per day. During the May Day holiday there were 100 customers eating per day on average," Lu said.