For some of our OG customers, you may remember the very first pop-up of ours held on the weekend of Lunar New Year and Valentine’s that we creatively came up with “Lunartine’s” to be the theme. It was our initial trial of this dessert box concept along with the help of The Boba Bish, Layla.

As we have come a full circle after a year-long of grinding, tears, and sweat, it is forbidden to have our 1-year anniversary slip by without gifts, games, and celebrations. As a Taiwanese American-owned small business, we kept in mind to practice our traditions and to never forsake our origin.

For that, we had our small 尾牙 at Hu’s Cooking.

Albeit a very small marketing firm with only 1 official employee, we insisted to show appreciation through these small gestures. In Taiwan, there would be rounds of raffles, red envelopes, other entertainments, and plenty of drinking involved. For a boozy one-night-only, the business hierarchy ceases to exist where everyone has fun.

We ordered these unique red envelopes, a collaborative product between 晨欣．曦拓 and 做作的Daphne , from Taiwan to surprise our guest of the 尾牙 night.

With the upcoming Year of Tiger, the illustrations on the red envelopes play on a word game with the stereotypical impression of tigers being vicious and ruthless.

Note that our culture has an ancient history of playing word games, including riddles, homonyms, and other lingual mind games; thus explains why Sphyrn has always been this punny.

To dip our toes in the linguistic water for a little, “Pie派” phonically means “bad attitude or mean” in Taiwanese; and in Mandarin, it shares the meaning of “grand, manner, style, or even swag,” such as 氣派 or派場.

If you were to take a closer look, the detail-oriented red envelopes come with 2 designs and each carries a phrase that makes people smile.

金架派 “ Don’t mess with me.”
好氣派 “you got swag.”
These are precisely what we hope for our business partners and helpers. May there be a lucky tiger spirit guarding them safely.

Within each red envelope, we had Chia handwritten something special for each person on a small square piece of red paper, known as Fai Chun (春聯).

People would place the red paper in the doorways to fend off evil and welcome good luck.

You may tape it upside down which symbolically means arrival. 到 (arrival) shares the same pronunciation as 倒 (upside down; throw) in this case.

It seems like someone needs a 彼女(kanajo) soon.

No empty red envelopes are allowed to be given, so we had various goodies stuffed in them:

a pineapple cake(In Taiwanese: 王梨(ông-lâi) homonymous with 旺 luck 來come )
ginseng candies
a green tea nougat
a 南棗核桃糕 (which we really don’t care to translate lol)
dried fruit

Wrapping up all the auspicious meanings that there is to give, our one-and-only Sphyrn worker Chia baked everyone a nut tart (堅果塔) to make it a very “Pie” 尾牙 for all participants. We received a lot of thumbs up for how tasty the tarts were that they may come back in the next box so be on the lookout for our latest updates!

Regretfully, we were not able to order more for all of our beloved followers due to the steep international shipping cost. However, we hope to be more generous next year and have you celebrate this significant end-of-the-year dinner with us.

拜個早年！虎年行大運！

Sphyrn end-of-the-year Banquet 鯊魚小尾牙

Becoming a Full-time Marketer. If not now, then when?

“Let’s Eat,” Let’s Eat.