Juicers & Juicing

Company History of the Green Star & Kempo Dual-Gear Juicers

To clear up the "controversy" started by an email I received in 2009 regarding the true ownership of the greenstar dual-gear juicer technology and the honesty of the Tribest company (see bottom of the page Clear Winner & Best Juicer for Health Purposes in the General Category under "Important Update August 2009" and "Update July 2011"), here is a detailed statement sent in by Mina Yang, a representative of the Tribest company, which I believe to reflect the truth until further notice.

"...Tribest is the OEM manufacturers of the Green Star Juice Extractors, which are produced exclusively by Corrupad in Korea. Corrupad is owned by the family of Mr. Choi, the founder of Tribest Corporation.

The idea of the dual gears was not invented by one person as it existed before 1986. Therefore, no one can really claim to be the sole inventor of the dual gears as it was already in existence way before juicing became popular in Korea.

As you may already be aware of, Tribest added a new model—the GS-5000 Elite, which is equipped with the new Jumbo Twin Gears. Before, the Twin Gear had a two stage juicing: masticating and impeller pressing. Now, in the Jumbo Twin Gears, we adopted a “mixing” stage. This new design is to support Dr. Max Gerson’s advice on mixing carrots and apple pulp before pressing. Now, the Jumbo Twin Gears have a three stage juicing: masticating, mixing, and pressing.

I hope this information clarifies the misunderstandings about the negative claims on Green Star compared for the Kempo models. Unlike them, we didn’t just change the model number with the same machine. Actually, we made so many adjustments and improvements that the Green Star does not resemble the Kempo models at all. For your convenience, I have attached a historical timeline of the dual gears. You can also [view] a Youtube video of John Kohler’s visit to Tribest factory at Corrupad in Korea (www.youtube.com/user/rawfoods#p/u/12/2s781klZ4fE).

From the below timelined history of dual gear juicers in Korea, we hope you will be able to learn that the KP model (Samson Ultra) and GPT model (Hippocrates) were manufactured by two different companies which were organized by two different interest groups. If you are interested in learning more about the two groups, we will provide such information to you.

And also, unlike their claim, the design and the tooling of the Mini Green (Kempo) were not constructed after the new two companies were established in the late 1990s; instead, in the same mid-90s as Green Star Gold were to compete against the competitor’s lower-end juicer called Angel Life, which was launched a little ahead of Mini Green (Kempo) before their bankruptcy. It was our painful mistake as we failed to acquire that Mini Green tooling when we became the successor of the failed Green Power Company.

Lastly, the two companies—Kempo (KP) or Green Power Ten (GPT)—were neither established nor run by the original owner (inventor) of the Green Power Gold. Later, the two became one and made Green Power Kempo but the new merged company had nothing to do with the original owner (inventor) of Green Power. They may have gotten permission to use the name like we did. This was another mistake of ours in that we were not careful enough to obtain the exclusive use of the name.

Later, we decided to abandon the name to avoid confusion in the marketplace because many customers requested warranty service for the Kempo machines from us. They falsely advertised as if GS and GP model were older models and replaced by the new KP and GPT models. Now, it is rare to get such questions.

Please take the time to review these materials as you will find that Tribest Corporation tries to be transparent as possible in its marketing material and business. We believe in creating healthy living and are dedicated to the mission of carrying the latest innovations and best products to help consumers maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Should you have any further inquiries or questions, please feel free to contact me.

Peace and love,

Mina Yang
Administrative Assistant
Tribest Corporation
1143 N. Patt Street, Anaheim, CA 92801"

History of Dual Gear Juicers

1986

First dual geared juicer was introduced in Korea. At this stage, the production seems to have been very limited at a domestic level. It is not clear if the dual gear juicers were sold under a certain brand name and what was the company name. It is assumed that the juicer was called Angel Juicer.

The two key persons who were involved in this venture were Mr. Moon Hyun Lee, who was known to have an engineering background, and Mr. Jong Gill Kim, who was known to have a business background. So Mr. Lee and Kim may be the two responsible persons who started the dual juicer business in Korea. Later, both parties have been involved in a lot of litigation on the patents, copy rights and design against each other.

1988

Mr. Lee and Mr. Kim announced separation. Mr. Lee continued the old venture. However, Mr. Kim established a new venture called the “Taehoon Sanop” and started making another dual gear machine.

1990

Mr. Lee changed his business name to Hosan Silop. He launched his improved Angel dual gear juicer. Mr. Kim of Taehoon Sanop also launched an improved dual gear juicer called Green Power.

1991

Juicer business started picking up. Hosan Silop (Mr. Lee’s company) and Taehoon Silop (Mr. Kim’s company) started advertising their juicers through the mass media: TV, radio, newspapers, and magazines.

1992

Dual gear juicer business boomed in Korea. The boom was led by the two leading brands Angel and Green Power. Many entrepreneurs followed and opened new juicer companies to share the success of these two juicer companies, which became already big names in Korea. These two big names launched many campaigns to keep up with their leading positions. They started sending entries in international invention competitions because they needed something good to advertise or to publicize. From this effort, not only did they respectively receive awards and medals, but they also received exposure to the juicing industry of the world.

Hosan Silop (Mr. Lee’s company) changed its name to Angel Life Co., Ltd.

1993

Angel Life and Green Power both entered in the ’93 World Invention Contest held in Pittsburg, PA (USA). At this competition, Green Power Gold (GP-E1503 model) earned the Grand prize. Therefore, Taehoon Sanop (Mr. Kim’s company) changed its business name to Green Power Co. Ltd.

Green Power Co., Ltd launched a Clean Gear campaign to educate consumers that the acetal buffer used in its dual gear was to prevent the two metal gears from touching each other, and thus, unlike Angel’s dual gear, the concern of metal scrapping was entirely removed.

Tribest Corporation, Los Angeles, CA, (USA) signed an agreement with Green Power Co., Ltd for the exclusive international marketing rights. Tribest created the concept of Twin Gear to distinguish its different characteristics from the Angel Juicer and those of other plain dual gears. That unique concept of Twin Gear included the following: an acetal safety buffer, magnetic and bioceramic technology, cutting points, and pocket recess. Eventually the term, Twin Gear, became a trade dress of Green Power Juicers in the international market including the US market.

The term Twin Gear had never been used in Korea, as the copyright was owned by Tribest Corp. to use in international business.

1994

Juicer industry kept on growing in Korea. A juicer became the necessity in every new modern home in Korea. A juicer was the one of the most favorite gifts given in weddings for new couples. 17 dual gear juicer companies were enjoying the boom.

At this time, Tribest Corporation launched Green Power Gold (GP-E1503) Juicer into U.S. and Canadian market.

1995

Competition among juicer companies became very severe. The competition between Angel and Green Power were most severe as they were the two major leading dual gear juicer manufacturers. At first, the competition was to take the larger market share in sales, but they gradually became angry each other and fell into so many litigation on wasteful arguments in patents, design and copyrights. In some litigation, the winner became the loser. In another, the loser became the winner.

They spent so much money in advertising; thus, they cut down their profit to win the game. After all, their competition became the focus of who would survive the litigation and who would shut down its business from the litigation.

Green Power Gold (GP-E1503) Juicer was launched in Germany by Keimling Naturkost who was appointed as the sole importer by Tribest Corp. Later, Tribest Corporation launched the Green Power Juicer in more than 20 other countries including Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Japan, and Taiwan.

International market started growing and stabilizing.

1996

Juicer business in Korea was at its high peak and continuing to grow. But the wasteful competition produced a lot of negative PR/marketing against their competitors as they accused one another.

Requested by Green Power Co., Ltd., a Korean government owned laboratory conducted a test on the 17 juicers sold in the Korean market at that time and published a report showing all the 16 juicers, including the big name Angel, contained impurities in the juice at a higher level than the guideline of drinking water set up by government. Only one juicer, Green Power Gold passed that test, showing much lower levels from that guideline. Green Power Co., Ltd. was much excited at this result and their PR release this news to major media.

One national TV covered this story on the prime time news. The negative influence of this TV news coverage was enormous to the juicer industry. Consumers were now reluctant to buying a juicer. Many consumers wanted to return their juicers they had already bought. Even though it may have been a temporary reaction and reservation, this impact was big enough to shut down the juicer companies exhausted from the severe competition, litigation, and cut from price.

A few days later, the news covered another story that the test was conducted through a questionable method; a new test had been conducted by another laboratory by the request of Angel. All the juicers were fine and passed the guideline.

However, the damage was too late. They could not warm up to the consumers and have the consumers return to the juicer market. They had to start downsizing their operations rapidly but they were only flexible to reducing manpower—not in liquidating their fixed assets. Their loans, stocks, and raw materials in the warehouse were sitting there paying interest. And on top of that, to make matters worse, the Asian financial turmoil was approaching. At last, in late 1996, Angle Juicer Co. Ltd filed for bankruptcy. Green Power Co., Ltd also was experiencing big difficulties because of severely reduced size of demand from the market.

1997

Green Power Co., Ltd survived several months longer thanks to the stable international market operated by Tribest Corporation. However, the international market did not mature enough yet to generate plentiful force to hold the sinking giant vessel.

Eventually, Green Power Co., Ltd. filed for bankruptcy in May 1997. Creditors Association of Green Power Co., Ltd (CAGP) was formed. Members of the association were the majority of the component suppliers. CAGP obtained all the business rights from the failed company including patents, trademarks, and the tooling.

CAGP and Tribest Corporation agreed to continue manufacturing and marketing for its international customers. Also, Corrupad Packaging Company was appointed to assemble the final products. Later, major toolings and all the other business rights, such as the patent, trademark, and copyrights, were bought out by Corrupad from CAGP. Thus, Corrupad became the rightful successor of Green Power Co., Ltd. Corrupad was now the manufacturer of the original Green Power Twin Gear juicers.

When Corrupad acquired the Green Power business, there were two active models which were GP-E1503 namely Green Power Gold model, and SM-2000i namely SEMO model. Both models were bought out by Corrupad. Tribest continued marketing GP-1503 Green Power Gold model without changing the model name. Later, Tribest Corp. launched a new model using the tooling of SM-2000i and changed the model name to Green Life and the model number to GL-2000i.

At that time of bankruptcy, there was another tooling of a design which was originally planned and developed to compete against Angel’s cheaper and smaller model called Angel Classic but Green Power’s smaller model remained inactive, waiting for the timing of launching. Angel Classic was launched at around 1995 and became the leader in the lower-end market. Angel launched a price war using Angel Classic and cut down the price substantially.

So, Green Power Co., Ltd. had to do something. They needed a new smaller model equipped with reduced sizes of juicing parts and motor to compete against Angel Classic in the lower priced juicer market. Later, this new design became the Kempo juicer. The development was finished just before the company’s bankruptcy and it was not able to give birth to this model. Thus, the tooling became inactive in the warehouse at the time of company’s bankruptcy.

1998

After the bankruptcy of Green Power Co., Ltd., early in 1998, Kempo Co., Ltd, from Sungnam, Korea, was formed by a group of entrepreneurs majority of which consisted of the former employees of Green Power Co., Ltd. For several months before bankruptcy, the company owed money to its employees because it was not able to pay their payrolls due to the financial difficulties.

It is not known what kind of legal process that they had acquired for this tooling but this group started manufacturing KP-E1201 with the inactive tooling of the KP model, and called it the Kempo juicer. Theoretically, the tooling should belong to the major creditors.

Kempo Co., Ltd was represented by Mr. Jae Yung Lee and the co-president, Mr. Mun Gi Lee.

In late 1998, another company was organized in Anyang, Korea, majorly by the group of entrepreneurs which consisted of former dealers of the Green Power machine in Korea. This company was represented by Mr. Sung Dae Lim and Mr. Chan Gi Lee as the co-president.

They named their company Green Power Ten Co., Ltd. They started manufacturing GPT-E1201. The name had been so confusing to the original company and they kept on misleading consumers saying its machine was a new model of the famous Green Power Gold and Green Star as if they were the manufacturers of the said two models.

The major differences of the two machines of KP and GPT were at the locking system of the housing to the body. One used a screw with a round knob and the other used a locking handle. Tribest Corporation was the first company who tried to introduce both models of KP-E1201 and GPT-E1201 under the name of Mini Green (trademark owned by Tribest Corporation) into the international market. But after the first shipment, every international customer did not like them and refused to carry them anymore with a fear of ruining the well established reputation and name of Green Power Gold.

In the same year, Tribest Corporation newly launched Green Life model (later name changed to Green Star), GL-2000i which had a modern look in ivory color using the SEMO tooling. All the international importers liked this model very much as it was the same quality with the Green Power Gold and with a little lower price compared to the Green Power Gold model. Accordingly, some of the countries including Germany, Green Life (Green Star) model was substituted for the Green Power Gold.

Widely in the world market, Green Life (Green Star) became the main model and the Green Power Gold remained as a classical premium model. Both models still have been available in some of countries including USA, Singapore, and Malaysia.

Angel Co., Ltd (ACL) (President: Mr. Moon Hyun Lee, the former President of the failed Angel Life Co., Ltd.) was formed to re-establish the Angel dual gear juicer business.

2001

Unfortunately, Tribest Corporation had to change the name again from Green Life to Green Star due to a conflict of interest with a company who has been using Green Life on their herbal product for a long time. Green Star was launched with new model numbers of GS-1000, 2000, 3000.

In July, Angel Industry Co., Ltd (AICL) was established (President: Cho Young Bok). AICL was organized using the word Angel. That gave the effect of piggybacking the former reputation of the Angel Life juicer. Even, AICL made some prepayment with the exclusive right to distribute Health Bank juicers produced by Angel Co., Ltd (ACL) (President: Mr. Moon Hyun Lee, the former President of the failed Angel Life Co., Ltd.) according to the arguments between both parties at the bulletin board of AICL. AICL deposited 300,000,000 Korean Won (About U$300,000.00) to get exclusive distributorship and payment of the machine. The following is the summary from the above bulletin board:

First delivery of Health Bank machines from ACL to AICL was made in between August and September and was found not successful due to too many problems with the machines (sold 20 machines and 16 machines were said to be returned). AICL had to recall the entire machine sold since then (67 machines). ACL was accused by AICL that they had failed to deliver any machine for almost 5 months thereafter. ACL said that they couldn’t help but announce separation of partnership relations. And they decided to manufacture their own machine, which was named Twin Health juicer.

2002

Kempo Co., Ltd had been merged into Green Power Ten Co., Ltd. due to lack of business. Since then, KP model and GPT model were supplied by Green Power Ten Co., Ltd. Green Bison’s Samson Ultra was a KP model, and Hippocrates was a GPT model. Greenpower Kempo was a GPT model also. All of them were made basically by the same tooling.

In February, AICL changed its name to Woorideul Industry Co., Ltd. (WICL) and WICL started manufacturing the Smile juicer. In June, the Smile juicer was launched in Korean market. It is not certain but is assumed that WICL started use the name Twin Health Marathon Juicer in international market in 2003. Australia may be the first country that started selling this machine.

2004 To avoid continuous confusion derived from the Green Power Kempo juicer, Tribest Corporation made a decision to change the grouping name from Green Power Juice Extractors to Green Star Juice Extractors. Before, Green Star was only the model name and Green Power was the juicer name. Now, Green Star became the juicer name and Green Power became the model name. So, before, it was called Green Power Juicer, model Green Star GS-1000, and Gold GP-E1503 but now Green Star Juicer, model GS-1000 or Green Star Gold GP-E1503. Accordingly, the GP emblem on the front body of the GP-E1503 model replaced to a new Green Star logo.

Juicers & Juicing

Company History of the Green Star & Kempo Dual-Gear Juicers

History of Dual Gear Juicers

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