In an interview, she recalled: "At that time, I fantasized about opening a small bookstore and living a petty bourgeois life of reading Hemingway’s novels, drinking coffee and raising a cat.
"[2] In 1996, she joined the then newly established Taikang Life Insurance Company and in 1999, she went to the United States to study at University of Pennsylvania, where she graduated with a major in international politics.
Located at 798 Art Zone, the bookstore sells literature and paraphernalia related to Mao Zedong and communism.
[6][7] In 2013, Chinese magazine New Fortune published the '500 Rich List', which featured Kong Dongmei and her husband Chen Dongsheng and ranked them at 242nd position with an estimated 5 billion yuan ($815 million).
[8][9] In 1996, after joining the Taiking Life Insurance, Kong met the founder of the company Chen Dongsheng.