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author | lin mo

1

in a business war drama, if the plot is pushed forward at the same speed as luckin coffee, the screenwriter will most likely be criticized by the audience for being unrealistic and inexperienced.

they can finish a year's worth of work for others in just a few weeks. even the oxen and horses in the production team can't work so hard.

last month, the netizens saw the trending search #瑞幸已年合牌18次# on weibo, and they all expressed their shock in the comments section. friends, the emotions came too early, and now this data has been updated again.

according to incomplete statistics, luckin coffee has produced dozens of co-branded products in the past two years.

logically speaking, when forming cps becomes a routine operation for this company, people should get used to it after seeing it so many times.

but it didn't! luckin coffee can still catch the overwhelming popularity through joint ventures and output a strong presence to the public time and time again.

in the words of netizens, ruizi is a god in charge of collaborations in the coffee industry.

so the question is, how can it achieve this? there are at least three core reasons:

one is a keen sense of smell. take this year as an example. compared with previous years, luckin's joint ventures are more diverse, covering art, animation, film and television dramas, games, old companies, dance dramas and other fields. in addition to the safe selection of classic and popular ips, there is also the use of traffic in advance. for example, the film and television drama "the story of rose" and the domestic game "black myth: wukong" are both the types that exploded as soon as they were launched. thanks to advance prediction and sufficient preparation, luckin can always catch up with the peak of traffic in the first time and stand out among many joint ventures.

this involves luckin's second joint advantage, super strong execution. luckin has its own set of joint gameplay. joint-themed paper bags and cup sleeves are all routine operations, plus customized peripherals, as well as the opening screen and pop-up windows on the app side, electronic screens and display boards on the store side, etc., online and offline unified pace and concentrated firepower dissemination. this set of tricks, plus the touch point coverage of more than 20,000 stores across the country, has surely attracted the attention of people across the country.

luckin coffee co-branded cup sleeve

for example, luckin coffee’s collaboration with the domestic game “black wukong: mythology” not only bet on this treasure game ip early, but also prepared paper bags, cup sleeves, posters and other materials in advance, and even opened a joint theme store offline to create an immersive joint experience in all aspects, focusing on a fast and stable approach. for another example, after luckin coffee collaborated with the popular drama “rose story”, it quickly launched the yellow rose latte and prepared exquisite cup sleeves, keys, etc., which also attracted countless viewers to buy and check in.

the last point, and the most important one that distinguishes luckin from other brand collaborations, is that its collaborations are never castles in the air, they must be consistent with the product and brand. take the collaboration between luckin and moutai as an example. luckin specially customized the new product, maotai latte. in the process of becoming popular, the brand also gained a wave of real growth. topic creation and conversion are the ultimate goals of collaboration.

with a keen sense of smell and the ability to find co-branded ips that suit the needs of consumers, coupled with sincere topics, material reserves, and customized products to sustain sales, it is no wonder that "being fun" has become luckin's label.

2

joint hits and popular cps are the aspects that are easily perceived by hot searches. however, the aspect that is easily perceived by the tongue is the product itself.

for a long time, when we mentioned luckin coffee’s products, the first things that came to our mind were often the popular products such as raw coconut latte and thick milk latte. after all, 700 million cups of raw coconut latte alone were sold in three years.

but in fact, the appeal of luckin's products goes beyond this. over the past few years, more and more people have developed the habit of drinking coffee, and their taste demands have continued to change. under this trend, luckin not only works hard on basic coffee products, but also quietly meets the taste demands of more segmented groups of people.

for example, in order to increase the milk base, oat milk was added in the first half of this year on the basis of thick milk, velvet, and raw coconut to meet the personalized needs of users. some consumers cannot drink coffee products made with milk due to lactose intolerance or the need to strictly control calorie intake. luckin coffee has launched oat latte and a variety of oat milk products. this subtle change may be insignificant to the general public, but it is a great satisfaction for people with specific needs, especially when they use the same oatly champion oat milk and can drink it at a more advantageous price.

for example, we have added different roasting degrees of coffee beans to choose from. we just launched dark roasted beans today. as we all know, when coffee beans are roasted, maillard reaction and caramelization reaction will occur. there are significant differences in flavor between dark, medium and light roasting degrees, which is an important factor in determining the final taste.

before the dark roasted beans were launched, luckin only had one type of coffee beans on a daily basis, which was the blended beans that won the iiac gold award. this blended bean is roasted in a medium-deep roast, mainly showing the flavors of nuts and caramel. the dark roasted beans are the same type of coffee beans, but the slow dark roasting process is used, and the caramelization reaction is more obvious, so it can present a thick dark chocolate flavor.

in short, dark roasted beans are more mellow and can satisfy some consumers who pursue a rich taste. in addition to launching the new dark roasted latte, luckin coffee has also added dark roasted beans to its american, velvet latte, oatmeal latte, and essence white. the dark roasted latte has a softer and smoother taste due to the addition of milk, and has a rich milky chocolate flavor.

another example is the continuous update of the soe black cup, which is committed to allowing more coffee lovers to enjoy rare, top-quality coffee beans. soe, the full name of which is single origin espresso, refers to espresso made from coffee beans from a single origin. it can better show the unique regional flavor of coffee beans than blending, and is usually only used to make americano and latte.

to a certain extent, whether a coffee brand can select good beans and meet the needs of coffee lovers can be determined by whether they can make a good cup of soe coffee.

according to the standards of sca (specialty coffee association), coffee beans are certified as specialty coffee beans based on scores of nearly ten dimensions including aroma, flavor, and body. only those with a score of 80 or above can be certified as specialty coffee beans.

as luckin's boutique coffee line, soe black cup selects single-origin coffee beans with an sca score of 80 or above, such as yirgacheffe, oiran, and paradise manor, and even changes products according to the season. these coffee beans basically come from well-known production areas, and luckin will use different processing methods according to the characteristics of different raw beans to bring coffee lovers a better taste experience as much as possible.

recently, luckin coffee has returned to the market with a brand of soe beans, gesha. this coffee bean is carefully selected from the famous production area [benchimagi], with an altitude of 1909-2069m. it is processed by traditional sun drying method to present the best state of bright floral and fruity aroma. the products launched this time are still the four classic flavors of american, latte, dirty, and australian white.

geisha americano has a bright taste, with a light floral scent and blueberry sweetness at first, and a soft, mellow and full sweetness of dried apricots in the middle, and a light macadamia aroma in the aftertaste, with rich layers. geisha latte has the aroma of plums, a sweet and sour aroma, a toffee sweetness in the middle, and a butter and cocoa flavor in the aftertaste. in short, the four geisha products not only maximize the characteristics of the beans themselves, but also create different flavors through different production methods.

when the little black cup soe series was first launched, there was only one product. now, 4-6 premium coffee beans are available throughout the year, and they change with the seasons. behind this is luckin coffee's determination to provide users with professional, high-quality coffee beans, and to move firmly towards major well-known origins and extend to the front end of the industry chain.

3

business development is not a competition, speed is important, but speed is not the only thing. luckin coffee is so good at making trouble, but it also makes people wonder, is it useful to compete with speed alone?

especially in the coffee industry, there are strict requirements for supply chain management and refined operations. we have seen that a large number of new brands have failed in the fierce competition because they cannot guarantee the constant and stable supply of raw materials. luckin coffee, a hit product maker, has also faced the situation where its product director ran to the supplier's factory to monitor shipments.

in order to avoid this embarrassing situation, luckin coffee began to continuously expand into the upstream of the industrial chain and seek to optimize its product structure at the source.

at the beginning of 2023, luckin coffee fully launched the "global bean search plan", aiming to bring more boutique coffee beans from their origins back to chinese consumers, meeting users' extreme demand for high quality and more diversified products. among them, ethiopia is the key production area of ​​this plan. the luckin coffee team is deeply involved in the planting, harvesting, and green bean processing in the local area, and the popular new product soe huakui was also born in this process.

so far, luckin has established cooperative relationships with six major coffee producing regions: ethiopia, brazil, colombia, panama, guatemala and yunnan.

in june this year, brazilian vice president and minister of development, industry, trade and services alckmin met with luckin coffee chairman and ceo guo jinyi and visited luckin coffee stores. witnessed by the leaders of the two countries, luckin coffee signed a letter of intent to purchase brazilian coffee with several suppliers, and also signed a memorandum of understanding on the promotion of brazilian coffee with the brazilian export and investment promotion agency, promising to purchase 120,000 tons of brazilian coffee beans with a total value of nearly us$400 million.

what does that mean? let’s put it this way: in 2023, the total value of coffee beans exported by brazil to china was only $280 million.

it is worth noting that luckin coffee has also been making frequent moves and steadily advancing in its domestic supply chain layout. since the beginning of this year, luckin coffee's fresh fruit processing plant in baoshan, yunnan has started trial operation; the jiangsu baking base in kunshan, suzhou has officially started production; and the qingdao innovation production center project has also started construction, with a total investment of about 3 billion yuan.

it is worth mentioning that the newly built qingdao baking base is a large-scale production base integrating modernization, intelligence and greenness. it is the third and largest baking factory in luckin coffee's national layout. it continues luckin coffee's experience in intelligence and digitalization on the industrial chain side, further promotes luckin coffee's layout in the entire coffee industry chain, and controls product quality from the source.

with four self-owned factories in three years, luckin coffee has achieved industry-leading acceleration.

this kind of speed is not a random series of punches, but a return to the industry and products. on the basis of stability, it continues to explore the upstream and downstream of the industry. you think luckin has been doing things, but it has actually been doing coffee.

secretly working hard, and then forcibly controlling everyone. luckin coffee has endless energy, and it must have drunk a lot of luckin coffee in secret.