Which Coffee Attributes Turn a Drink Into Social Currency?

Coffee has moved past its role as a morning wake-up drink and now works as a shared social language among young people. The "early coffee, late alcohol" routine, the workplace invitation to grab a coffee, and neighbors swapping bean stockpiles during the pandemic all show functions that go well beyond staying alert.

Starbucks has operated in China for more than 20 years, and cafes have spread from business districts and office towers into residential streets, taking on a community character. Coffee discussion stays busy on platforms such as Xiaohongshu and Douban, and brand fan groups form around the coffee attributes people identify with.

Coffee is no longer just a drink that wakes up a tired body in the morning; it is gradually evolving into a common social language among young people. From the "early coffee, late alcohol" lifestyle, to the workplace moment when someone says "Wanna grab a coffee?" and a bit of goofing off begins, to the warmth of neighbors giving each other their coffee stockpiles during the pandemic, the functions coffee carries have long gone beyond simply staying awake. Starbucks has been in China for more than 20 years, driving cafes to spring up everywhere. Discussions about coffee on platforms such as Xiaohongshu and Douban remain highly popular, and brand fan groups have emerged along with them. Cafe locations have also extended from business districts and office buildings to residential streets, giving them an increasingly distinct community character. This article observes how coffee has shifted from a functional drink to social hard currency, while also retaining recommendations for specialty bean channels such as Front Street Coffee.

The day before, you were still living the carefree life of U.S. time; the next day, work was grinding you into the ground over and over again. If you are reading this on a screen, you probably still have not fully recovered the next day, and returning to work after a holiday inevitably makes you wonder whether you are dreaming. To truly and thoroughly wake yourself up, coffee becomes an indispensable weapon for staying alert.

Holding a cup of coffee has already become one of the tasks office workers must complete every day. The popularity of "early coffee, late alcohol" has even made coffee and alcohol flow through young people's bodies at the same time, as they willingly become part of the atmosphere at cafes and bars. Coffee is the start button for daytime work, and alcohol is the shutdown button for nighttime relaxation; the two have long been deeply embedded in young people's lives.

As one of the giants of the coffee industry, Starbucks has made a cup of coffee priced at more than 30 yuan the obvious choice for urban white-collar workers to show their status since it opened its first store in China in 1999. With the spread of coffee in China, the number of cafes has also continued to mushroom.

The word "coffee" is frequently used on major popular online platforms. If you enter the two characters "coffee" on Xiaohongshu, you can find more than 8.49 million notes, with content ranging from store visits to homemade coffee and an enormous variety of topics. There are also quite a few Douban groups centered on "coffee." Among them, the group with the most members, "Did You Drink Coffee Today?", has more than 140,000 members, and new shared content is updated in the group almost every minute.

All kinds of coffee brands and products keep emerging, and young people place orders, check in, and leave their reviews on online platforms. "This brand's coffee tastes good," "that brand's coffee beans are fragrant" — some netizens gather into small circles because they think alike, becoming fan groups for a certain coffee brand.

"Staying alert" was the reason young people first chose coffee: pulling all-nighters to study, getting up early for class. When the brain is almost "shutting down," coffee works quickly to keep you awake, so it naturally becomes the first choice.

However, with the popularity of coffee, its role seems no longer limited to "staying alert"; it also carries an important "social" function. Somewhat similar to "milk tea socializing," a sentence like "Wanna grab a coffee?" starts "coffee time" in the work group and becomes one of the periods when office workers can "legitimately slack off." To keep up with everyone's rhythm and fit into colleagues' circles, some office workers have no choice but to follow along and buy coffee and drink coffee too.

The outbreak of the pandemic could not stop coffee from breaking through regional lockdowns, and drinking coffee thus became a way for neighbors to share and communicate. During the period when Shanghai experienced community lockdowns because of the pandemic, a resident sighed in a grocery group: What is the world coming to? There is not even any coffee left. Neighbors then responded one after another, sharing their coffee "stockpiles" and giving coffee away for free.

In addition, coffee shops themselves also have social attributes. What people who go to coffee shops to drink coffee want may be exactly to communicate in the same space with people who share the same interests. For example, meeting an online friend they have never met before, or chatting and catching up with a friend they have not seen for a long time. More and more cafes are no longer fixated on choosing locations in business districts and office buildings, but instead choose streets with more everyday life, becoming cafes with a community character and blending and interacting with the neighbors throughout the block.

The mission of this life-sustaining water is no longer just to refresh and wake you up; it is also playing the role of social hard currency. So, did you take your colleagues out to slack off today?

Image source: Internet

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The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.