What does the Heytea Logo contest reveal about coffee knowledge?

Heytea launched its first A-Xi Full-Body Portrait Collection Contest, asking fans to draw the brand logo's full-body character. Submissions closed on October 15, and the grand prize, worth over 9,999 yuan, will be announced on October 31. Related topics on Weibo and Xiaohongshu have passed ten million reads. Just before launch, the logo quietly lost its black hair and the fingers holding the cup, a change some compared to black bean coffee.

The article traces how the Heytea logo has changed over time, including last year's fan-made full-body portrait and an April crossover with Hiroshi Fujiwara that gave the character a lightning strike and an afro. Such fan interaction is a way for the brand to build equity, and it sits alongside everyday coffee knowledge shared through coffee-focused media channels.

Heytea recently officially announced the launch of its first "A-Xi Full-Body Portrait Collection Contest," inviting fans to participate by drawing the Heytea Logo—the full-body portrait of A-Xi—with the top prize worth over 9,999 yuan. The submission period ended on October 15, and thousands of works have been received across various platforms. The total reads of related topics on Weibo and Xiaohongshu have exceeded ten million, and the grand prize will be announced on October 31. Interestingly, on the eve of the event's launch, the Heytea Logo quietly went "bald"—the black hair was removed, and the fingers holding the cup disappeared too, sparking a frenzy of comments from netizens. This article reviews the iterative journey of the Heytea Logo from its creation to the present, including last year's viral full-body portrait created by netizens and this April's crossover collaboration with Hiroshi Fujiwara that saw the Logo struck by lightning and turned into an afro, analyzing how the brand interacts with consumers through its Logo to accumulate brand equity. For more specialty coffee beans, please add the private WeChat of Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee), WeChat ID: qjcoffeex.

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Recently, Heytea officially announced that it is looking for fan collaborations by launching its first "A-Xi Full-Body Portrait Collection Contest." The submission period for the event ended on October 15, and it has now entered the judging phase. The contest features a grand prize worth over 9,999 yuan, inviting fans to participate by drawing the Heytea Logo—the full-body portrait of A-Xi.

After the event launched, the total reads of related topics on Weibo and Xiaohongshu exceeded ten million. According to Heytea's Weibo announcement, thousands of works have been received across various platforms. The "Great Heytea Painter" grand prize will be announced on October 31, so all Heytea painters please keep an eye on official information. This "collaboration" has been jokingly called by netizens "Heytea's largest collaboration scene to date."

Did you notice? On the night before the "A-Xi Full-Body Portrait Collection Contest" was announced, Heytea's Logo went "bald" overnight! Is this because it worried itself bald over the contest? Heytea quietly changed the Logo design, removing the black hair, and the fingers holding the cup also disappeared.

What followed was a frenzy of "complaints" from netizens: I accidentally noticed Heytea changed its new Logo... Heytea! Are you losing hair? It really looks like it. Some netizens, facing the suddenly changed Logo avatar, said this was too "abrupt" (a pun on "bald"). Well! The Logo updated on September 29 became like this.

This happened before the National Day holiday. After the National Day holiday, we can see that the Logo avatars on Heytea's major official accounts have changed again. Yes! The brand gave the "bald A-Xi" Logo a layer of gold, instantly making it look "luxurious"!

Since its founding, Heytea created the original A-Xi Logo, initially featuring a cute little figure with simple black-and-white strokes. The simple black-and-white stroke design has strong visual recognition, and subsequent designs have been continuously iterated and upgraded while maintaining the same stick-figure style. It is understood that the inspiration for the Heytea Logo comes from the classic profile portraits on coins circulated throughout history across the world. The figure on the Logo has no gender, race, or regional identity.

In October last year, the first full-body portrait of the Heytea Logo "appeared." A netizen created a full-body portrait of A-Xi as a little boy with a big belly drinking Heytea on social media. After the image was reposted to Weibo, the topic #HeyteaLogoFullBodyImage# also trended.

In response to this "spoof," Heytea officially stepped in to "debunk" it—haha, this reminds me of "nicely drawn, please don't draw it next time." This debunking actually got more netizens involved in this fun creative activity, and Heytea's trending topic reached 400 million reads.

Everyone expressed agreement: "I don't know if this is Heytea's full-body image, but it's definitely my full-body image," "It looks exactly like me trying to lose weight while still insisting on drinking milk tea," and some netizens even said: "Found the reason Heytea won't release a full-body image!" Heytea said this creation provided a lot of soul collisions, and now this time it's for real. Now we just wait for the "Great Heytea Painter" works to be announced on October 31.

Heytea's Logo updates aren't just a one-time or two-time thing. In April this year, Heytea officially announced a crossover collaboration with a well-known trend godfather under the theme "Black TEA." Perhaps the two sides deeply collided to produce a huge inspiration—just days after the announcement, the Heytea Logo was struck by lightning, and its hair directly turned into an afro.

To highlight this outstanding hairstyle, the entire color scheme also changed from the original black lines on a white background to white lines on a black background. Heytea officially even made a GIF for this, the little boy was struck by lightning and his hair "exploded"! Because of being "electrified" by Hiroshi Fujiwara, this inspiration was really huge!

Over the years, the Heytea Logo has been constantly modified and updated in the details, which not only brings users a deeper understanding but also conveys the brand's latest philosophy, gradually becoming a deeply ingrained brand memory.

The Heytea Logo has extremely high recognition and strong inclusivity. Now the creation of Heytea full-body portraits seems to have gradually become a unique "Heytea-style interaction," continuously deepening users' awareness and impression of the Heytea Logo. This also helps accumulate brand equity and is something other brands cannot replicate.

Many food and beverage brands also seem to always unconsciously overturn our perceptions, though we also look forward to the surprises they bring. However, genuine interaction and connection with consumers still need to be built around real products and experiences to truly be established.

In conclusion, it's important to understand that a Logo is far more than just a brand's outer garment. Building a good Logo is not something that can be done overnight. Having the right positioning, responding quickly and analyzing across different periods, not stinting on every investment, and not fearing every change—only then can you master the Logo and achieve great things in brand marketing.

Image source: Internet

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