Why Is Luckin Coffee Relaunching Mango Pomelo Sago?

Luckin Coffee plans to relaunch its Coconut Mango Pomelo Sago at the end of September, bringing back a drink absent from the menu for about three years. The new version adds crystal boba and coconut elements, and the recipe runs to 12 preparation steps with six new ingredients, which store staff say strains refrigerator space and slows service.

The Mango Pomelo Sago series first appeared around 2020 with items such as Big Mango Pomelo Sago and Mango Pomelo Sago Rinabing. Its return has revived a debate about where coffee ends and tea beverages begin, a familiar question in coffee culture as chains widen their menus beyond espresso drinks.

Luckin Coffee, the chain coffee brand, is expected to relaunch "Coconut Mango Pomelo Sago" at the end of September. The return of this drink after a three-year absence has filled many long-time customers with anticipation. However, after the new recipe was revealed, it triggered a collective complaint from employees—as many as 12 preparation steps and 6 new ingredients made the already crowded store refrigerators even worse. Some joked that "the recipe is longer than life itself," while others quipped that "the time it takes to make one cup is enough to make two or three Coconut Lattes." Is the return of Mango Pomelo Sago a case of nostalgia fulfilled or an operational challenge? Around topics such as recipe complexity, ingredient storage, and brand positioning, a heated discussion about the boundary between coffee and tea beverages is unfolding.

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Currently, before chain beverage brands launch new products, they usually release hints on social platforms first to attract consumer attention. Luckin follows the same playbook, and fans can often catch various clues about new products outside official channels. Recently, a "Coconut Mango Pomelo Sago" planned for launch at the end of September has stirred up quite a wave online.

According to the recollections of Luckin's veteran customers and former employees, the Mango Pomelo Sago series is not making its debut. As early as 2020, the brand launched products such as "Big Mango Pomelo Sago" and "Mango Pomelo Sago Rinabing," which became unforgettable favorites for many long-time customers thanks to their generous ingredients.

After waiting a full three years, Mango Pomelo Sago is finally coming back. Luckin fans' joy is written all over their faces, and they have high hopes for this relaunched product. But when the operations department issued the new product recipe, store partners cried out in distress, exclaiming that "the sky has fallen," and lamenting that this Mango Pomelo Sago's "recipe is longer than life itself."

As everyone knows, traditional Mango Pomelo Sago cannot do without the basic ingredients of sago, mango, coconut milk, and pomelo. Judging from the ingredient list shared by employees, Luckin's upgraded "Coconut Mango Pomelo Sago" retains mango, coconut milk, and pomelo while adding elements such as crystal boba and coconut milk pudding, making the entire drink practically "overflowing with ingredients."

Moreover, compared with Luckin's other existing drinks, "Coconut Mango Pomelo Sago" not only has a wide variety of ingredients but also a rather cumbersome preparation process, totaling 12 steps. This means that after receiving an order for the new product, staff need to take out each ingredient one by one, add them to the cup in the specified amounts and order, and then complete sealing and packaging. The whole process may take two to three minutes or even longer. "The time it takes to make one of these is enough to make two or three Coconut Lattes," "enough to make two or three Light Jasmine Teas."

After learning about the operational requirements, some store partners couldn't help but mock themselves, saying that when orders are flooding in, "I am the Mango Pomelo Sago recipe," "my outstretched hand is the production standard," meaning that once things get busy, there is simply no way to strictly follow the brand's standards to make this lengthy-step drink.

From another perspective, Luckin's current product line covers multiple categories such as flavored lattes, fruit coffees, light milk teas, and fruit-and-vegetable teas. The ingredients required for different drinks vary greatly, so when store refrigerators are opened, they are full of colorful juices and blended milks, making them visually dazzling and leaving storage space at full capacity every day.

Therefore, once Mango Pomelo Sago is officially launched, the 6 new ingredients needed to make this drink will sharply increase the refrigerator's storage pressure, and staff will also have to spend more effort searching for materials during operation. "When an order comes in, first squat down and rummage in the fridge for a minute, pulling ingredients out from a pile of bottles and jars," "making one drink empties half the fridge"—complaints like these are endless.

In response to this dilemma, some employees suggested that Luckin equip stores with countertop refrigerators, which could both reduce the refrigerator's storage burden and spare partners from repeatedly squatting down and standing up. "I don't want to squat down to grab so many things," "employees' backs and knees can't take it anymore."

Of course, some netizens hold different views. They believe that Luckin's recent new products are mostly related to tea drinks, and this Mango Pomelo Sago in particular gives people a sense of mismatch, as if "a coffee seller has gone off to sell milk tea." In their view, the brand might consider reactivating its previous tea beverage sub-brand "Little Deer Tea," assigning categories such as light milk tea and fruit tea to another track, rather than letting "a coffee brand increasingly develop toward milk tea."

Image source: Xiaohongshu

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