Why Did Luckin Coffee Ban Customized Drink Orders?

Luckin Coffee has told stores to stop preparing the viral all-ice, no-water, dome-lid swap that spread across social media. The customization swapped the still water in drinks like the Little Butter Americano for extra ice cubes and the flat lid for a domed one, slowing dilution for a richer taste with a popcorn-like aroma. Luckin halted it because the non-standard request disrupts store inventory of both lid types.

The habit grew after some customers found the standard Little Butter Americano too bland and shared their fix online, and it spread to orders like the Matcha Velvet Latte and Raspberry Americano. Longtime users were surprised when stores suddenly refused, and employees said they felt helpless, since the swap sits outside the standard process. The episode has fueled debate in coffee culture over whether chains should adapt to personal taste or protect standardized operations.

Recently, Luckin Coffee halted the "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" ordering method that went viral on social media, sparking heated discussion among consumers. This drinking method, by replacing the still water with ice cubes and the flat lid with a dome lid, makes the drink richer in taste and more photogenic, and was once imitated by many netizens. However, because this operation is a non-standardized process and causes confusion in store inventory between flat lids and dome lids, the company has issued a notice prohibiting its continued preparation. Some consumers believe the brand should adapt its products to meet demand, while others understand the necessity for chain brands to maintain standardized operations. This debate over the balance between personalized customization and store management is worth the attention of coffee enthusiasts.

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Recently, many netizens have posted on social media platforms giving feedback that the Luckin "Little Butter Americano all-ice no-water" they had been drinking for months can no longer be made.

It is understood that since Luckin's Little Butter Americano was launched, some users felt the standard version of the drink tasted bland. To satisfy their own taste preferences, some customers figured out the "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" drinking method and shared it on social media platforms.

According to netizens, after the still water originally added to the Little Butter Americano is replaced with ice cubes, the ingredients are diluted more slowly, making the whole drink richer in taste and flavor, with a popcorn-like aroma. And swapping the standard flat lid for a dome lid allows staff to add more ice cubes, making photos more photogenic too.

As a result, in recent months, many people who learned about the "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" method followed suit, adding this note when buying drinks such as Little Butter Americano, Matcha Velvet Latte, and Raspberry Americano, in order to get a customized drink that suited their taste, and gradually formed the habit when placing orders.

So when they noted "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" but were suddenly told the drink could not be made as requested, longtime users were quite surprised and asked why stores had made such a sudden change.

Faced with consumer feedback, most Luckin employees felt quite helpless, saying the "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" method is actually a non-standard operation for the drink, and that only some staff, worried about getting bad reviews for not fulfilling customers' note requests, secretly made it while guarding against surveillance cameras, admitting that if caught, the store would be fined.

The reason this viral drinking method was recently strictly banned is that the dome-lid swap has affected store management. It is understood that drinks such as the Little Butter Americano use flat lids as standard, and each order a user places reduces the corresponding material inventory in the system. However, if the lid is swapped to a dome lid according to order notes, the inventory counts of the two materials—flat lids and dome lids—will not match up, and there may even be drinks with cream tops that originally require dome lids left with no lid to use.

Perhaps because of this, after realizing that the non-standard "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" operation has affected store operations and management, the company issued rigid rules, sending notices stipulating that stores "should no longer make all-ice no-water, and can only produce drinks according to the standard method."

In response, some consumers said that since "all-ice, no-water, swap to dome lid" has been recognized and sought after by a broad range of users, the brand could improve the method and launch a new product, rather than taking a "one-size-fits-all" approach, "not even letting us make a delicious version."

But other netizens pointed out that as a chain brand, it is understandable for Luckin to focus on standardized production processes, and the customized drinking methods users have devised may not suit most people's tastes. Considering store management and sales of normally made drinks, among other factors, it is reasonable for the brand to halt employees' non-standard operations.

Image source: Xiaohongshu

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