On the eve of the May Day holiday, the Manner store in Shanghai's North Bund became a favorite among photography enthusiasts because it allowed them to capture the "Shanghai Four-Piece Set" all in one shot. However, tourists who visited recently found that a row of temporary stalls set up outside the store happened to block the originally perfect view, leaving many who had made a special trip to take photos greatly disappointed. At the same time, nearby residents are full of anticipation for the upcoming Shanghai International Coffee Culture Festival. One camera spot, two moods, reflecting the delicate relationship between urban public space and festival activities. This article will walk you through the whole story, along with related recommendations and practical information from Front Street Coffee. [more…]

Shanghai, known as the "Coffee Capital," always attracts a large crowd of coffee lovers eager to check in at coffee festivals. However, a recent coffee event held in a park left many people with mixed feelings: entry queues exceeded an hour, the venue was packed like the Spring Festival travel rush, mobile signal was so poor that payments couldn't be made, and some specialty coffee prices were seen as steep by visitors. At the same time, some "freebie hunters" who weren't there for the coffee crowded around to collect giveaways, adding to the headaches of vendors and queuing consumers. Longtime enthusiasts lamented that the coffee festival is getting livelier and more commercialized, but that sense of ease and the true essence of coffee seem to be fading. [more…]

Recently, a coffee festival held on the grassy grounds of Lujiazui in Shanghai was hit by a sudden heavy rain, plunging what was originally a lively autumn event into a sorry mess. The rain turned the lawn into mud, some stalls leaked and lost power, and visitors struggled through the wet, slippery mud, greatly diminishing the experience. Although weather forecasts had already warned of rain over the weekend, the organizers appeared to have made inadequate preparations, sparking dissatisfaction among many participants. Still, some optimistic coffee lovers found a different kind of fun in it, even joking that they got to drink coffee with a "built-in washed flavor." Below is a detailed report on the incident. [more…]

During the 2024 Mid-Autumn Festival, Typhoon Bebinca, the strongest typhoon to make landfall in Shanghai in 75 years, struck head-on, putting the entire city on high alert. Yet as soon as the wind and rain let up, Shanghai residents couldn't wait to step outside and head for coffee shops. Whether independent cafés or chains like Manner, Luckin, Mstand, and Starbucks, long lines quickly formed. This article captures the scenes at Shanghai's street-side coffee shops after the typhoon, showcasing the city's deep-seated love for coffee. [more…]

During this year's Dragon Boat Festival, several Starbucks stores in the Jiangsu-Zhejiang-Shanghai region ran short of Frappuccino Zongzi (sticky rice dumplings), leaving customers holding redemption vouchers unable to collect their goods as scheduled. At some stores, heated arguments broke out between customers and staff. Some employees were reduced to tears by verbal abuse, while other customers threatened to call the police or expose the situation. Starbucks responded that it had made every effort to meet redemption demand, but some consumers remained dissatisfied with the compensation package. This supply-demand conflict triggered by a zongzi shortage reveals deeper issues in the brand's allocation and inventory management of seasonal products. [more…]

The five-day May Day holiday has always been a peak time for travel. Rather than queueing for ages outside popular coffee shops, many efficiency-minded coffee lovers choose to go to coffee festivals instead, tasting all the signature drinks from various vendors in one go. According to social media, Shanghai—a city jokingly dubbed "Coffee City"—held six coffee festivals across different districts during the May Day holiday, an astonishingly high density. Yet behind the explosion in the number of coffee festivals, problems such as uneven event quality, an overload of creative coffee, inflated prices, and scarce free tastings have also drawn frequent complaints. This article walks you through the buzz and controversy of Shanghai's May Day coffee festivals, and explores the shift of coffee festivals from "industry networking conventions" to "specialty beverage tech conventions." [more…]

On the eve of the Lantern Festival, KFC launched a limited-edition "Tangyuan Affogato Romance"—affogato paired with black sesame tangyuan—sparking a check-in craze, but designated stores and limited supply left many netizens empty-handed. Later, a café in Shanghai also rolled out Americano tangyuan: four freshly boiled black sesame tangyuan served in a ceramic cup, topped with a shot of espresso. However, the 38-yuan price tag and the taste of "super bitter coffee with super sweet tangyuan" drew complaints from netizens about poor value for money, and since it's simple to make, it can be replicated at home with household coffee equipment. This article will walk you through the ins and outs of this festive special and include Front Street Coffee's recommendations for making it at home. [more…]

The 8th Lujiazui Coffee Festival recently wrapped up in Shanghai, just half a year after the previous edition. The organizers made several adjustments in response to past issues, including full Wi-Fi coverage and timed-entry reservations. However, social media still buzzed with complaints: the venue remained packed, reservation slots were hard to secure, the 138–168 yuan coffee mystery boxes were seen as disguised ticketing, and some foreign brand experiences fell short of expectations. Despite gathering 100+ cafés from 25+ cities and brands from multiple countries, the event's weak offerings still hurt its reputation. This article reviews the highlights and gripes of this year's coffee festival. [more…]

From its stunning debut at the Shanghai Coffee Festival to now becoming a staple creative drink on Beijing café menus, Douzhi Coffee has gone through several years of development. Recently, this Beijing specialty has been upgraded once again—some shops have launched a Douzhi Latte, paired with a complete "Douzhi three-piece set," and even selected the highly renowned Huakui coffee beans, attracting many curious visitors to check in. However, the extreme flavor of Douzhi itself keeps the drink's reputation polarizing. What's more interesting is that the shop later quietly switched the coffee beans, from Huakui to an IICA Platinum Award-winning bean, sparking discussions among consumers about the pairing of beans and Douzhi. [more…]

The 8th Lujiazui Coffee Festival recently kicked off, with the five-day event bringing together 270 participating coffee shops, the largest scale in its history. In addition to more than a dozen overseas specialty coffee brands from Australia, Japan, Thailand, Singapore, South Korea and other places, the creative competition among exhibitors over peripheral giveaways is equally eye-catching. From oversized canvas tote bags to red and yellow plastic bags that replicate the style of wholesale markets, brands are using uniquely designed shopping bags to attract attention and generate buzz. As coffee itself becomes increasingly homogenized, these peripheral products, which are both practical and highly shareable, are becoming a "hard currency" more sought after than coffee at the festival. [more…]

A heavy downpour brought a distinctive African estate vibe to the coffee festival, and among the many stalls that insisted on staying open, the coffee pop-up stall from milk tea brand Good-mee unexpectedly became the center of attention. Besides the high-value-for-money specialty coffee that drew passersby to check in, the one-day store manager standing behind the bar attracted an even bigger crowd—none other than Boram Julio Um, champion of the 2023 WBC World Barista Championship, founder of Brazilian coffee brand Um Coffee Co., and one of the chief coffee masters collaborating with Luckin. The sight of this highly popular champion shaking milk tea for customers caught many people off guard, with some in the comments even calling out to Luckin, saying "Your handsome guy has been poached by Good-mee." So why exactly did this coffee industry star show up at the Good-mee stall? Let's revisit the lively scene together. [more…]

Popular specialty coffee brand o.p.s. has officially launched its "On The Move" city tour program, with the first stop at the Awakening Coffee Festival in Shenzhen's Excellence Center. The event runs from April 29 to May 5, a total of seven days. After the announcement, fans flooded the comments section calling for the brand to come to their cities, and the founder responded that future stops would be arranged based on the number of likes. On opening day, a long line formed in front of the o.p.s. booth early in the morning, and even the 30-degree heat and the constraints of a weekday could not dampen everyone's enthusiasm. Some people queued for over four hours just to taste the legendary "ceiling of specialty coffee." This time, o.p.s. brought two seasonal sets, each containing three specialty drinks, one of which is alcoholic, all priced at 118 yuan. [more…]

Recently, Luckin Coffee reportedly announced that it will pay triple holiday wages to all employees for the 2025 Spring Festival, breaking the previous practice of only full-time employees receiving this benefit. Behind this move lies the high turnover rate and labor shortage that Luckin has faced over the past year. From cost reduction and efficiency improvement to increased performance demands, frontline employees have come under mounting pressure, and part-time workers' pay is not proportional to their effort, leading many employees to choose to resign before the Spring Festival. In order to retain experienced workers and maintain normal store operations, Luckin has had to respond to the labor shortage with a triple-wage strategy. This article reviews the causes of the incident, employee feedback, and the industry background, and also includes a brand recommendation from Front Street Coffee for readers to gain a deeper understanding. [more…]

The last stop of Heytea's bottled beverage "Inspiration Bus" has arrived in Shanghai, partnering with 13 independent coffee shops across the Jing'an, Changning, Xuhui, and Huangpu districts to launch 22 limited-edition "Inspiration Coffee" drinks. The bus previously stopped in Guangzhou and Chengdu, where it teamed up with 20 and 23 coffee shops respectively to roll out dozens of specialty drinks. Heytea's ties to coffee can be traced back to 2014, and it has continued to launch new products since then, officially entering the coffee arena in 2021 by investing in SEESAW COFFEE. However, these specialty drinks mixed with fruit juice and sparkling water, while friendly to those new to coffee, raise a question: are people who drink specialty coffee really savoring the flavor of coffee? Perhaps while enjoying mixed drinks, we should also bravely take a step forward to experience the unique charm of pure coffee. [more…]

Shanghai Mental Health Center has once again drawn attention by using coffee as a medium. This time, its co-branded coffee "Music + Spirit," launched in collaboration with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, quickly sold out after release. Not only did long lines form at the offline store, but online channels also announced they were out of stock, leaving consumers waiting for pre-sales. This special coffee blend incorporates chocolate powder and American cayenne pepper powder and is available only at the COFFEE CUBE coffee shop inside the symphony orchestra. The simultaneously launched archive-file handbag contains ten drip coffee bags from different regions, each with a QR code that allows listeners to hear ten symphonic works and audio interpretations by mental health experts on urban emotional issues such as workplace PUA and insomnia. This is another successful creative attempt by the center to break out of its niche after "No. 600 Mooncakes," reflecting the market trend in which coffee has become a daily necessity for urban young people. [more…]

In recent years, cross-industry ventures have become a popular trend, and even century-old traditional Chinese medicine shops are joining the beverage market. Following Tongrentang, Tonghanchun Tang, with a history of 237 years, has also tested the waters of national-style wellness tea drinks in Shanghai Yuyuan Mall, launching over 30 beverages including wellness teas, fruit teas, milk teas, sparkling water, and coffee. Among them, the wellness milk tea incorporates ingredients such as ginseng, goji berries, and donkey-hide gelatin, while the two wellness coffees focus on American-style black coffee and ginseng honey latte, priced between 20 and over 30 yuan, with the most expensive bird's nest product exceeding 100 yuan. Whether these time-honored brands can win consumer favor through innovation is worth watching. [more…]

In recent years, luxury brands branching out into coffee shops has become an undeniable trend. From Vivienne Westwood to Coach, from Dior to Tiffany, numerous high-end consumer brands have opened cafés or launched limited-time pop-ups in cities such as Shanghai and Beijing. These venues sell themselves on exquisite décor, branded-logo tableware, and photogenic desserts, with prices ranging from twenty yuan to over a hundred, attempting to close the distance with the general public through a cup of coffee. Yet consumer reviews are mixed: some find it worth the money, while others see the products as perfunctory and the pricing as artificially inflated. This article will examine the market logic and consumer response behind this phenomenon. [more…]

Lin Junjie's coffee brand Miracle Coffee recently restarted in mainland China, with its first pop-up store opening on Qixi Festival on the 1st floor of Huacai Tiandi in Hexi, Nanjing. Although it is only a pop-up format, fan enthusiasm has not diminished. On the first day of opening, a long queue formed before business hours, with waiting times generally 2 to 3 hours during peak periods, and some even waited 5 to 6 hours to successfully check in. The production team for this Miracle Coffee is the champion-level brand S.O. The official Nanjing store has also begun renovation and is expected to open at the end of September, when Lin Junjie is expected to appear in person. [more…]

During the New Year holiday, gathering with friends to play cards is a popular pastime for many, and cozy coffee shops naturally become a hot choice. But recently, a customer who invited eight people to a coffee shop entrance to push tables together and play cards was asked to leave by the owner, and then left two consecutive bad reviews, saying the owner "lacks class." This incident sparked heated discussion online: some support the owner in protecting other customers' experience, while others believe coffee shops should accommodate entertainment needs. Should coffee shops allow card playing? Is it reasonable for the owner to refuse customers? This article will sort through the incident and the views of various parties, and explore the boundaries and difficulties in coffee shop management. [more…]

In recent years, Starbucks has continued to expand into county-level markets in China, with its stores now covering more than 1,000 county-level areas. Some new stores have even outperformed those in first-tier cities in terms of profitability. Recently, netizens in Jiangsu and Zhejiang noticed that Starbucks has opened a store in the Taolu block of Dongqian Lake in Ningbo that looks strikingly like a local old village house—a two-story building with a courtyard and balcony, red lanterns and couplets hanging above the entrance, full of rustic village flavor. Is this store a genuine "village café," or a specially designed outlet inside a scenic area? Let's take a look. [more…]