瑞幸开卖9.9元珍珠奶茶 与茶饮巨头正面“宣战”

Overall: Luckin has launched pearl milk tea priced from 9.9 yuan to 12.9 yuan in about 36,000 stores, highlighting zero non-dairy creamer and zero creamer, and using the familiar taste and chewy texture of classic milk tea to attract people beyond the coffee-drinking crowd.

1. Price and product: The pearl milk tea sells for 9.9 yuan to 12.9 yuan and is positioned with zero non-dairy creamer and zero creamer. The pearls are frozen, no-cook pearls, but stores still need to reheat them, hold them on a timer, and discard them after two hours.

2. Early trial notes: On the first day, some consumers already encountered issues such as only regular cups being available and promotional merchandise not included with orders. This suggests the added process is consuming store labor, and product consistency could be affected.

3. Data points: Luckin's cumulative sales of non-coffee categories have exceeded 20 billion yuan; about 40% of its 2025 new products were non-coffee. In Q2 2026, total net revenue was 15.886 billion yuan, but same-store sales at self-operated stores fell 5.3% year on year.

4. Consumer takeaway: The pearl milk tea targets people who want something to chew at 3 p.m., not just an Americano. If you want to try it, pay attention to how fast the store makes drinks and the condition of the pearls.

Overall: Luckin's 9.9 yuan pearl milk tea marks its move from topping-free tea to topping-added tea, using a branded product to broaden its audience and dayparts. Behind the move are integrated considerations of marketing, pricing, channel, and competition.

1. Brand marketing positioning: Luckin uses campus nostalgia to launch pearl milk tea at 9.9 yuan to 12.9 yuan, emphasizes zero non-dairy creamer and zero creamer, and uses classic familiarity to tap into new demand for richness, sweetness, and chewiness.

2. User behavior observation: Global consumer surveys show that young consumers' preference for chewiness is rising quickly, and pearl milk tea is one of the fastest-growing menu categories. Luckin wants to capture the afternoon crowd that wants to chew something rather than drink an Americano.

3. Channel and product extension: Luckin's roughly 36,000 stores form a channel moat, and its product line is extending from light milk tea to topping-added drinks. Its RTD coffee liquid has sold over 400 million cups, and its bottled coffee has topped multiple coffee rankings on Tmall, JD.com, and Douyin.

4. Risks and competition: Same-store sales at self-operated stores were negative for a second consecutive quarter in Q2 2026. Rivals such as Cotti Coffee, Lucky Cup, and Nowwa, as well as tea chains like Guming and Mixue, are cross-penetrating into each other's categories. Luckin needs to balance efficiency, quality control, and price competition.

Overall: The article shows that coffee and milk tea have growth opportunities in stores, online, and RTD scenarios, but they also face same-store declines and intense competition. Sellers need to track demand shifts and manage fulfillment risk.

1. Demand changes: Pearl milk tea speaks to richness, sweetness, chewiness, and familiarity; younger consumers are increasingly favoring chewiness. Luckin's cumulative non-coffee sales exceed 20 billion yuan, and about 40% of its 2025 new products were non-coffee, indicating growth in both topping-added milk tea and RTD coffee.

2. Online opportunity: Luckin coffee liquid has sold over 400 million cups and exceeded 900 million cups cumulatively by July 2026. Bottled products such as coconut latte and classic Americano sold more than 1 million bottles online within 24 hours, generating 18 million yuan in sales and topping coffee rankings on Tmall, JD.com, and Douyin. RTD and bottled coffee have clear explosive potential in e-commerce.

3. Risk alerts: Pearl milk tea adds operational pressure because of fresh pearl preparation, timing, and the two-hour discard rule. On the first day, issues such as missing promotional merchandise appeared. Sellers entering topping-added milk tea should prepare waste-management and supply-chain capabilities in advance.

4. Competitive landscape: Cotti Coffee, Lucky Cup, and Nowwa are competing intensely in lower-tier markets, while tea giants such as Guming and Mixue are accelerating their coffee push. The 9.9 yuan price band and lower-tier market carry both opportunity and risk, so product selection and channel positioning require more caution.

Overall: Putting pearl milk tea into 36,000 stores creates new supply-chain demand for frozen toppings, no-cook operations, and store-level waste management.

1. Product design requirements: Luckin uses frozen, no-cook pearls to avoid adding a dedicated pearl cooker, but stores still need to reheat the pearls, move them to room-temperature storage, hold them on a timer, and discard them by batch. This means pearls supplied to chain stores need standardized design for no-cook preparation, easy reheating, and texture retention.

2. Production and waste management: The usable life of prepared pearls is only two hours, after which they must be discarded. Factories should consider small-format packaging, batch control, stable cold-chain logistics, and longer shelf-life solutions to help stores reduce both shortages and waste pressure.

3. Equipment and process opportunities: The store operation area does not add a pearl cooker; reheating and holding are done within existing space. This points to demand for topping support equipment, timer and reminder tools, heat-retaining containers, and quality-control recording systems.

4. Future extension: Pearl milk tea is viewed as Luckin's pilot move from topping-free tea to topping-added tea. If it works, more topping products requiring on-site preparation, temperature holding, and discard management could follow, so factories can reserve multi-category topping production lines in advance.

Overall: Luckin's pearl milk tea highlights the operational pain points that emerge when chain stores move from ultra-simple workflows to fresh-made toppings. Service providers can build solutions around standardization, waste, and staffing.

1. Client pain points: Stores were originally expected to fulfill an order within about two minutes. Non-coffee recipes are already more complex than coffee, and pearl milk tea adds reheating, texture control, timed holding, and a two-hour discard rule. This increases staff workload and pressure; on the first day, execution slips such as missing merchandise already appeared.

2. Solution direction: Service providers need to help chains embed the new steps into the existing small-store, pickup, two-person-per-shift model. Examples include digital prompts for reheating and holding, batch discard reminders, dynamic topping-inventory management, and scheduling tools linked to the drink-dispensing system.

3. Industry trend: Luckin's move from topping-free tea to topping-added tea shows that fresh-making toppings are not an isolated SKU. More topping products requiring fresh preparation and waste management will follow, so service providers can offer lifecycle-management solutions for multiple topping categories across chain restaurants.

4. Business opportunity: The article also shows that coffee liquid has sold over 400 million cups and bottled coffee is taking off online. RTD supply chain, e-commerce operations, and channel-data services are additional service directions worth watching.

Overall: Luckin's growth and competitive landscape show that coffee, milk tea, and RTD products create merchant-recruitment and operational opportunities on e-commerce and local-life platforms, but also bring fulfillment risks.

1. Platform opportunity: Luckin coffee liquid has cumulatively exceeded 900 million cups, and bottled coconut latte, classic Americano, and Yuzu C Americano have topped coffee rankings on Tmall, JD.com, and Douyin. This shows that new products from leading coffee brands can scale rapidly on e-commerce, so platforms can compete for exclusive launches or major promotion resources from such brands.

2. Merchant demand: Luckin RTD products sold more than 1 million bottles online within 24 hours and generated 18 million yuan in revenue. Online channels have become a second growth curve for the brand. Platforms need stronger listing exposure, category traffic, and best-seller operation tools to absorb coffee-liquid and bottled-coffee demand.

3. Risk avoidance: On the first day of the pearl milk tea launch, there were fulfillment problems such as only regular cups being offered and merchandise not included with orders. This shows pressure on brand store execution. Platforms should set more conservative inventory and fulfillment rules for promotions and delivery to avoid negative reviews from order surges.

4. Operational insight: Luckin uses about 36,000 stores for freshly made coffee and milk tea while also building an RTD business. Platforms can design merchant-recruitment programs around combined in-store, delivery, and e-commerce scenarios to help brands reach different consumer groups across dayparts.

Overall: The Luckin pearl milk tea case shows a mature chain brand pushing product expansion under growth constraints while confronting operating-system friction. It can serve as an observation sample for the evolution of the freshly made beverage industry.

1. Industry shift: Luckin is moving from topping-free tea to topping-added tea, extending its standardized, modular drink-production logic to categories that require fresh preparation, timing, holding, and disposal. This indicates that supply chains and store operating procedures for freshly made beverages will become more complex.

2. Emerging problems: Luckin's 36,000-store system is built around small stores, pickup, two-person shifts, and fully automated equipment. Pearl milk tea's two-hour discard rule and batch-based preparation conflict with that minimalist-efficiency model. First-day execution issues such as missing merchandise show that the operational ceiling is becoming a bottleneck for chain expansion.

3. Business-model analysis: Luckin's revenue growth still depends on new store openings. In Q2 2026, total net revenue was 15.886 billion yuan, up 28.5%, and operating profit was 2.123 billion yuan, up 22.0%. However, same-store sales at self-operated stores fell 5.3% year on year, the second consecutive quarter of negative growth. This suggests existing stores are being diluted by denser store networks, and the company needs to rebalance product innovation with network expansion.

4. Competitive landscape: Cotti Coffee, Lucky Cup, and Nowwa are competing closely in lower-tier markets, while tea-drink giants such as Guming and Mixue are accelerating their entry into coffee. The industry is moving from single-category competition toward two-way penetration between coffee and milk tea. Luckin's choice of a 9.9 yuan pearl milk tea is a probe across the three dimensions of price, target audience, and daypart.