Shanghai brews coffee culture week
A WIDE range of discounts are being offered and latest technologies are on display as a two-week coffee promotional season kicked off in Shanghai yesterday.
Delivery sites and tech startups have made latest technologies available as part of ongoing efforts to boost consumption and consolidate the city’s position as an international consumption hub.
“Shanghai’s coffee culture serves as an important element of the city’s urban style and an essential element of building a high quality of life for residents and visitors,” director of the city’s publicity department Zhao Jiaming said at the Shanghai Coffee Culture Week’s opening ceremony yesterday.
Coffee stores and online delivery platforms will be giving away free drinks and vouchers for customers as the city’s retail scene regains vibrancy.
A Manner coffee store at the Expo Cultural Park in Pudong’s riverside area is providing consumers with free takeaway drinks delivered by Meituan’s drones.
It takes about two minutes for the drone to deliver drinks from the riverside cafe to the camp site, which would take about ten minutes on foot. The route is not easily accessible for delivery staff by moped.
Meituan’s drone delivery service has been under trial operation in cities like Shenzhen and Hangzhou.
“We will draw experience from the trial operation to include more food and beverage vendors in the near future to serve takeaway orders,” said Mao Yinian, head of Meituan’s drone business.
In addition, a total of 30,000 coffee takeaways will be given to shoppers for free on Ele.me starting from today.
Shanghai’s coffee market has shown strong momentum and the amount of spending by local shoppers has topped domestic cities for three years in a row, according to data from Alibaba’s lifestyle services and its online shopping sites.
Domestic and foreign players and statebacked trading platforms are actively playing their parts to elevate the industry’s development.
Eight founding members, including Tim Hortons China, Pacific Coffee, McCafe, NOWWA and Bright Dairy, established the Shanghai Coffee Industry Alliance.
The Hongqiao Import Commodity Exhibition and Trading Center, which hosts the newly-unveiled coffee trading and exhibition platform, the Shanghai International Coffee Harbor, hopes the combined import and export volume of coffee companies and relevant trading firms on the platform will reach 10 billion yuan (US$1.48 billion) by 2025.