Roses, red beans, singles, Valentine's Day milk tea knows how to play with memes

Before Valentine's Day this year, as the ambiguous value between young people increased rapidly, the new tea beverage industry also took advantage of the opportunity to launch various Valentine's Day-related activities and products, trying to play the "romantic economy". Who will you spend Valentine's Day with?

"Many milk tea shops have Valentine's Day events. Is there anyone who has quickly fallen in love with me these two days? Let's go have a drink together?" Seeing a circle of friends posted by his secret crush, Xiao Bai was very hesitant: Is this a hint? Should he take this opportunity to confess his love and win the goddess?

Before Valentine's Day this year, as the level of ambiguity between young people increased rapidly, the new tea beverage industry also took advantage of the opportunity to launch various Valentine's Day-related activities and products, trying to play the "romantic economy."

1. Valentine’s Day Marketing Strategy of New Tea Drinks

"This Valentine's Day limited edition milk tea is so good, I want to drink it just by looking at it. I feel like I need to finish several cups a day to try all of them in a week."

For Qin Yu, the ultimate milk tea lover, the romantic offensive of new tea drinks on Valentine's Day is a "sweet burden." "I'm so depressed and crazy. I wish I could split myself into 8 people to eat all of them!"

What’s the secret behind the fascinating new tea drinks?

First of all, there is the common but enduring co-branded limited edition method for consumer goods today. Although the products remain the same every year, the co-branding itself is a way to attract consumer attention by constantly creating new topics.

"Maybe there are five thousand flowers in the world that are exactly like you, but you are my only unique rose." This sentence from the French fairy tale "The Little Prince" reveals the purest form of love.

Nayuki Tea chose to collaborate with the Little Prince on Valentine's Day this year, incorporating roses, which represent extreme romance, into the beverage and packaging design, adding a touch of poetry and tenderness to Valentine's Day. On February 13, it launched the domineering Little Prince Rose Strawberry, as well as illustration-themed cups and the Rose Guardian Package of "milk tea + limited-edition peripheral cups".

Nayuki's Tea Valentine's Day Limited Edition Milk Tea

The collaboration with The Little Prince earned Nayuki's Tea its first wave of publicity. This type of marketing, through celebrity-themed products and limited-time pre-sales, allowed the product to spread through major social platforms and whet consumers' appetite.

In comparison, the Valentine's Day limited edition "Brown Sugar Bobo Milk" jointly launched by the Heart-beating Grass Jelly and Fox Spirit Matchmaker seems more substantial. Not only have some offline stores set up Fox Spirit Matchmaker-related decorations, but corresponding cup sleeves, paper bags, masks, red envelopes, tissues, hair bands, etc. have also been launched in terms of peripherals.

"There are so many co-branded small gifts, full of sincerity. Do you know how touching it is for a fan of the two-dimensional world?" Wen Lin likes Fox Spirit Matchmaker very much, so he has checked in offline at the Herbal Jelly Shop several times.

Yihetang boldly and directly sang praises of love, co-branded with "A Chinese Odyssey", and launched a Valentine's Day limited new product - the True Love Rose series of drinks with the theme of "Talking about Journey to the West Again, Roses Seal Love". Yihetang's self-created IP Mr. Tang and Sun Mengmeng transformed into "Monkey King" and "Fairy Zixia", instantly creating a Valentine's Day atmosphere.

Heytea's Valentine's Day event is a powerful combination of business. On Valentine's Day, consumers who buy two drinks can receive a set of "wedding certificates", which include coupons for Heytea and Hippocampus Photo Studio, boosting the marketing of both brands. At Heytea's Zhuoyuehui store in Shenzhen, there will also be Hippocampus photographers on site to take "wedding photos".

Compared with the previous "romantic" brands, Luckin Coffee, which always loves to "make things happen", also went the other way this year and turned into a "funny guy": Luckin Coffee and Line Dog jointly launched the Thorn Rose Latte and Acacia Red Bean Latte, and gave away puppy stickers. "Luckin Coffee understands Valentine's Day and singles." Netizens commented.

Luckin Coffee went viral on social media platforms by using the "single dog" joke on Valentine's Day. Many netizens made stickers of the puppy into wagging dogs, and the stickers were in great demand. Some stores quickly sold out of stickers. Many "brand fans" were disappointed that they could not get the co-branded products, but some consumers also questioned whether the value of this Valentine's Day marketing campaign was high.

"Does having pictures on cups and bags mean collaboration? It's really easy to make money."

“The striped puppy is really cute, but the product feels average. Coffee drinkers don’t like this kind of coffee with excessive additives, and milk tea drinkers don’t like it either. It’s an awkward position.”

Faced with the mushrooming of co-branded limited drinks, not all consumers have a positive attitude. Aiming at this group of users with "picky" tastes, many new tea brands take a safe route in the selection of beverage ingredients, mostly using strawberries, red beans, chocolate, cherries and other elements that are popular and easy to accept. For example, Moqi's Love Cool Black Forest, Chabaidao's Fresh Strawberry, and Coco's Strawberry Sweetheart all use strawberry elements, and Yihetang's True Love Rose series of drinks use real rose petals that can be seen and drunk.

This strategy ensures that the taste is basically correct while also fitting in with the pink theme of Valentine's Day.

"I'm not a very adventurous person. Although there are always some strange new products on Valentine's Day, I still prefer products with high certainty." Consumer Wen Lin told Xiaguangshe.

Some brands, such as Moqi, will pin a fresh rose on the milk tea cup to maximize the sense of ceremony, attracting a large number of users to take photos and check in.

Overall, no matter what kind of users they are, new tea drinks always have a way to stimulate their taste buds and heartstrings and provide the ultimate romance.

2. Don’t follow the beaten path and stand with the rebellious

Year after year on Valentine's Day, brands gradually gain control of users' minds.

In 2020, French luxury brand Balenciaga released an hourglass bag exclusively customized for Chinese Valentine's Day. In the bag's promotional advertisement, a gust of earthy elements from the last century caused discomfort to the audience, causing this Valentine's Day marketing to "turn over". After all, the "earthy cool" and "earthy" that young people like are obviously two different things.

Balenciaga Valentine's Day Advertisement 2020

Facing the personalized and demanding new generation of consumers, any unilateral interpretation by the brand will have a negative effect. Therefore, in Valentine's Day marketing, the core focus of new tea drinks is separated from the Valentine's Day holiday, and the essence is to focus on the changes in the users themselves.

According to Baidu Index data, in the 30 days ending February 10 this year, Internet users' searches for "Valentine's Day gifts" increased by 552% month-on-month, among which consumers aged 20-29 accounted for the highest proportion.

Combining the Valentine's Day marketing strategies of new tea drinks, it can be found that almost all of them revolve around the preferences of this main consumer group, and the most creative of them is Luckin's reverse marketing of "integration of ideas".

On Valentine's Day, people usually think that the target audience is couples, but in fact everyone has a longing for love, and even "love" itself can be extended to family and friendship. Luckin Coffee has grasped this core and expanded its product audience to single users.

Reverse marketing requires creativity and a tacit understanding with consumers. The form is often unconventional or even contrary to common sense, so as to cater to the rebellious mentality of users. For example, Fanicapo, a female underwear brand, launched a series of sexy underwear called "Pet You". The end users are still women, but the direct target users can be men.

In an environment where market competition is fierce and differentiation is difficult to achieve, this unconventional marketing strategy has gradually become a market breakthrough for many brands. As the new tea beverage market is in a fierce competition, it is also urgent to open up a broader and bolder new marketing world.

In addition, Luckin’s reverse marketing also reflects the new consumer brand’s deep insight into and respect for changes in user psychology.

"Singles also celebrate Valentine's Day, isn't that cool?" Qin Yu believes that many young people now have different views on love and partners. Many people prefer to reconcile with themselves rather than regard love as salvation. "My soul and I are the most suitable CP." She said.

There are many young people who are as rebellious as Qin Yu. However, from the perspective of the whole society, this view of love and marriage is questioned and criticized by the elders. Young people need recognition and need to find "similar souls" with each other. Therefore, when Luckin Coffee used the "single dog" stalk to create a topic, many young people were instantly attracted.

Image source: Luckin Coffee Weibo

In the fiercely competitive new tea market, it is difficult to retain users by relying solely on the taste of the product itself. Most consumers like to try a variety of flavors, which means that companies need to continue research and development, pushing up related costs. In addition, once a new tea product is launched, it is often easy to be quickly copied, and the core barrier is not unbreakable.

However, standing with users on an emotional and spiritual level will produce a dramatic brand fission effect. When a brand has its own "personality label", it can increase user loyalty and repurchase rate to a certain extent.

3. Why do new tea drinks need Valentine’s Day?

The significance of festivals to consumer goods is self-evident. Why are new tea drinks focusing their efforts on Valentine's Day?

First of all, judging from the current situation of the new tea beverage industry itself, the competition is too fierce and new stories are urgently needed.

According to Xinhua News Agency, new-style tea drinks are rising rapidly, with 300,000 cups sold per day and a market size of over 100 billion yuan. The market potential is huge, but there are also many players emerging.

Even though Nayuki's Tea, a leading company, suffered a loss of HK$20 billion in market value in just over a year after its listing, many small and medium-sized brands are still scrambling to enter the market. According to the 2022 New Tea Beverage Research Report released by the China Chain Store & Franchise Association, the total number of new tea beverage stores in operation by the end of 2022 will be about 486,000.

As the number of players increases, the competitive pressure continues to increase. According to a report from iResearch Consulting Institute, new tea brands face common problems such as low operating threshold, easy copying, and product homogeneity.

As mentioned above, the launch of limited edition products by many brands on Valentine's Day is an attempt to differentiate themselves. Economist Song Qinghui once said that almost every time a holiday comes, consumer brands will launch limited edition products. The fundamental reason behind this is to create an atmosphere of "I have what you don't" and emphasize brand differentiation.

It is worth mentioning that consumers themselves have huge consumption demand during Valentine's Day.

According to the latest survey results released by the National Retail Federation and Prosper Insights & Analytics this year, American consumers will spend $25.9 billion on Valentine's Day this year, which is one of the highest figures ever recorded. Although there are no similar specific data survey results in China, judging from past phenomena, Chinese Valentine's Day consumers also have great potential.

According to iiMedia Research's 2022 data, 72.7% of Chinese netizens attach great importance to Valentine's Day, and 67.5% of consumers will even buy roses at a higher price. On the social platform Xiaohongshu, searching for the keyword "Valentine's Day" yields more than 6.7 million related notes.

In addition, the long Valentine's Day cycle can also bring continuous selling points to brands. Zhiniuer Research Institute once divided the marketing nodes of Valentine's Day into four stages: the seeding period (20 days before the holiday), the stable growth period (5-20 days before the holiday), the purchase explosion period (1-5 days before the holiday and Valentine's Day), and the residual heat continuation period (1 week after the holiday).

Valentine's Day is the "Double Eleven" of the new tea beverage industry, which has its own natural market promotion traffic pool. At this time, launching new products can not only plan a wave of "Double Eleven explosion orders" in the new tea beverage field, but also, through the users' habit of posting orders and checking in during the festival, it can also explore users' feedback on product preferences at a relatively low cost and promote product iteration.

Obviously, for new tea brands, the marketing achievements during the "Valentine's Day" holiday are the "target", while further communicating with consumers and achieving results are the "essence".

Author: Zhang Yi; Editor: Ma Ji

Source: Public Account: Xiaguangshe (ID: Globalinsights); see the brilliant rays of light of the new economy.