If you go shopping at Li Ning's brick-and-mortar stores in the future, in addition to seeing all kinds of sports apparel and supplies, you may also see coffee in the store. That's right, Li Ning is also getting into coffee.
According to information from SkyEye, Li Ning Sports (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. has filed a trademark registration in April 2022 for the classification of food and beverage accommodation - "NING COFFEE".
▲Image from: Li Ning Official Weibo
In the same month, at the opening of Li Ning's Xiamen China City flagship store, the official Li Ning microblogging site already featured the "Ning Coffee" sign and a corner of the store set aside for food and beverage.
▲Image from: Li Ning Official Weibo
The 'combination' of Li-Ning and coffee has already been seen in the Li-Ning store in Zhanjiang in February this year. Back in November 2021 when the first LI-NING 1990 store opened in Beijing, Little Red Book also had notes that the store's guide would offer freshly ground coffee, and the cups that held it had the Li-Ning logo on them.
▲Image from: Little Red Book
In response, Li Ning said it will offer coffee service in-store in the future to enhance customers' comfort and experience while shopping.
▲ Image from: Little Red Book
Li Ning is not the only sports brand that has taken aim at coffee, New Balance has also opened a New Balance X CAFE!N co-branded coffee shop in Taipei not long ago.
▲ Image from: MILKX
In addition to coffee and meals inspired by New Balance's iconic grey, the store also features the New Balance 2022 Grey Day crossover exhibition.
▲Image from: MILKX
The time has come to 2022 and the coffee market is surging even more. Online brands such as Three and a Half Ton, Sumidagawa, Houya, and China Coffee are popping up in freeze-dried, hang-ear, cold brew, and instant ...... forms and new flavors.
▲ Photo from: Yong Pu, Three and a Half Dons
The offline freshly ground coffee, is "a hundred flowers," not only specializing in coffee Starbucks, Ruiying, Manner, Tims, Costa and a host of other brands "hit" hot, Xi tea, Naixue's tea and honey snow ice city and other new tea beverage brands also want to coffee tea beverage two hands.
▲Image from: Honey Snow Ice City, Xi Cha
Nowadays, Li Ning's Ning Coffee, China Post's Post Office Coffee, Sinopec's EasyJet Coffee, PetroChina's Hospice Coffee, and even Dogwood, which has acquired Gloria, are all entity-dependent brands that want a piece of the coffee market.
Although the coffee market is hot, but the domestic coffee consumption is actually not high, which means that it is not yet a red sea, and several brands have entered the coffee because of this.
▲ Photo from: Post Office Coffee WeChat
In addition, compared to other brands, brands such as Li Ning and China Post have deep roots in the physical industry and already have advantages in the supply chain, stores or sites, and brand coverage.
Li Ning, for example, has more than 7,000 stores of all kinds, including franchised dealers, which is no more of a burden than Starbucks, which has more than 5,500 stores, or RuiXing, which already has about 6,000, adding coffee service to its stores.
In addition, Li Ning has attracted the attention of many young people in recent years after breaking through with the 'national trend', which also overlaps with some consumers in the current coffee market, and these are potential customers who may 'pay' for Li Ning coffee in the future.
▲Image from: Li Ning Official Weibo
The ability to shop or take a break in the store while sipping coffee might also give customers a different shopping experience (perhaps a taste of the movie in which you're in a luxury store, sipping champagne while making your selection). The packaging or flavors of the coffee could also be co-branded with the IP acquired by Li Ning to expand the brand's reach.
Sports brands selling coffee is a crossover, but coffee is also more of a 'side project' that adds traffic and buzz like icing on the cake.
▲ Image from: Little Red Book
Of course, for Li Ning and other brands that want to sell coffee, this 'side business' is not the only advantage. The taste and quality of coffee, the availability of raw materials, and customer acceptance all need to be considered.
The types of drinks and prices that will be offered at "NING COFFEE" are still unclear, but I'm sure that many people will visit the store in the future and have a cup of "Li Ning Coffee".