Costa China expands ready-to-drink business through innovations

High-end ready-to-drink coffee products are considered as new opportunities.

It is estimated that by 2025, the coffee industry is to reach a scale of 1 trillion yuan ($144.5 billion), according to the 2022 China Coffee Industry Report compiled by Alibaba New Service Center, Ele.com and Tmall Coffee.

In recent years, milk tea and coffee have enjoyed high-speed growth. Ouyang Qingqiu, president of Costa China, said ready-to-drink beverages have become a pillar for the strong growth in building an all-coffee business company for Costa China.

Han Liang, general manager of Costa China Ready-to-Drink, said Costa's on-premise coffee business in China has laid a solid foundation for their ready-to-drink business in the Chinese market, reinforced by the massive support from Coca-Cola in terms of research and development, and distribution expansions.

Meanwhile, COFCO Coca-Cola has plans to further enhance its market shares by strengthening the efficiency of its supply chains with digitization and expanding its distribution channels at multiple retail terminals including supermarkets, convenience stores and vending machines.

Nowadays, fast-moving consumer brands are required to build a highly efficient operational system and more nimble supply chains to reduce costs and add profits, said Qing.

Advanced technologies including big data and artificial intelligence have been adopted in optimizing COFCO Coca-Cola's digital management of the supply chains.

The fast expansion of retail networks and execution of the supply chains of Coca-Cola's bottling system have greatly boosted Costa Coffee's rapid development in the country, said Costa China.