Mixue, China’s largest chain of milk tea and ice cream, has become the largest F&B chain globally by store count.
The company filed for a new IPO prospectus to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on 1st of January. In the document, it revealed its total store count as 45,302 as of 30 September 2024.
At the same time, McDonald’s and Starbucks had about 43,000 and 40,199 stores respectively. Within a year, Mixue had jumped from the 4th place to become the largest, globally.
In comparison, Luckin Coffee has 21,343 stores as of 30 September 2024.
While aggressively growing in store count, in terms of terminal sales, Mixue is still ranked number 4 in the freshly-made beverages category, behind Starbucks, Inspire Brands, and Tim Hortons. Starbucks leads with 55.5 billion USD, followed by Inspire Brands at 14.9 billion USD, and Tim Hortons at 7.5 billion USD.
Amongst the 45,302 stores, about 3,700 are of Mixue brand in China, and 2,900 are of its coffee sub-brand Lucky Cup.
Mixue (left) and Lucky Cup (right) in the same (Tier 4) city
The remaining 4792 stores are located across 11 countries outside China. Indonesia and Vietnam still lead the overseas store count: 2,667 and 1,304 respectively.
Yes, indeed Mixue alone contributed more than 70% of the 6100+ stores Chinese F&B chains have opened in Southeast Asia, according to Momentum Works “Chinese F&B in Southeast Asia 2025” report released last week.
However, Mixue’s business model and value proposition are unique compared to many other Chinese F&B brands, which we have discussed extensively in Momentum Works “Who is Mixue?” report released last year.
We will issue an update of “Who is Mixue?” report in the coming weeks. Those who have purchased the report would get the update for free.
Ultimately, we will try to answer the question “Is Mixue a good business?” in the updated report. We think that business model wise it is definitely good, but there are more to lasting success of a business.
Stay tuned!
