Tim Hortons will open an average of one coffee shop a day in China

Reporter | Wei Xianghui

Edit | Zan Huifang

1

On December 30, Tims Hortons China disclosed that it plans to expand the number of stores in the Chinese market to more than 800 in 2022, hoping to open at least 2,750 profitable stores by the end of 2026.

Up to now, Tims Hortons has opened more than 390 stores in more than 20 cities, including Dalian, Nanjing, Beijing, Xiamen, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and so on. Achieving the latest 2022 store expansion plan means that next year it needs to expand at a rate of at least one store per day.

With the goal of opening 1,500 stores in 10 years proposed by Tim Hortons when it first entered China in 2019, its store expansion speed has been greatly improved.

At present, Tim Hortons' offline stores in China include three types of stores: standard store, Tims Go Jiefeng store and theme store, which correspond to the three consumption modes of "daily drinking", "buy and go" and "personalized experience". Among them, the standard store for mass consumers is Tim Hortons' main store type.

Tims Go is a new store model for Tim Hortons to launch in 2021. In order to promote tims go stores, in November this year, Tim Hortons announced a strategic cooperation with METRO China to enter metro stores. Theme stores focus on community culture and cut into the young people's market. At present, Tim Hortons has cooperated with Tencent E-sports, QQ Music, Bilibili, Ele.me and other partners to launch stores with different themes.

Tims Go Jet Maple store set up in METRO

The rapid expansion of the store is in preparation for the listing of Tim Hortons' China business.

According to Bloomberg, Peter Yu, chairman of Tim Hortons China, has previously said that the rapid expansion is the prelude to the listing of the Chinese business after the merger of Tim Hortons China and silver Crest Acquisition Corp., a blank check company. The merger is likely to be completed in the first quarter of 2022.

This speed has been slightly delayed than it had previously planned. In a timeline disclosed by Tim Hortons China in August, executives had said the deal to fund the expansion would be completed by the end of 2021.

It is worth noting that while rapidly expanding stores, Tim Hortons China has also proposed a goal of opening at least 2750 profitable stores by the end of 2026. Tim Hortons China said that the brand has entered a critical period of speeding up stores, hoping to focus on quality store expansion.

According to Tim Hortons China's forecast, its total revenue for 2021 will be US$103.9 million (about RMB665 million); adjusted store EBITDA (EBITDA before tax) will be US$5.7 million (about RMB36.48 million); adjusted EBITDA loss of US$14.7 million (about RMB94.08 million), and it is expected to turn a profit in 2023.