Yunnan, located in southwest China. Due to the special climatic environment, it is rich in products, and the number of animal and plant species ranks first in the country, and it is known as the "kingdom of animals and plants".
Pu'er tea, edible roses, and various fungi are specialties of Yunnan and are famous throughout the country. In addition, in terms of coffee bean cultivation, Yunnan also ranks first in the country, accounting for more than 90% of the domestic output.
1. The birth of a large coffee province
Looking through the existing information, it is not difficult to understand that coffee was introduced to Yunnan in 1882, and it is rumored that it was brought by a European missionary. In the hundreds of years since, these coffee seeds have been bred in Binchuan County, Yunnan Province.
Although the introduction of coffee in Yunnan was early, because the domestic coffee culture was not strong at that time, large-scale cultivation only began in the mid-1950s, and the planting scale once reached 4,000 hectares.
Everyone should have this impression, in fact, until more than ten years ago, there were not too many people drinking coffee in China, except for some large cities, the coffee market in other lower-tier cities in China is not large. Even today, there are not a few Chinese people who do not like to drink coffee.
However, international brands led by Nestlé and Starbucks, after years of market cultivation, the domestic coffee market size has exceeded 140 billion yuan in 2020, and it is expected that this figure can reach 500 billion yuan in 2025.
The considerable incremental market has also spawned many local Chinese coffee brands, such as Luckin, as well as Xicha and Naixue, which launched coffee drinks. The growing market, fed back to the upstream, naturally led to the continuous expansion of the scale of coffee bean cultivation in Yunnan.
In fact, as early as 2008, Coffee cultivation in Yunnan ushered in a wave of outbreaks, and the planting area increased from more than 300,000 mu to more than 1.8 million mu in just six years. Although it later declined slightly, it still ranked first in the country and established a dominant position in China.
2, the road to brand upgrading is difficult
Although Yunnan coffee is second to none in the country, compared with South America, Africa and other regions where coffee culture is more developed, Yunnan coffee seems to be out of line.
That is to say, the history of coffee cultivation for hundreds of years has not brought Yunnan a matching reputation. One of the fundamental reasons for this is that Yunnan has always been far away from the main coffee consumption markets such as Europe and the United States.
In recent years, with the growing coffee culture in China, even coffee has been sought after by many young people. Originally, this could bring benefits to Yunnan coffee, but "low-cost commodity beans" have become a new obstacle in front of them.
Before 2014, coffee beans in Yunnan were mainly acquired by Nestlé, and most of them were used to make cheap instant coffee.
If you think about it, the price of terminal products is not high, and the price of raw materials can be high. This model has made the price of yunnan commodity beans continue to decline, and once led to the reduction of coffee planting area in Yunnan.
Of course, the reason why the price is low is actually because the taste of Yunnan coffee beans at that time was not top-notch, and it was difficult to process them into high-end coffee categories to sell.
In response to this pain point, coupled with the rise of the national tide in recent years, Yunnan Coffee has begun to seek brand upgrades. Not only more advanced technology and equipment have been introduced in the processing process, but also more varieties of coffee trees have been introduced.
It should be noted that although Yunnan coffee is cheap, it is still sought after by capital. There are two reasons, one is the rise of the national tide mentioned earlier, and the other is that its low price means low cost.
For coffee brands doing business in the Chinese market, Yunnan beans are a good story. Of course, such a story is not good for Yunnan coffee farmers.
Therefore, if Yunnan coffee beans want to do a good job in brand upgrading, it is not only a problem of coffee farmers, but also a problem of capital, which is something that can only be done well by both sides.
But countless capital stories tell us that few capitals take the initiative to raise costs. The upgrading of the Yunnan coffee brand is a good thing for Yunnan coffee farmers, but not necessarily for capital.
What capital prefers to do is that the price of yunnan coffee should not rise, it is still low, and then it uses Yunnan coffee beans as a gimmick to sell coffee drinks at a large price increase. Therefore, the current Yunnan beans are highly sought after by capital.
In this way, the road to brand upgrading of Yunnan Coffee is still difficult.