This is an English adaptation of a FoodBud historical article originally published on October 27, 2022.
According to an October 2022 interview by CASE SHOWCASE, Luckin Coffee positioned its new Cheese Latte as an “annual hero product” and treated it as a test of whether the chain could repeatedly manufacture beverage hits at scale.
Luckin’s “hit product” playbook had become visible in 2021 with the launch of Coconut Latte. From April 2021 to April 2022, the drink sold more than 100 million cups. At the time of the article, its discounted mini-program price was RMB 18, while Luckin reported full-year 2021 revenue of RMB 8 billion.
In 2022, Luckin chairman and CEO Guo Jinyi said on the company’s Q2 earnings call that one driver of growth was the continued launch of hit products, including Coconut Cloud Latte after Coconut Latte.
On October 10, 2022, Luckin launched Cheese Latte in collaboration with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean.
The product sold:
That exceeded Luckin’s previous first-week records for Coconut Latte and Coconut Cloud Latte. CASE SHOWCASE compared it with another 2022 ready-to-drink hit, HEYTEA’s collaboration with A Dream of Splendor, which sold 1.4 million cups in its first week.
Luckin co-founder and chief growth officer Yang Fei, vice president Shen Yue, and product center senior director Wang Meijie told CASE SHOWCASE that Cheese Latte was Luckin’s first externally defined “annual hero product.” The company planned to brand it independently, with its own short-term spokesperson, IP tie-in, campaign events, and ad spending, aiming to make it synonymous with the category in the same way Coconut Latte had become.
Yang said the most important metric for judging whether a product is a hit is cups sold per store. In Luckin’s system, a product selling more than 30 cups per store can be classified as a hit.
For an annual hero product, Luckin looks more closely at sustained daily volume. Yang said a typical coffee shop selling 200 cups a day is near break-even, and Cheese Latte alone was approaching three-quarters of that level per store.
Luckin’s product team said the company had built a tiered product structure:
Annual hero products receive the highest priority, the most resources, and the longest sales and communications cycle.
Wang said Luckin’s normal new-product preparation cycle is 3-6 months, but annual hero products require longer preparation.
For Cheese Latte:
Wang said Cheese Latte emerged from Luckin’s broader “big latte strategy,” with milk coffee as a core R&D direction. The team was also watching growth in cheese-based products and cheese flavor trends.
The main concern was polarization: the cheese flavor was distinctive, and Luckin did not want a product that some consumers loved but others strongly rejected.
Wang described two key inputs in Luckin’s new-product development: product strategy and data.
Data is used to:
For example, if consumers frequently mention “refreshing,” Luckin may push further in that direction. If sweetness is criticized, the team may adjust sugar levels.
When Coconut Latte launched in 2021, many stores sold out. Shen said that was not hunger marketing; inventory was simply insufficient.
For Cheese Latte, Luckin used a joint forecasting and stocking mechanism between the product center and marketing center. Wang said the company’s supply chain advantages were digitalization and flexible supply, which allowed more precise and stable support for the launch.
Yang said Cheese Latte was designed for autumn and winter. Unlike summer products such as Coconut Cloud or seasonal fruit-flavored milk coffees, autumn-winter products are intended to feel warmer and richer.
The original launch window was mid-September 2022, but Luckin moved it to October for two reasons:
Yang said annual hero products must first be product-led: the drink has to taste good. Marketing then amplifies it.
Luckin’s strategy was to give Cheese Latte its own independent brand treatment, including IP collaboration, events, advertising, and possibly a short-term spokesperson.
For the IP collaboration, Luckin chose JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean. Yang said the rationale was “small circle first, broad circle later.” Compared with mainstream anime IP such as Naruto or One Piece, JoJo had a smaller audience, but more committed fans who could more strongly convert affinity into purchases.
Yang also noted that Luckin had more than 7,000 stores by then, giving the company a larger user base than it had during the April 2022 Coconut Cloud Latte launch.
Some fans felt the collaboration was shallow because it used IP imagery but did not include secondary creative adaptation. Shen said the timeline was too tight: collaboration with Japanese anime IP would require at least six months for that level of creative work, while Luckin only confirmed the Stone Ocean partnership at the end of August 2022. Shen said the studio of JoJo creator Hirohiko Araki reviewed materials only one day per week.
Shen said the marketing team monitored social media during small-scale testing and noticed demand from consumers in cities where the product was not yet available.
Luckin then used teaser-style social media interactions. In early September, it removed the test product while announcing a full October launch, turning pent-up demand into a launch moment.
Shen said Luckin had its own standardized new-product communications method and that following it usually met expectations.
Shen said Luckin’s marketing system relies heavily on its own traffic pool, built over years through its mini-program, private-domain channels, and WeChat public account. The company had accumulated tens of millions of users and developed habits such as Monday 8 a.m. coupon releases.
He said Luckin has 18 required actions for using that traffic pool.
The company also manages its social accounts closely, especially Weibo, where Shen said Luckin likes to interact with users in a way that feels knowledgeable and playful.
Yang said Luckin’s spending on external traffic buying was relatively small, with more dependence on private-domain operations and content marketing. After a new product enters a stable period, operations shift toward more refined private-domain work.
Luckin launches more than 100 products a year. Yang said the company grades products internally, then assigns marketing resources and launch cadence by tier. Quarterly planning considers holidays, solar terms, and specific consumption occasions.
He said a monthly hit product is expected, and some months may have two.
Product grading is based on:
If a product is assigned a higher tier but misses its cup-volume target, Luckin may add promotional resources. If it still fails, the company analyzes whether the issue is product strength or promotion.
Yang cited Luckin’s 2022 Qixi Festival collaboration with Sad Frog as a marketing-driven success case. The company identified Qixi as a major marketing moment and asked the product team for a drink that had both symbolic meaning and strong flavor. The campaign helped Luckin evaluate how much traffic pure IP collaboration or a major seasonal occasion could generate, and those learnings were reused for Cheese Latte.
Asked about his next work focus, Yang said he was responsible for revenue growth and user growth. His team’s role was to support new-product promotion, help stores operate traffic, acquire users, retain users, and increase purchase frequency.
He also said China’s coffee market was still attracting new entrants, which he viewed as a sign that the market was far from its ceiling.
Note: Launch targets, annual product-frequency guidance, store count, sales volumes, and market comments are historical statements from October 2022.