---
title: "The Awkward Position of NFC Juice"
description: "Have you ever bought NFC juice priced above 15 yuan? How many times? Leading brands like Huiyuan, Nongfu Spring, and Uni-President have entered the NFC juice market, yet why haven't they achieved billions in sales? Despite being known for freshness, health, and nutrition, NFC juice has failed to capture consumers in the era of consumption upgrade. From Zero Degree Fruit Workshop's entry in 2012 to Luckin Coffee's foray in 2019, over seven years, as players entered and exited, this once-promising juice category has fallen into an awkward position in China."
author: "李青林"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2019-11-05"
categories: "Consumer & Categories"
language: "en"
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attribution: "New Distribution — https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/the-awkward-position-of-nfc-juice-e7439fc1/"
citation: "李青林. “The Awkward Position of NFC Juice.” New Distribution, 2019-11-05. https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/the-awkward-position-of-nfc-juice-e7439fc1/"
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---

# The Awkward Position of NFC Juice

> Have you ever bought NFC juice priced above 15 yuan? How many times? Leading brands like Huiyuan, Nongfu Spring, and Uni-President have entered the NFC juice market, yet why haven't they achieved billions in sales? Despite being known for freshness, health, and nutrition, NFC juice has failed to capture consumers in the era of consumption upgrade. From Zero Degree Fruit Workshop's entry in 2012 to Luckin Coffee's foray in 2019, over seven years, as players entered and exited, this once-promising juice category has fallen into an awkward position in China.

Have you ever bought NFC juice priced above 15 yuan? How many times?
Leading brands like Huiyuan, Nongfu Spring, and Uni-President have entered the NFC juice market, yet why haven't they achieved billions in sales?
Despite being known for freshness, health, and nutrition, NFC juice has failed to capture consumers in the era of consumption upgrade.
From Zero Degree Fruit Workshop's entry in 2012 to Luckin Coffee's foray into NFC juice in 2019, **over seven years, as players entered and exited, this once-promising juice category has fallen into an awkward position in China.**

**-01- An Awkward Market: NFC Juice Fails to Adapt to Local Conditions**
In China, **low-concentration and medium-concentration juices have long held a significant market share** in the juice industry. Compared to higher-priced NFC juice, low-concentration juice has a relatively lower retail price, making it easier for consumers to accept. Medium-concentration juice, on the other hand, is mostly sold in medium-to-large packages, offering good value for money.
**Although NFC juice has a mature market and stable consumer base abroad,** in China, consumers do not have a habit of regularly drinking juice and remain price-sensitive. As a result, NFC juice has yet to escape the shadow of being a niche product.
Based on the above points, juice is still seen by most consumers as a synonym for beverages. Therefore, when NFC juice appeared, consumers merely regarded it as a more premium juice drink. Many people think that spending over ten yuan on a small bottle of juice is not as worthwhile as buying a bag of fruit.

**-02- Awkward Consumption Habits: We Remain Conservative About Food**
Chinese consumers do not have the habit of drinking juice with meals; instead, tea, alcohol, and other beverages dominate. This is because, in foreign countries where fresh fruit is scarce, juice serves as a dietary supplement, whereas Chinese dining tables are rich in vegetables and fruits, and having fruit after meals has become a daily habit.
Furthermore, NFC juice is a high-sugar beverage. Eating a 100-gram watermelon and drinking a 100-gram glass of watermelon juice have fundamentally different calorie contents. Chinese consumption habits tend to favor low-sugar, low-calorie options.
In terms of consumer perception, many people view NFC juice as just a juice drink, and beverages are not part of the daily consumption habits of Chinese consumers.
"It's okay to drink occasionally, but not every day." We have all heard this phrase. Over time, the notion that beverages are unhealthy has taken deep root in our minds. In Chinese consumption habits, tea is the preferred choice.

**-03- Awkward Consumption Scenarios: Life and Work Can Do Without You**
Currently, the best-selling channels for NFC juice are coffee shops, Western restaurants, and high-end clubs, where it is often consumed as a companion to fast food or meal replacements. However, these scenarios are very limited. **In Chinese restaurants and daily convenience store consumption, when faced with a variety of beverages, consumers do not prioritize NFC juice.**
In other consumption scenarios, NFC juice appears even less frequently. After all, given its price, two bottles of NFC juice could cover an afternoon at Starbucks.
This shows that NFC juice is not a necessity in consumption scenarios, unlike carbonated drinks or milk tea—the former provides the impact of carbonation, while the latter satisfies the taste buds.

**-04- Awkward Processing: NFC Juice, with All Its High-Tech, Fails on Taste**
Fresh fruit pressing, pasteurization, low-temperature filling, and cold chain throughout. As a juice, **NFC juice not only has a prestigious origin but also a high price tag.** Why hasn't this premium product in the juice category become popular? Is it really because of the price?
Of course not—it's the taste.
Especially citrus fruits, after processing such as juicing and sterilization, bitter substances like limonin cause taste variations, making many fresh-squeezed orange juices slightly more bitter and sour than eating fresh oranges.
For consumers accustomed to low-concentration juices, it is difficult to accept the taste of NFC juice.
Additionally, an opened bottle of NFC juice, if left at room temperature for a period, tastes worse than when chilled. That's why we see labels on NFC juice bottles stating "refrigerate after opening and consume within 24 hours."
After all, Chinese consumers' beverage choices still lean heavily toward flavor and taste. Even though low-concentration juices contain more additives, it does not affect consumers' fondness for them.

**-05- Awkward Supply Chain: Strict Requirements, High Costs**
NFC juice, lacking additives, is destined to have a short shelf life, typically around 45 days. Moreover, NFC juice requires a cold chain throughout transportation and sale.
Short shelf life and full cold chain require a relatively complex supply chain system. However, China's cold chain logistics is currently underdeveloped and costly. Ultimately, the costs in the supply chain are passed on to consumers, meaning that part of the price of a bottle of NFC juice (over ten yuan) goes to paying for the supply chain.
At the same time, the physical distribution radius of cold chain logistics is generally 300 to 500 kilometers, which means that NFC juice, centered around factories, cannot reach a broader market. The short shelf life also demands faster turnover; otherwise, by the time it reaches consumers, only about ten days of shelf life remain. This is definitely not a good consumer experience.

**-06- Awkward Market Cultivation: Consumers Don't Understand NFC**
**NFC juice, appearing in refrigerated cabinets at major retail terminals with an air of arrogance, peers at consumers outside the cold cabinet with a proud gaze.**
Similarly, consumers outside the cold cabinet are also paying attention to NFC juice, wondering why such a small bottle of juice can be sold at such a price.
If it is defined as juice, consumers would choose concentrated juice with lower nutritional value because it is easier to store.
If it is defined as a beverage, then consumers would never spend ten or twenty yuan to buy it.
Juice brands seem to be fiercely competing in the low-concentration juice category while neglecting consumer education for NFC juice.
After all, low-concentration juice still holds a significant market share, and consumers are already familiar with it; what they care about is taste and price. Compared to premium products like NFC juice, brands prefer to focus their efforts on low-concentration juice, using sales volume to compensate for the declining market.
In advertising and offline promotional activities, it is hard to see NFC juice. It can be said that the current growth of NFC juice seems to rely solely on consumer self-driven growth.
**More consumers still define NFC juice as a beverage that needs to be refrigerated.**

**-07- Awkward Price Range: Why Should I Spend Money on You?**
According to the 2018 report "Distribution of Middle-Income Groups and Strategic Choices for Expanding the Middle-Income Group" by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, **China has approximately 450 million people belonging to middle-income families.**
Based on the price of 15 yuan for NFC juice, we can estimate that the market sales scale for NFC juice is about 6.75 billion yuan.
However, according to Euromonitor International's forecast, by 2023, NFC juice sales in China may only reach 4.83 billion yuan. This indeed looks awkward—there are many people who can afford NFC juice, but many do not choose it as their first option.
The premise for consumers being price-insensitive is whether the product's value meets their expectations.
For 15 yuan, besides NFC juice, consumers can buy coffee, milk tea, tea drinks, or fresh-squeezed juice. So in this price range, consumers have too many choices. These products can be purchased not only through offline channels but also delivered to their doorstep via food delivery.
In consumers' mental accounts, beverages like coffee and milk tea satisfy their taste and palate, not a health sentiment.
These drinks can meet their consumption needs in the current scenario, making them valuable to consumers.
NFC juice, on the other hand, with its high price, cold storage requirements, and the need to consume within 24 hours after opening, does not offer convenience. Therefore, unless consumers have developed a deep awareness of NFC juice, they will not choose it first.
**In the overall sluggish sales environment of the juice category, although NFC juice sales have grown, it still cannot escape its awkward position. Lack of consumer education and failure to form awareness in consumers' minds mean that self-driven consumption alone cannot boost sales for the category.**
From an external perspective, high cold chain logistics costs will continue, which means the distribution radius of NFC juice cannot reach more consumers.
In the coming period, NFC juice will remain in an awkward position.

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## Citation metadata

- Publisher: New Distribution
- Author: 李青林
- Published: 2019-11-05
- Canonical: https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/the-awkward-position-of-nfc-juice-e7439fc1/
- Original source: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/uF54QwgYNpfJUOfQNkaXdw

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