China's beverage industry is becoming the 'salvation' for Japanese unsweetened tea giants. Suntory's star brand 'Iyemon' hit a record low in Japan last year, and there were concerns it might be discontinued. This year, Ito En also feels the pressure, hinting at 'adjusting 2025 business targets.' However, in China, Japanese unsweetened teas frequently top e-commerce bestseller lists, with Suntory oolong tea achieving about 200% sales growth for two consecutive years. Executives who had been largely absent from China for over a decade are now collectively expressing their commitment to 'invest in China unswervingly.' Domestic unsweetened tea pioneers are also reaping huge profits. Oriental Leaf, known for its 'unpleasant taste,' sold out several times last year and saw sales surge 90% in the first half of this year, nearly doubling. Sensing the opportunity, players have swarmed in, and convenience store and supermarket shelves are now crowded with unsweetened tea brands, with 'more brands than in Japan.' Many attribute this sudden boom to the health trend, while others think it's because workers, whose lives are bitter, are using unsweetened tea to counteract their bitterness. These explanations are tautological, like 'a white wall without black spots' or 'a horse without five legs.' In reality, people have underestimated the functionality of unsweetened tea and haven't realized that their taste buds have been quietly trained and upgraded.

Super 'Water Substitute' Bought by Young People

Over the past year, almost all well-known unsweetened tea brands have dropped to around 3 yuan. You can even get 18 bottles of Suntory for 31.1 yuan, and 500ml bottles of Oriental Leaf are available for just over 1 yuan on instant retail platforms, cheaper than mineral water. This mirrors the situation in Japan when unsweetened tea took off over 30 years ago. In the 1990s, the price per liter of unsweetened tea in Japan was only 15 yen, 60% of cola's price and 65% of juice's, only slightly more expensive than mineral water. This affordable price allowed it to surpass carbonated drinks in market share within just five years (1990-1995) among Japanese people facing the economic bubble's collapse. Therefore, the current rise of unsweetened tea in China is also attributed by many to the victory of the 'price butcher' under economic downturn. However, a closer look reveals that this boom is fundamentally different from Japan's. Japan's unsweetened tea has been cheap since its launch in 1981. This cheapness went unnoticed during the Showa era of prosperity and high consumer spending, but during the Heisei 'Lost 30 Years,' it became a boon for Japanese households with tight budgets. In China, while Oriental Leaf and others cut prices aggressively, they insist in earnings calls that they won't engage in large-scale promotions or subsidize channels. This inconsistency is because for domestic players, price cuts are just following the trend—among popular drinks, unsweetened tea has the highest price sensitivity due to many substitutes and low penetration, so price cuts can open the market faster. Since the price cuts, workers who used to drink coffee like water are now using Oriental Leaf to stay alert, and young people who drank juice or yogurt for digestion are now holding Suntory. It seems overnight, unsweetened tea has become a 'universal water,' replacing other beverages. Delving deeper, this is because while everyone drinks beverages to quench thirst, they have different preferences in taste and function. For example, 'happy water' lovers enjoy sugary drinks, and truck drivers rely on Red Bull and Dongpeng Special Drink, corresponding to needs for happiness, alertness, and health. These functions are provided by key ingredients. Sugar brings physiological pleasure, and popular 'happy waters' are loaded with sugar, often twice the recommended daily intake (25g). Caffeine and taurine stimulate the central nervous system to boost alertness, as clearly stated in ads like 'Tired? Sleepy? Drink Dongpeng Special Drink.' Health is often associated with natural, organic, and sugar-free attributes. Analyzing unsweetened tea's ingredients, it combines hydration, alertness, and health, while other popular drinks like sweetened tea and carbonated beverages mostly satisfy only two needs. In other words, among the six major beverage categories, unsweetened tea can replace the most types. Such a 'one bottle for many' super product is hard to resist once it hits the right price point. Domestic unsweetened tea remained obscure for over a decade due to high prices. When Oriental Leaf launched in 2011, it was priced at 3.5 yuan per bottle, more expensive than popular iced tea and Coca-Cola, and later rose to 5 yuan, with the entire unsweetened tea market staying high between 4-7 yuan. The reason is that the category initially targeted tea drinkers, like Uni-President's 'Chaliwang' with its 'aftertaste like freshly brewed' selling point, and Oriental Leaf clearly aimed at middle-aged white-collar workers or public institution employees. These people are not price-sensitive and are willing to spend on tea. For example, in county-level tea consumption, mainstream mid-range tea costs 300-500 yuan per jin. Assuming one jin makes 50-60 brews and 1-2 brews per day, one jin lasts about a month and a half, costing 8.8 yuan per day. This means to win them over, the 'prestige' of tea drinks cannot be low. However, no matter how players tried to please them, middle-aged men were indifferent because they prefer hot tea with 'color, aroma, and taste.' Young people also held back due to price, as one young man put it: 'For this price, I could order a freshly drawn cola at an internet cafe, and the attendant would bring it to my table on a tray.' Now that unsweetened tea prices have plummeted, middle-aged men who love hot tea may not be swayed, but young people who were previously deterred by price are overjoyed. Data shows that 84.1% of new unsweetened tea users are under 30, and 68.5% of frequent buyers are under 30. Besides product strength and price wars, price increases of competitors like iced tea and cola have also fueled the boom. In recent years, major sugar-producing countries have reduced output due to extreme weather, driving up sugar prices and consequently sweetened beverage prices—500ml cola and Sprite rose from 3 to 3.5 yuan, and Master Kong iced tea also increased by 0.5 yuan. In contrast, the main ingredient of unsweetened tea, tea leaves, has seen price declines in recent years due to the proliferation of tea gardens, giving it more room for price cuts compared to other drinks. Additionally, Oriental Leaf's channel profit is 2.7 yuan, twice that of Master Kong iced tea and three times that of Nongfu Spring bottled water. With such margins, channels are more willing to trade volume for price. Overall, the combination of price and product strength has achieved an optimal match, making everyone say 'it's really good.' But the question is: are young people with childhood trauma from Oriental Leaf so easily won over?

Young People Should 'Thank' Heytea and Naixue for Loving Unsweetened Tea

In 2017, the unsweetened tea track saw a drama of 'same tea, different fates.' On one hand, Oriental Leaf was once again listed in the 'Top 5 Worst-Tasting Drinks.' On the other, Ran Tea, also promoting 'unsweetened tea,' became the year's hit. In young people's social media posts, Ran Tea appeared as frequently as Haidilao, and top weight-loss posts often recommended 'drinking Ran Tea to lose X pounds in a week.' The stark difference in market reception largely stems from taste differences. Unsweetened tea is criticized as 'unpleasant' because people without tea-drinking habits find it hard to accept the bitterness of tea polyphenols. For example, one comment on Oriental Leaf: 'It feels like eating leaves, bitter.' Ran Tea, while promoting unsweetened tea, added fruit juice and sugar substitutes. This masked the bitterness of tea polyphenols, appealing more to young people. As Genki Forest founder Tang Binsen said: 'Young people don't dislike pure tea; they're just afraid of bitterness.' In fact, this 'compromise' approach wasn't Ran Tea's innovation but borrowed from new-style tea drinks. New-style tea drinks, represented by Naixue and Heytea, are characterized by real ingredients. For instance, tea bases abandoned tea powder and broken leaves in favor of real tea leaves and freshly brewed tea changed every four hours. This preserved more nutrients but also released more tea polyphenols. To balance the taste and prevent consumers from 'suffering,' Heytea added more milk and fruit, like its first hit 'Cheese Tea' using up to 2/3 fruit to complement the tea base. This brought a new problem: excessive sugar. Test data showed that even Heytea's Zhizhi Mangmang with 50% sugar had more sugar than traditional CoCo bubble tea with extra sugar. However, during that consumer trend prioritizing 'higher quality above all,' this was overshadowed by the health and premium aura of real tea leaves and fruit milk. Thus, a series of drinks combining sweetness and bitterness, firmly grasping the sugar + tea polyphenol combo, quickly replaced bubble tea as young people's favorite, and many began unknowingly consuming tea polyphenols and caffeine. Consumer enthusiasm attracted capital to new-style tea drinks, and with new narratives, they entered shopping malls in first-tier cities, unlike bubble tea shops that were confined to streets. The average price of milk tea jumped into the 30-yuan era and became social currency—people posted photos of queuing for hours and paid 20 times the price for scalpers. The 'person-to-person' following and pursuit helped new tea drinks break out, exposing more young people to tea polyphenols, subtly training their taste buds and bodies. Alongside this, unsweetened tea's fortunes reversed. During Ran Tea's boom, Coca-Cola launched 'Chunchashe,' and Wahaha introduced 'Anhua Dark Tea' and 'Yi Cha.' In 2018, Oriental Leaf, once stigmatized as 'unpleasant,' began to see improved reputation—Nongfu Spring founder Zhong Shanshan revealed in an interview that Oriental Leaf's 'sales surged and turned profitable.' Since then, the development trajectory of unsweetened tea has been closely intertwined with the penetration of new-style tea drinks. As shown below, from 2019 to 2021, Naixue's penetration among young people rose from 19% to 56%; during the same period, tea beverages' contribution to Nongfu Spring's revenue gradually increased. In 2021, Chagee's Boya Juexian, with a tea taste close to freshly brewed, became a phenomenon—tea polyphenol content around 500mg/kg gives a taste close to freshly brewed tea, and a medium cup (470ml) contains about 594.6mg. That year, Oriental Leaf, which had not launched new products in 10 years, released three new products, and Zhong Shanshan excitedly stated in an interview that Oriental Leaf's 'growth curve (has risen).' This wasn't the end. Subsequently, second-tier tea drinks like Chabaidao and Guming rose rapidly with cost-effective pricing, and under competitive pressure, Heytea and Naixue increased their supply of lower-cost pure tea—from 2018 to 2024, Heytea's menu saw pure tea increase from 1 to 8 items, entering an era where 'tea flavor outweighs milk flavor.' As new-style tea drinks intensified tea polyphenols, young people, through repeated exposure, consumed more tea polyphenols and their taste buds adapted increasingly. For example, some consumers complained that some Oriental Leaf flavors 'aren't as tea-flavored as Chagee.' Clearly, under the education of freshly made tea drinks, 18-30-year-olds have gradually increased their acceptance of tea polyphenols, and their tastes have changed. Standing on the shoulders of giants, unsweetened tea, which had been a 'spare tire' for over a decade, has finally risen to become the 'protagonist.'

Summary

'Three yuan is 'national liquor,' three and a half is 'horse urine''—this online quip about Master Kong iced tea's price increase vividly conveys the consumption views of the younger generation. Adapting to this subtle shift, unsweetened tea, with its 'rock-bottom prices' and 'one bottle for many,' has broken free from being misunderstood and become people's new favorite. Although unsweetened tea still tastes bitter, in this restless and anxious era, it seems just right for taste buds that have been 'tempered' by repeated training.