Source | FBIF Food & Beverage Innovation For leaders in the food and beverage industry, the past 2025 was a year of both opportunities and challenges. In 2025, China's FMCG industry achieved steady growth while undergoing structural adjustments. Image source: FBIF Channels are diversifying: traditional offline channels like hypermarkets face pressure, hard discount stores gain attention, and bulk snack stores see growth. Product demand is enriching: sugar-free tea growth slows, functional beverages lead category growth, and health trends like low GI and clean labels heat up. Consumer logic is being rewritten: consumers focus more on value for money, membership-based supermarkets like Sam's Club become central topics, and retail reforms emulating Pangdonglai continue... Against this backdrop of change, "returning to basics" became the keyword. Yan Xiaolei pushed Hema to streamline its business formats, focusing on Hema Fresh and Hema NB, with product strength as the core competitiveness. Tang Binsen redirected Genki Forest's resources more concentratedly to core categories like sparkling water, electrolyte water, Haozizai, and ice tea. Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu expanded Mixue Bingcheng's extreme cost-performance to new overseas markets, replicating domestic supply chain advantages. Liang Changlin proposed that Dingdong Maicai would not trade growth for low prices or subsidies, insisting on "one inch narrow, one kilometer deep." Top leaders in the food and beverage industry are returning to business common sense, consumers, and real needs. They focus on core product tracks, refine channel operations, use diversified product structures and brand portfolios to hedge risks, and steadily seek new growth in overseas markets by deepening supply chains. In 2025, Tang Binsen said in an interview with CCTV News that a company should never expect to change its destiny in a few years. The food and beverage industry is like "the tortoise and the hare race," where one must be like the tortoise, doing every step well, not expecting a single move to win or to advance a thousand miles in a day, but to make daily progress, continuously improve, and maintain passion. [1] This is also a true reflection of the food and beverage industry in 2025. Compared to short-cycle hit logic, returning to "basic skills" like product innovation and channel construction is the common answer among entrepreneurs. Below are the stories of the Top 10 Food & Beverage Innovation Figures of 2025 (sorted by strokes of surnames).
Yu Donglai: Pangdonglai Has No Scale Development Plan, Will Become a "School-Type Enterprise" In 2025, Pangdonglai's attention continued to rise. According to Pangdonglai's official website, as of November 8, 2025, Pangdonglai's total sales in 2025 exceeded the 20 billion yuan mark, reaching 20.035 billion yuan, about 3 billion yuan higher than the full-year sales in 2024, setting a new historical high. This is inseparable from long-term product strength construction. Pangdonglai founder Yu Donglai wrote in the book "The Road to Beauty" that the core value of retail is products; good products satisfy customers, and 80% of customer satisfaction comes from products. Unlike community hard discount stores or membership-based stores, Pangdonglai does not compete on low prices or streamline SKUs. Store product counts range from 10,000 to 15,000, with 70% around daily livelihood consumption, meeting functional and variety needs, and 30% pursuing personalization, high-end, and trends. [2] Because of its focus on product quality, store service, and employee treatment, Pangdonglai has become a rare sample in the retail industry, gaining internet fame in recent years. Yu Donglai himself is also a minority in the retail industry. Yu Donglai "raving" at a new store site Image source: Douyin screenshot He rarely talks about growth, instead maintaining restraint, believing that enterprises should not expand blindly. In November 2025, Yu Donglai mentioned on Douyin that Pangdonglai has no scale development plan, let alone an IPO plan. In December 2025, Pangdonglai opened a new store after two years—the "Sanpang Store"—while also planning to close some still-profitable stores. Yu Donglai explained, "Because we pay more attention to the quality of business operations." In 2025, Pangdonglai still did not expand beyond Henan. As retail giants like Yonghui and Wumart continue to undergo "Pangdonglai-style reforms," Yu Donglai remains open. In October 2025, Pangdonglai announced the establishment of an open day. A month later, Yu Donglai posted that Pangdonglai would become an excellent "school-type enterprise" in the future. When speaking publicly, he talks more about love, freedom, and lifestyle than specific management methods, emphasizing that enterprises should not only create commercial value but also make the world a better place. Pangdonglai gained widespread internet attention around 2023. In the era of physical retail growth, Pangdonglai's external influence was not obvious. But when physical retail faced channel changes and economic pressures, requiring transformation to regain offline traffic, Pangdonglai, seemingly counterintuitive, became a simple template by insisting on being itself.
Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu: Enhancing Supply Chain Breadth and Depth to Find Increment for Mixue Group In 2025, Mixue Bingcheng had several "big moves." On March 3, 2025, Mixue Group was officially listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. On the listing day, Mixue Group's stock price surged, with total market value rising to HK$109.35 billion, breaking the "curse" of new tea drink companies breaking issue prices on Hong Kong listings. This growth momentum is also reflected in Mixue Group's performance. In terms of revenue, Mixue Group's 2025 interim report shows that in the first half of 2025, affected by the "delivery war," the group's revenue was 14.875 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 39.3%; net profit was 2.718 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 44.1%, leading listed freshly made tea brands like Guming and Naixue. In terms of store scale, as of the first half of 2025, Mixue Group had over 53,000 stores globally. Supporting this growth is the supply chain capability formed by Mixue Bingcheng's long-term investment. Mixue Group's 2025 interim report points out that revenue growth is mainly attributed to product and equipment sales, followed by franchising and related services. One of the core purposes of Mixue Bingcheng's listing is also to strengthen the supply chain. Its prospectus mentions that about 66% of the proceeds from the global offering will be used to enhance the breadth and depth of the end-to-end supply chain. Zhang Hongchao\Image source: "The Entrepreneurial History of Mixue Bingcheng" Next, the question facing Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu is: As China's largest tea drink chain, where will Mixue Group's increment come from? Domestically, Mixue Group continues to densify the lower-tier market. Mixue Bingcheng, which already covers all city tiers, will further deepen its presence in 30,000 townships nationwide. Meanwhile, Mixue Group is laying out sub-brands, expanding Lucky Cup, and acquiring Xianpi Fulu Family. Lucky Cup reached 10,000 stores by November 2025, with supply chain improvements underway. In May 2025, Mixue Group signed a 4 billion yuan agricultural product procurement intention order with Brazil, mostly for coffee beans. Overseas, Mixue Bingcheng is improving quality and efficiency while expanding into new territories. As of June 30, 2025, Mixue Group had expanded to 12 overseas countries, with about 4,700 stores outside mainland China. In 2025, Mixue Group reduced store numbers in Indonesia and Vietnam to improve single-store operation quality, while also setting its sights on Central Asia and the Americas, opening first stores in Almaty, Hollywood, and New York. First store in Almaty Image source: Weibo @Mixue Bingcheng Mixue Group is among the first freshly made tea companies to go overseas, setting Vietnam as the first stop in 2018. However, Mixue Group mentioned in its prospectus that "overseas revenue is relatively small." In response, Mixue Group's solution is to replicate supply chain advantages overseas. The prospectus shows that Mixue Group plans to establish a multi-functional supply chain center in Southeast Asia to reduce logistics costs and improve response speed to local markets. For Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu, who started from a shaved ice shop in Zhengzhou and built a 10,000-store tea drink business from scratch, achieving the goal of "letting everyone in the world enjoy high-quality, affordable deliciousness" still requires facing many new challenges, and the supply chain, which plays an important role, is their strength.
Yan Xiaolei: Committed to Hema's Product Strength, Focusing on Core Business Formats In the New Year's letter to all employees released on January 1, 2026, Hema CEO Yan Xiaolei disclosed the past year's achievements: In 2025, Hema's overall revenue grew by over 40% year-on-year; Hema Fresh entered 40 new cities, Hema NB opened over 200 new stores, and the dual formats served over 100 million consumers. After 10 years, Hema has experienced phases of "running desperately" and explored different formats, but in recent years, Hema has become more focused, investing more energy in "product strength." On August 7, 2025, at Hema's 10th anniversary open day, Yan Xiaolei made her first public appearance, emphasizing the importance of product strength: "Strengthening product strength is a development strategy Hema has always adhered to. Fresh premium products and trendy internet-famous foods on the shelves are the reasons that attract users to continuously explore Hema." [3] Yan Xiaolei Image source: Retail Business Finance Video Account In the past two years, Hema's overall product line has focused more on health, convenience, and self-pleasing products, serving younger user groups and those who are perceptive to new things. [4] In her 2026 New Year's letter, Yan Xiaolei mentioned that "healthy foods and innovative fresh food solutions lead industry trends" and "80% of new product development focuses on core user needs." In 2025, several of Hema's new products attracted attention on social media, including HPP turmeric ginger lemon juice, the first A++-level clean label egg tart, and the internet-famous drink "White Horse Prince Soup." At the same time, Hema is also exploring new product consumption trends. For example, as health diet attention rises, in August 2025, Hema launched multiple private-label low GI products. Some of Hema's new products in 2025 Image source: Hema APP Product strength does not exist in isolation; it requires continuous investment in systematic capabilities. At Hema's 10th anniversary open day, Yan Xiaolei revealed that Hema has built 8 supply chain centers, over 300 direct procurement bases, and 8 logistics transfer warehouses. In her 2026 New Year's letter, Yan Xiaolei added that in 2026, Hema will "deepen supply chain resilience" to make "quality" and "freshness" unshakable labels for Hema. While making product strength the core, Hema is also proactively adjusting its business formats to achieve more orderly expansion. Unlike the past four years of experimenting with 8 new formats and iterating repeatedly, Hema has returned to the most pragmatic questions: which models can work, and which formats can make money. Focusing on Hema Fresh and Hema NB is the strategy Yan Xiaolei clearly proposed in an internal letter at the end of 2024. She said at the time, "The former replicates the successful model, the latter polishes the optimal model." Hema Fresh is the new retail sample Hema launched in 2016. Hema NB is Hema's affordable community supermarket brand, differentiated from Hema Fresh. Hema X Membership Store, once seen as a second growth curve, was fully closed on August 31, 2025, sparking public discussion. Yan Xiaolei responded to related rumors, mentioning that the closures were proactive format adjustments to focus on the main business, with cumulative closures not exceeding 2% of total stores. The "focus" strategy has already shown phased results. Alibaba's FY2025 annual report shows that from April 2024 to March 2025, Hema's overall GMV exceeded 75 billion yuan, and it achieved its first full-year positive adjusted EBITA. This is Hema's first full-year profitability since its founding ten years ago.
Lin Muqin: Leveraging Channel and Supply Chain Capabilities to Drive Dongpeng's Diversification and Globalization In 2025, the revenue share of Dongpeng's new growth curves continued to increase. Dongpeng's electrolyte drink "Bushuila" achieved revenue of 1.493 billion yuan in the first half of 2025, matching the full-year sales of 2024, with revenue share rising to 13.91%. During the same period, the core big product "Dongpeng Teana" remained the performance pillar, but its revenue share dropped to 77.91%. [5] "Bushuila" was launched in January 2023. Previously, the main market for electrolyte drinks was in sports. After 2022, as health needs grew, consumer demand for electrolyte drinks became more daily, and Dongpeng seized this consumption trend in time. Lin Muqin Image source: WeChat Official Account @Dongpeng Beverage Group 2023 also marked Lin Muqin's 20th year at the helm of Dongpeng. That year, Dongpeng's revenue exceeded 10 billion yuan, and it fully implemented a multi-category strategy. Lin Muqin told FBIF at the time that Dongpeng's next goal was "to become a comprehensive, multi-category beverage group," and said "Dongpeng must have second and third growth curves in the future." [6] After "Bushuila," the sweet tea "Guozhicha" launched in 2025 became another highly anticipated new product. Data from Mashangying shows that within the ready-to-drink tea category, Guozhicha's market share rose from 0.02% in February 2025 to 1.20% in November, with its market share ranking reaching the top 10 by September and continuing through December. [7] Image source: Dongpeng Beverage Lin Muqin once pointed out, "For mature big products, competition is not entirely about the product, but more about channel and supply chain capabilities" [6], and this is also where Dongpeng excels. Dongpeng implemented "Five Codes in One" in 2019, achieving efficient supply chain management and precise decision-making. The 2025 interim report shows that Dongpeng has planned 13 production bases, of which 9 have been built and put into operation. Meanwhile, Dongpeng has over 3,200 distributors, covering a sales network of over 4.2 million effective active terminal outlets, reaching over 250 million non-repeating terminal consumers cumulatively. These reusable "infrastructures" support Dongpeng's category expansion, building new growth curves with higher efficiency. At the same time, Dongpeng is also exploring markets to find new increments. Domestically, Dongpeng is already the leader in the functional beverage track. In October 2025, Dongpeng submitted another listing application to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The prospectus shows that by sales volume, Dongpeng Beverage has ranked first in China's functional beverage market for four consecutive years since 2021, with market share growing from 15.0% in 2021 to 26.3% in 2024. But Dongpeng's ambition goes beyond that. 2025 is Dongpeng's "first year of going overseas," with products exported to over 20 countries and regions including Vietnam and Indonesia. The prospectus also mentions that the use of proceeds includes expanding overseas market business. Currently, Dongpeng Beverage's overseas revenue share is still relatively low. Lin Muqin hopes that overseas revenue will become an important growth pole for the company in the future. He told Xinhua News Agency: "People around the world know Coca-Cola; Chinese beverages can also become world-class brands." [8]
Zhou Can: Strategically Choosing Channels to Stabilize Position in Sugar-Free Tea In 2025, Guozishule, founded just over five years ago, stabilized its "position" in sugar-free tea among established players. Data from Mashangying shows that in the period from Q2 2024 to Q1 2025, the top five groups in the sugar-free ready-to-drink tea category were Nongfu Spring, Suntory, Master Kong, Guozishule, and Uni-President. As of the first half of 2025, Guozishule's market share in domestic sugar-free ready-to-drink tea ranked in the top three. [9] Guozishule sugar-free tea Image source: Xiaohongshu @Guozishule Zhou Can, founder and CEO of Guozishule, is a low-profile entrepreneur who rarely speaks publicly. Judging from Guozishule's recent strategies, Zhou Can had clear strategies and choices for offline channels from the beginning. According to Mashangying's statistics, from January 2022 to July 2023, compared with Coca-Cola, Nongfu Spring, and Genki Forest, Guozishule had a clear advantage in convenience store market share, and its share in grocery stores also improved significantly. However, its share in large supermarkets and hypermarkets was significantly lower than more mature water beverage brands, showing its emphasis on small formats like convenience stores. These formats are characterized by lower sales volume but higher average transaction value and higher gross margins. [10] In 2025, Guozishule continued to strengthen channel construction with a clear direction. Jiemian News reported that Guozishule expanded into special channels like catering and sports venues, as well as emerging channels like snack/hard discount stores and instant retail, with its 970ml large bottle achieving doubled sales. [9] Some of Guozishule's new products in 2025 Image source: Xiaohongshu @Guozishule The emphasis on channels also allowed Guozishule to better understand consumers' real needs while getting closer to terminals. Zhou Can once shared his attitude towards products at a Qicheng Capital roundtable: "In the past, the beverage industry was often supply chain-driven. In recent years, consumer demand-driven has become more obvious... We plan our entire product portfolio around consumer needs, with product innovation as the core, while actively embracing channels." [11] In 2025, an obvious change in the beverage industry was the slowdown in sugar-free tea growth. Data from Mashangying shows that in April, May, August, and September 2025, traditionally the peak beverage season, the year-on-year growth rate of sugar-free tea industry sales was less than half of that in 2024. [12] While focusing on sugar-free tea and maintaining its base, Guozishule is also looking for the next potential category. In addition to launching new sugar-free tea products like "White Peach Guanyin Fruit Tea," Guozishule is also densely launching multi-category new products, spanning fruit tea, electrolyte water, nutrient drinks, craft beer, and plant-based drinks, including limited editions in cooperation with channels like 7-11 and Tmall Supermarket. Based on statistics from Guozishule's official account, Guozishule launched at least over a dozen new products in 2025.
Qu Cuirong: Building Synergies to Let Yum China Grow Like Bamboo Yum China, China's largest restaurant group, did not stop expanding stores in 2025. In November 2025, Yum China released its Q3 2025 financial report. In the first three quarters of 2025, Yum China's total revenue increased 3% year-on-year to $8.974 billion; operating profit was $1.103 billion, up 9% year-on-year; total stores exceeded 17,500, including over 12,000 KFC stores and over 4,000 Pizza Hut stores. Besides the two flagships, KFC and Pizza Hut, other sub-brands are also accelerating expansion. K Coffee, founded just over two years ago, surpassed 2,000 stores by the end of 2025. As of Q3 2025, Pizza Hut WOW stores, focusing on cost-performance, expanded to 250 stores, and KPRO, focusing on energy bowls and superfood smoothies, has opened over 100 stores in high-tier cities. Qu Cuirong Image source: Yum China These sub-brands are not built from scratch but developed on the basis of classic brands or complement existing brands. Among them, K Coffee and KPRO adopt a "side-by-side" development model, sharing store space, in-store resources, and membership programs with KFC to achieve synergies. Pizza Hut WOW stores, with lower single-store investment and a more streamlined operation model, entered about 40 cities that Pizza Hut had not previously covered. Yum China CFO Ding Xiao said, "WOW created a new Pizza Hut, raising the ceiling of Pizza Hut's overall market significantly." [13] Additionally, Yum China launched sub-brands like Fried Chicken Brothers and Pizza Burger in 2025, continuously expanding its brand matrix. Fried Chicken Brothers is a fried chicken specialty store under KFC, while Pizza Burger is a newly launched brand under Pizza Hut, focusing on the burger category and the solo dining track. In the Q3 2025 earnings report, Yum China CEO Qu Cuirong described the synergy within the group as "front-end layering, back-end aggregation": "At the front end, we cover a wide range of consumption scenarios and customer groups through a multi-brand portfolio, rich store modules, and diversified product lines. At the back end, we enhance efficiency through cross-store, cross-region resource sharing and integration, building stronger synergies." Image source: Weibo @KFC In the future, Yum China will continue to open stores. At Yum China's 2025 Investor Day, Qu Cuirong proposed, "From 1987 to 2020, we took 33 years to open 10,000 stores. Next, we strive to double the number of stores by 2026 and exceed 30,000 stores by 2030." In her view, China's restaurant market still has huge opportunities. Yum China currently serves only about one-third of Chinese consumers, and hopes to increase that proportion to about half in the future. [14] Qu Cuirong is from Fujian, and there was a bamboo grove in front of her childhood home. She uses bamboo to describe Yum China's current stage: "Before bamboo emerges from the soil, it takes root underground for years, and the roots are all connected. Once conditions are right, they can grow even one meter a day—now Yum China has reached such a rapid growth period." [13]
Zhong Shanshan: Good Products Transcend Cycles, Billion-Yuan Tea Business Is a New Starting Point In 2025, Nongfu Spring's tea beverage business broke the half-year 10 billion yuan mark for the first time. Nongfu Spring's 2025 interim report shows that in the first half of 2025, packaged drinking water revenue was 9.443 billion yuan, up 10.7% year-on-year, accounting for 36.9% of total revenue; tea beverage revenue was 10.089 billion yuan, up 19.7% year-on-year, accounting for 39.4% of total revenue. Tea beverage products not only maintained growth but also surpassed packaged water in revenue share. Among tea beverage products, Oriental Leaf is the more prominent one, contributing over 70% of revenue. Oriental Leaf was once criticized as "the worst-tasting drink," but now it has become the core big product of Nongfu Spring, which started with "water." Image source: Xiaohongshu @Oriental Leaf In 2011, Oriental Leaf was launched, achieving "0 sugar, 0 fat, 0 calories, 0 flavoring, 0 preservatives." Nongfu Spring built an aseptic production line for it and invested heavily in R&D personnel. But at that time, it was not the best era for sugar-free tea. During the same period, many leading beverage brands launched sugar-free tea products, but most faded out of the market after a few years. Oriental Leaf also faced challenges; in the early years, even during peak season, the aseptic production line only needed to run two days a week. [15] Oriental Leaf, holding its ground, welcomed the growth inflection point for sugar-free tea around 2015. Data from iiMedia Research shows that from 2015 to 2023, the market size of China's sugar-free beverage industry grew year by year, from 2.26 billion yuan to 40.16 billion yuan. [16] Around 2019, consumers' awareness of 0 sugar matured. Oriental Leaf improved its product matrix through formula optimization, flavor expansion, seasonal limited editions, and size variations, while increasing marketing investment and incentivizing distributors, gradually growing into a national beverage for all age groups. [17] In 2025, Nongfu Spring continued to innovate in sugar-free tea, launching a new flavor after two years, "Chenpi White Tea," and continuously launching 1.5L large-size bottles to enter scenarios like family consumption. In June 2025, Oriental Leaf quietly launched the "Chrysanthemum Pu'er" flavor, testing the waters in the Guangdong market. Zhong Shanshan\Image source: Nongfu Spring Oriental Leaf's growth over more than a decade confirms Zhong Shanshan's "long-termism." At Nongfu Spring's annual shareholders' meeting in May 2025, Zhong Shanshan mentioned the company's product philosophy: "We do not chase trends; we only make products that are truly valuable to health." In the fast-changing consumer industry, he does not agree with only looking at short-term performance: "We believe that truly good products and good brands transcend cycles." [18]
Tang Binsen: Beverages Are a Slow Business, Continue to Make Products Well Genki Forest continued its growth momentum in 2025, with overall performance up 26% year-on-year, about four times the market average. This is the third consecutive year Genki Forest has maintained double-digit growth. If Genki Forest, which saw sales grow at 2-3 times between 2018 and 2021, could be called an "internet-famous new consumer brand" that understood the internet and challenged giants, then in 2025, Genki Forest has lost some of its initial "passion" and become more steady and determined. In November 2025, in an interview with CCTV News, Genki Forest founder Tang Binsen said that Genki Forest had also been "young and reckless," but because it pursued growth and revenue too much, it took some detours. So in recent years, they proposed learning from traditional enterprises, respecting channels and distributors, and the foundation of everything is still good products. One must be like a tortoise, doing every step well. [1] Image source: Genki Blackboard News Reflected in products, in 2025, Genki Forest maintained innovation speed while also driving performance in core categories through refined operations. In 2025, Genki Forest launched new products like boiled tea, Grandma Boiled Sugarcane and Water Chestnut Water, and Vitamin C Lemon Soda, making the overall product portfolio more diverse. At the same time, multiple categories achieved growth: electrolyte water grew 34% year-on-year, ice tea grew 56%, Haozizai grew 36%, and vitamin water grew 128%. [19] Existing products continue to upgrade in craftsmanship and quality. The "Ice Burst Little Green Lemon" sparkling water optimized its formula, making the lemon flavor fresher. Genki Forest ice tea uses "-196°C liquid nitrogen frozen lemon technology" to maximize the preservation of fresh fruit flavor. Tang Binsen previewed that the 2026 ice tea will taste better, with a more authentic lemon flavor. At the same time, Tang Binsen announced an important strategic adjustment in 2025: splitting the dairy brand Beihai Pasture from the group entity to promote fully independent operation. This way, Genki Forest focuses more on the beverage main track, concentrating resources more on core categories like sparkling water, electrolyte water, Haozizai, and ice tea, continuously strengthening product R&D investment, using "good products" as a long-term fulcrum to transcend cycles. Some of Genki Forest's new and upgraded products in 2025 Image source: Genki Blackboard News Behind the products, Genki Forest also improved its "basic skills" under the surface. In 2025, Genki Forest launched the Five Codes in One system, promoting channel digitalization and refined cargo management. At the same time, the channel network expanded, with cooperative outlets exceeding 1.28 million stores, a net increase of 120,000, and city coverage adding 64 new cities. In Tang Binsen's words, "Sales are more rhythmic, relationships with distributors are stabilizing, and through the accumulation of the past year or two, cooperation is becoming healthier." 2025 marks the 9th year since Genki Forest's founding, but this year's distributor conference used the theme "Meet Again in Twenty Years, Light Boat Passes Another Mountain." Tang Binsen pointed out at the meeting that he hopes to continue creating and delivering loving, good products to Chinese people over the next twenty years. In his view, "Beverages are a slow business; as long as you slowly accumulate, it becomes a huge barrier." Genki Forest, with a steadier mindset, remains full of drive. In recent years, Genki Forest has been promoting product globalization. Currently, products are available in over 40 countries and regions, and have entered some local mainstream channels, including Indonesian convenience store Alfamart, Korean Costco, and UK supermarket chain Tesco. In 2025, Tang Binsen said in an interview with Liaowang Think Tank: "I hope that in another 20 years, people will say Chinese beverages are the highest quality, healthiest, and world-class." [20]
Liang Changlin: One Inch Narrow, One Kilometer Deep, Seek Growth from Good Products After achieving full-year profitability under GAAP for the first time in 2024, Dingdong Maicai entered a new development cycle in 2025, focusing more on "good." At the supply chain ecosystem summit held in July 2025, Dingdong Maicai officially released its "4G" strategy, proposing "good users, good products, good service, and good mindshare" as the core strategies for the company's current development. The "4G strategy" has already shown initial results. "Today, our good products are getting stronger. In vegetables, organic vegetables account for 20%; in pork, black pork accounts for 40%. Now, our good products and good users account for a high proportion," said Liang Changlin, founder of Dingdong Maicai, at the summit. Liang Changlin\Image source: Xiaoshidai Low prices and subsidies are common ways for e-commerce platforms to attract traffic, but Liang Changlin clearly stated, "We do not take the path of low-price competition. We do not do 75 points for everyone, only 120 points for a few." He also proposed the concept of "one inch narrow, one kilometer deep." Narrow means focusing on fresh food and serving a few people well. Deep means deeply cultivating the entire supply chain from "seed to chopsticks." [21] Dingdong Maicai, which emphasizes "good products" and is more focused, has shown signs of this since 2021. In 2021, known as the watershed for fresh food e-commerce, Dingdong Maicai and Miss Fresh were listed one after another, but after the highlight, the business model of burning money for volume and continuous losses quickly exposed problems. In Q3 2021, Dingdong Maicai proactively adjusted its strategic focus—"efficiency first, appropriately consider scale"—shifting from national expansion to deep cultivation in regions like the Yangtze River Delta. In 2023, Dingdong Maicai placed more emphasis on product strength. When releasing Q1 2023 financial results, Liang Changlin said that cultivating consumer mindshare through good products, forming consumer trust and dependence, thereby increasing order scale, and then promoting the development of good products, "this is a brand new flywheel." [22] In 2025, Dingdong Maicai, which proposed the "4G" strategy, further concentrated resources on product strength and supply chain. In May 2025, Dingdong Maicai's APP interface underwent a major redesign, adding a "Quality Love" zone, categorizing products around low GI, organic food, clean ingredients, and other directions, capturing cutting-edge health trends and refining "quality" into labels. In the first half of 2025, sales of products with clean ingredient labels exceeded 500 million yuan, and sales of low GI products grew from less than 1 million yuan in the first half of 2023 to nearly 60 million yuan in the first half of 2025. Some of Dingdong Maicai's private-label products\Dingdong Maicai APP For the most core category of fresh food, Dingdong Maicai increased investment at the source. In 2025, based on large-scale direct procurement and order-based farming, the platform cooperated with upstream to establish black pig breeding bases and digital fish warehouses, achieving full-chain control from production to delivery. Additionally, Dingdong Maicai uses AI technology to ensure traceability transparency, sharing real-time data with suppliers through the "Digital Brain" system, digitizing quality monitoring at the raw material and processing ends. Growth continues. In November 2025, Dingdong Maicai released its Q3 earnings report, achieving positive year-on-year scale growth for seven consecutive quarters and profitability under GAAP for seven consecutive quarters. [23]
Zhang Liaoyuan: Full Category Is Not Cross-Border, Three Squirrels Will Eventually Become a Super Supply Chain Company 2025 was called the "rebirth year" by Zhang Liaoyuan, founder of Three Squirrels. This is first reflected in revenue. In March 2025, Three Squirrels' 2024 annual report showed that the company's 2024 operating revenue was 10.622 billion yuan. This means Three Squirrels returned to the 10 billion scale. Zhang Liaoyuan was deeply moved by this. At the "Three Squirrels 2025 Three Lives All Things·Ecology Conference" held in May 2025, he said: "We once took 7 years to reach (pre-tax revenue) 12 billion and went public. We then took 3 years to return to 12 billion (pre-tax revenue)." The two 12 billion have completely different meanings. For Zhang Liaoyuan, "rebirth" mainly means that in the past trough, he found the future development direction. At the ecology conference, Zhang Liaoyuan and the executive team released Three Squirrels' latest strategic plan: full category and full channel. Zhang Liaoyuan\Image source: Three Squirrels Full category means densely incubating a series of new brands, not vertical in nut snacks, but covering all major consumer categories, while adhering to the strategy of "high-end cost-performance" for products. Full channel means laying out all channel formats, opening "full-category lifestyle stores" and "one-cent profit convenience stores." As of May 2025, Three Squirrels had 33 sub-brands in incubation. In June 2025, Three Squirrels opened its first "lifestyle store" sample store, with sales exceeding 1 million yuan in the first three days. From December 26 to 28, 2025, Three Squirrels opened 7 "lifestyle store" standard stores simultaneously in five counties and districts in Anhui. [24] In Zhang Liaoyuan's view, making Three Squirrels a full-category private-label retailer is not cross-border, but "a natural extension based on Squirrel's core advantages." [24] Developing sub-brands first reuses the influence of the main brand. In Zhang Liaoyuan's words, "It's like Three Squirrels wants to open a store, needing 1,000 SKUs, so we use these 33 brands to undertake it." Supply chain and channel resources can also be shared. He told 36Kr: "After thirteen years of hard work, we already have the operational capability for full category and full channel. For us, from snacks to sanitary pads, it is essentially the process of 'converting raw materials into products and putting them on shelves for sale.'" [25] Three Squirrels Lifestyle Store Three Squirrels started online. In recent years, with the rise of bulk snack brands and channel changes, Three Squirrels did not stick to shelf e-commerce, shifting to new e-commerce channels like Douyin since 2023. In 2025, Zhang Liaoyuan saw the potential of community scenarios and hard discount formats, experimenting with lifestyle stores and convenience stores. According to Zhang Liaoyuan's vision, Three Squirrels will eventually become a super supply chain company. "We look like a brand company, and also like a retail company. Now we look like a supply chain company. So don't set boundaries; all are means. The purpose is how to let consumers buy good and cheap things." [26]
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【Moving Toward the C-End】The 11th China FMCG Conference Time: March 16-18, 2026 Location: Chengdu, China