Mixue, China’s and world’s largest F&B chain by store count, went public in Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The market was obviously excited – the price was up more than 43%, giving the company a valuation of US$14 billion.
Founded in 1997, Mixue’s rapid expansion really started around 2015, and kept accelerating. By September 2024, it already had more than 45,000 stores in 11 countries.
In fact, Mixue alone contributed more than 70% of the 6100+ stores of Chinese F&B chains in Southeast Asia, according to Momentum Works “Chinese F&B in Southeast Asia 2025” report.
A number of friends asked us yesterday about the success formula of Mixue. Well, you can find more detailed analysis about Mixue’s business model in the ”Who is Mixue” report we published exactly a year ago.
Today, we are just sharing some thoughts on the parallels (and connections) between Mixue and Pinduoduo/Temu, as well as J&T Express:
- Many of Mixue’s early top lieutenants came from Henan Zhisheng Communications Co. Ltd.. This little known company is the main distributor of Oppo products in Mixue’s home province. Friends in Momentum Works community might remember that J&T Express was built from Oppo’s distribution network; while Oppo’s godfather, Duan Yongping, was mentor and angel investor of Pinduoduo’s founder, Colin Huang;
- Duan, whose company BBK gave birth to Oppo, Vivo and many other electronics brands, built the nationwide distribution network in China as well as a system to build and manage franchises. This system and network has proven very useful later for J&T Express;
- Pinduoduo/Temu and Mixue both focus on one single value proposition that appeals to the largest cohort of consumers: savings, or value for money. Both companies focused on “lower tier markets” – i.e. smaller cities/towns and very cost conscious consumers. They built scale with this mass markets and achieved cost efficiency;
- Both execute on that focus to the extreme – Pinduoduo/Temu built a very focused organisation, while Mixue centralised a lot of the operations to make it really a no brainer to run stores;
- Both cut costs through controlling the supply chain: Pinduoduo/Temu through its C2M model to remove middlemen in distribution, while Mixue is simply the (vertically integrated) supply chain;
- Both use viral tactics to acquire customers. Mixue through its “Snow King” mascot and earworm “i love you you love me Mixue ice cream and tea” tune; while Temu uses a lot of gamified social tactics to get users to spread its promotions;
- When expanding outside China, both companies take the same value proposition: value for money. The interesting difference here is that Mixue’s organisation allows it to work well in Southeast Asia, while Temu went straight to the US with a value for money assortment manufactured in China.
Will Mixue continue to have a bright future? As our CEO, Jianggan Li, noted to CNN yesterday, “If executed well, this could be a relatively long-term business model, as profitability mainly depends on how much franchisees can sell.”
One thing we know for sure – Mixue’s ambitions do not stop at 45,000 stores and 11 countries.
The post What does Mixue have in common with Temu and J&T? first appeared on The Low Down - Momentum Works.
