Young people fall in love with "cooking tea around the stove", why tea companies can't make money

　　Chinanews.com, December 3 (Zuo Yukun, reporter from Chinanews Finance and Economics) "It's better to eat tea than to hold a hundred thousand verses." The good taste of the old ancestors playing and appreciating, but this winter let the young people find out Got something new.

　　In remote Rabat, Morocco, "Chinese tea" has entered the "intangible cultural heritage" of human beings, and traditional culture has ushered in new good news; The wind of "Chinese style" caught fire in the cold wave.

　　The good wind is blowing again, and the Chinese tea companies that are still a little bit "suffering", can they ride the wind this time?

A teahouse in Chengdu is full of customers "making tea around the stove".

Photo by Yue Yitong

　　"

around the stove "

　　On the evening of November 29th, Beijing time, the "Traditional Chinese Tea-making Technique and Related Customs" declared by China successfully passed the review and was included in the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

　　The traditional Chinese tea-making techniques and related customs that have been successfully applied for world heritage refer to the knowledge, skills and practices related to tea garden management, tea picking, tea hand-making, and tea drinking and sharing.

The success of this application for world heritage will naturally be of great benefit to the further promotion and dissemination of China's long-standing tea culture.

　　Looking back at home, young people have really practiced it.

This winter, a new form of drinking tea - making tea around the stove suddenly became popular, and related topics were played more than 1.6 billion times on the short video platform.

Young people who liked to drink coffee and milk tea in winter before turned around and got busy making tea.

　　There is a fiery charcoal stove, close confidants, sitting around the boiling tea, roasting tea, brewing tea, drinking tea... What I once thought I would only do after the age of 60, this year's "post-95s" fell in love with it in advance up.

　　But if you look at the things on the grill, you can see some young people again.

Based on simple tea sets and exquisite refreshments, young people have arranged roasted oranges, persimmons, and sweet potatoes, as well as roasted marshmallows, rice cakes, and barbecued meat. There is even a trend towards farmhouse entertainment. For making tea, you can also make an appointment to braise chicken with firewood.

　　First of all, making tea around the stove, which has become popular in the new first-tier cities, is mostly carried out outdoors, in the mountains and forests, on both sides of rivers and lakes, in small farmyards... It is not so much a new social activity, but more like a summer "camping style". "Continuation.

In a teahouse in Chengdu, young people are "making tea around the stove".

Photo by Chen Xuanbin

How much are young people willing to spend on

tasting tea with a sense of atmosphere "?

　　"Post-95" girl Xiao Liao is a young man who has been interested in tea culture since she was a child.

Before this year, her impression of drinking tea and roasting food was still roasted ginkgo, but this winter, she really experienced how "making tea around the stove" has been iterated into "Northeast barbecue stall".

　　"It was the first time I went to a small shop with friends to make tea around the stove. The sweet potatoes we baked only had two degrees of ripeness: raw or burnt. But after trying a few times, I also summed up some experience and fun. For example, the rice cake looks like They are hard, but if you are not careful, they will be over-roasted; the big persimmons are astringent after roasting, and the sweet persimmons are more delicious." Xiao Liao said.

　　Compared with making tea alone at home before, Xiao Liao believes that the fun of making tea around the stove lies in the overall sense of atmosphere.

"Good friends get together, chat and drink tea in a comfortable environment, and discuss together to judge whether the food is cooked. The time spent playing with mobile phones is less, and the feeling is closer. The taste of the drink is not the most important thing. .”

　　"Cooking tea around the stove is an innovation of the whole scene. This form has a sense of topic and social attributes, which perfectly matches and meets the core needs of the new generation." Zhu Danpeng, an analyst of China's food industry, believes.

　　All atmosphere gifts have a price tag behind them.

　　The reporter looked at the relevant platforms and found that the per capita price of tea brewing around the stove ranges from 20 yuan to 200 yuan, and most of them are set meals below 200 yuan for 2 people. The "production rate" of decoration has risen sharply.

And because of the long consumption time and low turnover rate of cooking tea around the stove, many businesses also have regulations on the number of people and consumption time.

　　Taking Chengdu, a "city soaked in tea soup", as an example, among the more than 20,000 various teahouses, there are about a thousand that provide the service of brewing tea around the stove.

According to the person in charge, the two teahouses he is currently running can receive more than 500 customers every day, and they are full every day. Queuing is common, and more than 80% of the customer base are young people.

　　"In the past two years, when it comes to the consumption cards that young people like, most of them are Western-style Internet celebrities. Cooking tea around the stove has a new Chinese style. The various courtyard scenery, traditional tables and chairs, and Hanfu elements are also very photogenic. , I think it is also a kind of progress for the promotion of Chinese people's own traditional culture." Xiao Liao thinks.

Data map: Freshly picked Anji white tea.

Photo by Zhang Hui

Can traditional tea companies "catch up" with the popularity of tea drinking among young people?

　　From the detonation of many hot spots such as "the first cup of milk tea in autumn" and "making tea around the stove", to the hot sales of new products such as new tea drinks, sugar-free tea drinks, and mixed flavor teas, people have seen that tea, a traditional product, attracts young people. Greater possibilities for a new generation of customers.

　　Behind the prosperity of the new market, the embarrassment of "A-shares without tea companies" has once again been revealed.

　　Four months after it withdrew its listing application from the GEM, Bama Tea recently submitted its prospectus again and then hit the Shenzhen Main Board.

This is the third time that Bama Tea has hit the IPO. It landed on the NEEQ in 2015, but delisted in 2018; it sought to be listed on the GEM in 2021, but withdrew its application after three rounds of inquiries, and sprinted to the main board .

　　In the past two years, planning to go public has become the general vision of Chinese tea companies.

Anxi Tieguanyin, Huaxiangyuan, and Colorful Yunnan have all hit IPOs; Lancang Ancient Tea withdrew its A-share IPO application and switched to listing in Hong Kong; China Tea updated its prospectus in February this year and is waiting for the next step.

　　According to data from the China Tea Circulation Association, from 2019 to 2021, the domestic sales of Chinese tea will be 273.95 billion yuan, 288.884 billion yuan, and 312 billion yuan respectively.

However, this 300 billion market is very fragmented, and there are a large number of traditional family workshop production enterprises and small tea enterprises.

　　The essence of tea is still a primary agricultural product, and the industry concentration is not high. "There are categories, but no brands" is a hurdle that Chinese tea companies have not yet overcome.

The fact behind the familiar tea varieties such as West Lake Longjing and Dongting Biluochun is that when we buy tea every day, we mostly think of which kind of tea, not which tea brand.

　　"The traditional tea industry has not yet entered a stage of standardization, specialization, branding, capitalization, and scale. At present, the overall operation of Chinese tea companies is not standardized. Internal audits and raw materials need to be constantly adjusted to meet the listing requirements. " Zhu Danpeng thinks.

　　Hotspots on social platforms are constantly changing. On the tea drinking track with new markets, new competition, and new ways of playing, who can seize this shareholder wind?

This is also the test question in front of tea companies behind the excitement.

(Finish)