BEIJING: Receipts piled on the floor as a label machine spat out an endless stream of orders at a ChaPanda outlet in Zhejiang.
“We are still 2,000 orders behind,” lamented a barista from the popular Chinese milk tea chain, posting a photo of the chaos on lifestyle platform Xiaohongshu.
“Today is a nightmare for milk tea shops,” added the user, known online as ChaPanda Working Diary, in a post on Sunday (Jul 6).
That outlet was just one of many food and beverage shops nationwide swamped over the weekend as China’s food delivery price war hit fever pitch.
A wave of deep discounts from leading platforms sent orders skyrocketing, overwhelming merchants and even briefly crashing a delivery app.
It marks a fresh escalation in an increasingly fierce battle for market share – a cutthroat contest that has drawn growing concern and scrutiny from the government.
DELIVERING DEEP DISCOUNTS
Major food delivery players such as Meituan, Alibaba’s Taobao Flash Sale and Ele.me, as well as JD.com, unveiled generous vouchers on Saturday to kickstart their summer campaigns.
Meituan collaborated with several beverage brands, including Mixue, ChaPanda and Cotti Coffee, and rolled out coupons for “0 yuan milk tea”.
Taobao Flash Sale released coupons promising “20 yuan (US$2.79) off for orders above 25 yuan”, according to the Shanghai-based news outlet IT Times.
The rock-bottom prices sparked a weekend buying frenzy as eager customers cashed in on the bargains. Some filled their refrigerators with beverages while others capitalised on the situation to place large advance orders.
