SHENZHEN ranked the top in China in terms of the number of coffee-related enterprises, according to database query platform Tianyancha, Shenzhen Economic Daily reported.

Shenzhen is home to more than 10,000 enterprises engaging in coffee-related business, with 1,500 new firms established last year.

In recent years, Shenzhen’s coffee market has been remarkably developing, driven by changing beverage preferences of the city’s white-collar workers. These workers commonly start their day with coffee in the morning and have another one in the afternoon to improve working efficiency.

Multinational professional services company Deloitte’s “White Paper on China’s Freshly Brewed Coffee Industry” showed that first- and second-tier cities have a coffee penetration rate of 67 percent, which is equivalent to their tea penetration rate. Habitual coffee drinkers in first- and second-tier cities consume an average of 300 cups a year, near the level of mature markets.

Tianyancha’s data showed that during the past decade, the number of coffee companies getting registered has grown year by year in China. The number exceeded 10,000 in 2012 and 20,000 in 2015. The number of the country’s coffee-related enterprises is over 150,000, with Guangdong, Yunnan and Jiangsu provinces having the most with 34,000, 13,000 and 10,000, respectively.

From Nestle’s instant coffee entering China in the 1980s to Starbucks opening its first shop in the 1990s, to online-to-offline (O2O) shops like Luckin Coffee and Coffee Box, as well as new popular, high-quality cafes like Manner and Saturnbird, China now has a 50-year coffee history, with coffee becoming a regular drink in the country.

Meanwhile, investors consider coffee-related businesses as one of their top choices. Tianyancha data showed that the coffee market has seen 21 financings in China this year, with a total capital of over 4.6 billion yuan (US$711 million).  (Xia Yuanjie)