TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan’s market for fresh coffee is expected to top NT$100 billion (US$3.12 billion) this year, leading to competition amongst top convenience store chains such as President Chain Store Corp. (7-Eleven), FamilyMart, and Hi-Life.

President Chain Store launched City Cafe in 2004. It hired actress Gwei Lun-Mei (桂綸鎂) to serve as a spokesperson in 2007, helping the company's coffee sales, per CNA. 

This year marks the 20th anniversary of City Cafe. The current business focuses on diversifying operations to include specialty drinks such as City Prima and City Tea.

City Cafe had NT$10 billion in revenue in 2015, topping Starbucks revenue that year. In 2023, City Cafe posted NT$17 billion in revenue which also bested Starbucks Taiwan's 2023 revenue of NT$14.98 billion.

President Chain Store said its fresh coffee sales were 40% lattes, 40% Americanos, and 20% flavored coffee. Its Sicilian-style lemon coffee, first launched in 2018, led the trend for specialty coffee drinks, with sales in this category doubling in the past three years.

FamilyMart largely followed President Chain Store in the fresh coffee market with the launch of its coffee brand, Let's Cafe, in 2006. And like President Chain Store, it also hired an actor, Mark Chao (趙又廷), to serve as brand spokesperson. Let's Cafe revenue in 2023 topped NT$7 billion.

FamilyMart told CNA that Let's Cafe competes with five major strategies: close consumption trends observation, product mix, topic management, customer management, and sustainable practices. Regarding product offerings, it has chosen to focus on classic blends and single-origin coffee.

Classic blend sales include Americanos (45%) and lattes (55%). FamilyMart was the first convenience store to launch a single-origin coffee in 2017 and currently has nine single-origin coffees.

Taiwan has experienced three different waves of coffee consumption. The first wave was 3-in-1 instant coffee, the second wave was the popularity of espressos and lattes, and the third wave was the rise of single-origin coffee.

Hi-Life, the third-largest convenience store chain, has spent heavily promoting its Hi Cafe fresh coffee business since April. It not only offers fruit-flavored coffees but other options, such as oat milk, leading revenue to grow 50% so far this year with a full-year revenue target of NT$3 billion.

According to Hi Life, in recent years consumers have been favoring strong coffees, which has increased by 50% this year. Furthermore, female customers are showing a preference for flavored coffee.