Dangdang Founder Li Guoqing Questions Luckin's Monopoly in Coffee Bean Market! Is Luckin Coffee's Guetia 5.0 Coffee Bean Authentic?

Yesterday afternoon, Li Guoqing, founder of Dangdang, posted the same video on Douyin, Xiaohongshu, and Weibo with titles respectively: "Listen to Old Li's advice, specialty coffee is not for you," "Luckin Coffee, what exactly are you trying to do?" and "Luckin introduces Guifei, Old Li is very angry! Today I must publicly diss Luckin on behalf of all friends who drink specialty pour-over coffee nationwide. You're a seller of mass-market coffee, stop having those bad thoughts of 'monopolizing' specialty beans!"

Let's start by reviewing Luckin Coffee's latest coffee bean purchase agreement signed on December 21, 2021. In the agreement, Luckin Coffee committed to purchasing over 3,000 tons of high-quality Ethiopian green coffee beans in Ethiopia during the first quarter of 2022, including 2,000 tons of specialty-grade Yirgacheffe and 80 tons of Sidamo Guifei coffee beans. For details, you can revisit the Coffee Workshop report: "Luckin signed a super big order! Will Luckin become the largest buyer of Guifei coffee beans in China?!"

On January 4th, Luckin Coffee launched its Little Black Cup · SOE Guifei 5.0 series nationwide, introducing multiple new products including Guifei 5.0 · Americano, Guifei 5.0 · Latte, Guifei 5.0 · Flat White, and Guifei 5.0 · Raw Coconut Latte.

The news immediately attracted attention from industry insiders. Both coffee industry practitioners and coffee brewing enthusiasts expressed that Luckin was wasting precious resources! They questioned whether Luckin Coffee was intentionally disrupting the market, not choosing just any coffee beans, but specifically selecting Guifei coffee beans, which have an annual total output of only over 1,000 tons.

According to data, the agreement signed by Luckin Coffee this time involves purchasing over 80 tons directly from the origin within a quarter (3 months), which already accounts for a significant portion of what enters China. This made Li Guoqing, known as the "Cannon," unable to sit still!

In his video, Li Guoqing said: "Old Li is going to publicly diss Luckin Coffee today! A friend of mine who runs a coffee shop knows I like to drink pour-over coffee, so he complained to me that good beans are becoming increasingly difficult to buy! And prices have risen a lot! At first, I thought it was due to the pandemic, until I saw Luckin's official new product push for 'Guifei Dirty' on the morning of January 5th. The whole of China imports only over 100 tons of Guifei coffee beans from Africa annually, and they alone bought out over 90 tons. First, I don't know if this is bragging, and Old Li doesn't want to help you with advertising, but Old Li thinks, isn't Luckin engaging in monopolization?"

*It's unclear whether the 90+ tons of Guifei coffee beans mentioned by Luckin in the video was a slip of the tongue by Li Guoqing or if there's newer data. Luckin has not yet officially announced how many Guifei coffee beans they will ultimately purchase in the first quarter of 2022.*

Immediately following, Li Guoqing continued in his video: "The so-called, of course so-called, upstream supply chain has already been invisibly monopolized. You (referring to Luckin Coffee) doing business this way will definitely leave those who truly drink pour-over coffee, those who make specialty coffee, and those who run coffee shops without beans to drink or beans to use, or with beans becoming extremely expensive." (At the same time, he didn't forget to promote his own Dangdang, stating that he had been in business for so long without thinking about monopolizing the source.)

(Continuing video content) "You Luckin, with your chain brand of over 5,000 stores, it's perfectly fine to use blended beans for your chain business. Other chain businesses don't deal with specialty beans, so why are you doing this? To disrupt the market? Who can tell the difference! Does it make any difference whether your Raw Coconut Latte uses specialty beans or not? Isn't this just wasting high-quality resources? In the end, those who truly make pour-over and drink specialty coffee won't be able to get them. Isn't this putting the cart before the horse?"

(Still continuing video content) "Actually, specialty coffee requires a sense of ritual. I know a little bit about coffee beans like Guifei. It's best to make Dirty yourself through pour-over and finish with latte art or something—that's what truly respects this coffee. Just like brewing tea, only with attention to detail can you do justice to good tea leaves. So Luckin, did you understand what I said? You should leave these good beans for those who can understand and appreciate them to drink."

By this point, netizens were already confused about what nonsense he was talking about... The bullet comments section went from initial agreement... to eventually questioning whether he had thought through what he was saying. From initial overwhelming support to final overwhelming doubt, many netizens' final reactions were either "Who are you looking down on?" or "Why can't chain coffee stores use good coffee beans to make good coffee for consumers? Such a bizarre viewpoint." Some netizens even joked: "Welcome everyone to watch how Old Li successfully fails with his experience."

Old Li's words also made many netizens wonder whether negative traffic is still traffic, and traffic means viewership, and viewership equals publicity. Therefore, some netizens commented: "A cultured person is always cultured—even their marketing can be so refreshingly unconventional."

In recent years, more and more people have transformed coffee from a "fashion label" into a daily beverage, but the gradual path of "popularization" has failed to shake the persistent chain of contempt in the coffee world: pour-over > hang-drip > americano > milk coffee > instant. As for why netizens reacted so strongly in the video comment section, a large part of the reason is that Li Guoqing, as a public figure, believes that good coffee beans should not appear in Luckin's stores but should appear in niche specialty coffee circles—this is precisely a manifestation of this chain of contempt.

"Looking at Old Li is like seeing a microcosm of the entire coffee world. Are ordinary consumers not worthy of drinking specialty coffee?" In response to this question in the comment section, I just want to say: knowing too much will get you "silenced." In reality, as Guifei's fame increases, as Li Guoqing said, the quantity entering China is not large. If orders increase, traders can simply increase their imports. In the years since Guifei won awards, it has already increased the number of processing plants and processed beans. A quantity of 80 tons really cannot monopolize anything. On the contrary, if Luckin directly purchases large quantities of beans in the market, affecting cheap bean prices, that would be the real concern.

Image source: Weibo Li Guoqing video screenshot Internet

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