Mixue Bingcheng is not just a story of the 'small-town youth' making a comeback.

Driven by the popularity of Labubu, the founder of Pop Mart, Wang Ning, became the "richest man in Henan." However, it wasn't long before his position was surpassed by the founders of Mixue Bingcheng, Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu. According to public reports from Qianjiang Evening News, on June 24, 2025, the "500 Rich List" by New Fortune magazine (hereinafter referred to as "the list") was officially released. The list shows that the founders of Mixue Bingcheng, Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu, became the richest men in Henan. According to the list, Pop Mart's Wang Ning ranked 60th, placing third among Henan's wealthy, while on Forbes' real-time rich list on June 9, Wang Ning ranked first as Henan's richest man. This news once again brought people's attention back to "Snow King" Mixue Bingcheng.

According to the latest market value data of Mixue Bingcheng, its market value is as high as 1996.79 billion HKD, just one step away from 2000 billion HKD. People always associate Mixue Bingcheng with words like low price, high frequency, and chain. In their eyes, Mixue Bingcheng is a vivid "small-town youth" success story. However, if you only see Mixue Bingcheng as such a label, you cannot truly understand the deep reasons why Mixue Bingcheng can become a leader in the new tea beverage track.

Many reports mention Zhang Hongchao's entrepreneurial journey, often referring to 1997 when, at 19, he started with 3000 yuan funded by his family. To make a delicious shaved ice, he tasted shaved ice drinks from street corners, carefully observed each shop, explored recipes, and concocted various flavors of shaved ice. After initial continuous failures, in 1999, Zhang Hongchao rented a shop in a village in the city of Zhengzhou, spent 800 yuan on a second-hand freezer, and welded a shaved ice machine with a rack and motor, restarting his entrepreneurial journey. The shop was named "Mixue Bingcheng," representing "sweetness" and "coolness," and the world's largest freshly made beverage company started from here.

In the author's view, Mixue Bingcheng started from a shaved ice stall and has become a true leader in the industry, which actually has its unique aspects. Recognizing these unique aspects may allow us to truly grasp the internal logic of Mixue Bingcheng's development, and we can have a clearer and more comprehensive understanding of why Mixue Bingcheng became "Snow King." However, one thing can be confirmed: Mixue Bingcheng is definitely not a "small-town youth" success story, but has a deeper internal logic.

Mixue Bingcheng has found a new traffic password

Whether for internet players or offline physical merchants like Mixue Bingcheng, one important reason for commercial success is finding their own traffic password. Reviewing Mixue Bingcheng's development, one important reason it grew from a shaved ice stall to a company with a market value of nearly 2000 billion HKD is that it found a new traffic password.

So, what is Mixue Bingcheng's new traffic password? In my view, Mixue Bingcheng's focus on the sinking market directly led to its success. We all know that for many new tea beverage brands, their main battleground is actually in the markets of first- and second-tier cities. When new tea beverage brands are hot, using "close combat" to describe the competitive situation in the new tea beverage market of first- and second-tier cities is not an exaggeration.

Data shows that from 2019 to 2023, the market size of China's new tea beverage industry grew from 65.9 billion yuan to 149.8 billion yuan, and it is expected to reach 179.3 billion yuan in 2024, with a year-on-year growth of 19.7%. In terms of store scale and revenue, Mixue Bingcheng and Gu Ming sit firmly in the top two positions in the industry. According to relevant information, as of September 2023, Mixue Bingcheng has 36,000 stores in China and overseas in 11 countries, with over 99.8% of stores being franchise stores, and over 57% of stores concentrated in third-tier and below cities, with the highest proportion in third-tier cities. There are about 5000 overseas stores, with a daily cup volume of over 650 cups per store, and the operating profit per store is about 26,000 yuan, with a profit margin of about 25%; by the end of 2023, Gu Ming has over 9000 stores, has entered 15 provinces and about 200 cities in China, and in terms of single-store operating data, Gu Ming's single-store operating profit reached 376,000 yuan in 2023, achieving a single-store operating profit margin of 20.2%.

From the above data, we can see that when players in the new tea beverage track focus their attention on first- and second-tier cities, Mixue Bingcheng focuses its main attention on third-tier and below cities. In such a blue ocean, Mixue Bingcheng found a new traffic password for its product characteristics. Low price, high frequency, and high repurchase rate have become the most obvious characteristics of Mixue Bingcheng's traffic password to support its business model. Therefore, if you only see Mixue Bingcheng as a "small-town youth" success story, you have not grasped the internal logic of Mixue Bingcheng's development. It found a new traffic password for its own characteristics, which is the internal reason why it can grow rapidly and reach such a large scale today.

Mixue Bingcheng has found a new profit model

When we look at Mixue Bingcheng, we cannot just focus on its products priced below 10 yuan, nor can we question whether such low prices make money, but we need to focus more on the products beyond Mixue Bingcheng, and more on the front and back ends of the industry. It is no exaggeration to say that Mixue Bingcheng's real profit point is not in the products purchased by consumers themselves, but in the front-end product chain and back-end supply chain that link these products. In other words, Mixue Bingcheng's profit point is in the front and back ends of the products.

We can see a hint of this from Mixue Bingcheng's prospectus when it was listed. According to the prospectus, Mixue Bingcheng's profit mainly comes from the wholesale sales of goods and equipment. Data shows that as of the first three quarters of 2024, "goods and equipment sales" accounted for 97% of total revenue. This means that most of the revenue does not come from direct sales in stores, but from the "supplier" role of providing raw materials and equipment to franchisees nationwide.

This profit model of Mixue Bingcheng is not only reflected in its downstream franchise stores. In addition, Mixue Bingcheng's procurement in the upstream of the industry chain is also a very important profit point. According to reports, Mixue Bingcheng's procurement network covers six continents and 38 countries worldwide, with core raw materials such as lemons and milk powder procured in 2023 reaching 115,000 tons and 51,000 tons respectively, with costs 10%-20% lower than the industry under large-scale procurement. In addition to the huge procurement network, Mixue Bingcheng has five production bases with a total area of 790,000 square meters, with an annual production capacity of 1.65 million tons, covering seven categories of raw materials such as sugar, milk, and tea, with a core food self-production rate of 100%, including more than 60 intelligent production lines, automated equipment (such as Probat coffee roasters) to improve efficiency, with a stock turnover rate of 7 times (turnover days 52 days) in 2023, significantly better than the industry.

After having a stable supply chain upstream, Mixue Bingcheng also built a strong logistics and distribution network to ensure that these products can be delivered to each store at extremely low costs. Mixue Bingcheng's domestic warehousing system consists of 27 warehouses with a total area of about 350,000 square meters, the largest in the industry. To support overseas business, localized warehousing systems have been established in four Southeast Asian countries, including seven self-operated warehouses with a total area of about 69,000 square meters. In terms of distribution services, the company mainly cooperates with localized distribution service agencies to provide distribution services for franchisees in mainland China and beyond, with about 40 localized distribution service agencies in mainland China.

Therefore, if we summarize and define Mixue Bingcheng's profit model, its main profit point is not just the thousands of stores selling cups of milk tea and lemonade, but the industry chain and supply chain that Mixue Bingcheng has established, connecting the upstream and downstream of the industry. It can be said that it is precisely because Mixue Bingcheng has innovated such a new profit model that it can stand out in the new tea beverage track, digest the industry chain and supply chain through scale, and thus find a new development path of its own.

Mixue Bingcheng has found a new imagination space for "milk tea +"

Through Mixue Bingcheng's development, we can see that the milk tea, lemonade, ice cream, and other products made by Mixue Bingcheng are actually more of a medium, more of a connection point. Mixue Bingcheng mainly uses these products to achieve connections with more external products, thus finding new imagination space for its own development. Therefore, if we look for the key reason for Mixue Bingcheng's success, it is based on new tea beverages, but not just new tea beverages, which is the key to its continuous release of new imagination space.

We all know that Mixue Bingcheng has incubated the "Snow King" IP. In 2018, it launched the "Mixue Bingcheng" brand's lifetime spokesperson - "Snow King," a cartoon character holding an ice cream scepter and looking cute. Since its launch, "Snow King" has been loved by fans for its honest, friendly, enthusiastic, and enterprising personality. Through years of content creation and IP operation, "Snow King" has become the only super IP in China's freshly made beverage industry, distinguishing the Mixue brand from other brands. Through the "Snow King" IP, we can see that Mixue Bingcheng is not just doing the milk tea business in physical stores, but also extending its reach to the virtual cultural realm dominated by cultural derivatives.

In addition to the "Snow King" IP image, Mixue Bingcheng has a larger imagination space in that each of its offline stores is actually a huge product display space. Now, we can see many derivative snacks, toys, and other series of derivatives from Mixue Bingcheng in many of its stores. At this time, Mixue Bingcheng's stores are no longer just places to sell milk tea in the pure sense, but have become one product exhibition space after another.

It can be said that the new development model led by "milk tea +" is allowing Mixue Bingcheng to find new development breakthroughs and open new imagination space for Mixue Bingcheng. From this perspective, Mixue Bingcheng is not just a milk tea brand, but a new industrial form with "milk tea" as the main medium. This new industrial form is the key to Mixue Bingcheng's ability to bring continuous imagination to people.

Conclusion

When mentioning Mixue Bingcheng, people always associate it with words like sinking market and small-town youth. In fact, the reason why Mixue Bingcheng can stand out from such a fiercely competitive market is not just a small-town youth success story, but a new business paradigm. Through Mixue Bingcheng, we can see new traffic passwords, new business models, and new imagination space. When we no longer see it as just a milk tea brand, when we no longer see it as just milk tea in the pure sense, when we no longer focus on the front end of Mixue Bingcheng, but more on the back end of the industry chain and supply chain, we may be able to understand a new Mixue Bingcheng.