Taiwanese bubble tea giant CoCo eyes more outlets next year

Kritapone Dabbaransi, chief executive officer of Food and Drink International, which currently runs 16 CoCo outlets in Thailand, said the company plans to continue expanding its stores in the country by at least 4-5 outlets in 2015. The expansion will continue to focus on the Bangkok area.

After less than three years in the Thai market, Coco has taken a lead with a 30-per-cent share of the middle to high-end segment, and holds No 3 position in the 

overall market. This achievement has come despite a proliferation of bubble tea brands in the market, he said. 

“CoCo has No 1 market share among the five major foreign brands competing in the market. Furthermore, we are the only brand from Taiwan where bubble tea originated,” said Kritapone.

The company has geared up a Bt5-million budget to launch a new marketing campaign dubbed as “Mystery Drinks” every Friday of this month. It is introducing three new drinks during the rest of this month at all 16 branches. The first 50 customers who line up to see the unveiling of the new menu each week, will be given a free drink. 

“Most of Coco’s customers are medium to high-end ones and tourists who know the brand well. During this month of celebration to the new year when there are a lot of travellers visiting the country, we have decided to launch the campaign,” he said.

Most of Coco branches situated in tourist spots such as Siam Paragon, Siam Square One, Asiatique, Platinum, Union Mall, Victory Monument, Lotus On Nut, Lotus Ram Indra. 

“We usually hold a campaign to arouse the market every year but last year, due to the political situation, we had no campaign [but] now it’s a good time to stir the market again,” said Kritapone.

CoCo is confident the campaign will help increase sales by 15-20 per cent since it had been proven successful in Taiwan where CoCo’s Facebook Fanpage has risen 60 per cent. 

“Thais are among the world’s top Facebook users,” said Kritapone.

CoCo will spend another Bt3 million to stimulate the market toward April 2015 through two additional campaigns comprising a lucky draw for prizes on the Coco Thailand’s Fanpage and a voucher giveaway for free drinks campaign. These three campaigns altogether are expected to help boost the firm’s sales revenue by at least 20 per cent, he said.

The company currently has an annual sales revenue of about Bt40 million.

“Our outstanding point is that we are a bubble tea coming 100 per cent from Taiwan, including its raw materials, production process, equipment, service, hygiene and new menus developed every three months. Furthermore, the tastes are exactly the same as in Taiwan which makes it easy to attract customers who have been familiar with and like the CoCo drinks in Taiwan,” he said.

CoCo has 1,900 branches worldwide, including more than 1,500 in China, and over 300 in Taiwan.