Luckin Coffee passes Starbucks in outlet numbers
March 25, 2022
The controversy-ridden Chinese coffee shop chain Luckin Coffee opened 1,221 new stores last year, a 25.4% year-on-year increase and taking their total number of outlets to over 6,000, surpassing Starbucks’ 5,358 locations in the country, reports Caixin. The company also disclosed sharply higher sales and a narrower loss in its first earnings report since the disgraced Chinese startup paid $180 million to settle fraud charges in the US last month.
The Starbucks China challenger said Thursday its revenue in the fourth quarter increased 80.7% to RMB 2.4 billion ($381.7 million) while the operating loss narrowed to RMB 120.8 million from RMB 488.9 million in the same period in 2020.
In fiscal year 2021, total revenue nearly doubled to RMB 8 billion and the operating loss reduced to RMB 539.1 million from RMB 2.6 billion in 2020.