Un diálogo con Zhang Hongji, director ejecutivo de Lian Coffee: ¡La ambición corporativa de utilizar café preenvasado para reconocer la libertad del café!

Pre-Packaged Coffee Strategy

Lian Coffee and the Ambition to Recreate the Cafe Experience

In a 2021 interview, Lian Coffee CEO Zhang Hongji described a shift toward pre-packaged products designed to make coffee more widely available while retaining elements of the cafe experience. The case offers useful lessons about product format, brand consistency, packaging performance, distribution, and the realistic role of IML decoration.

The original Honokage article introduced Lian Coffee’s ambition to “restore the store experience” through pre-packaged coffee. It referred to a 2021 dialogue with CEO Zhang Hongji, the brand’s years of exploration, its interest in reaching smaller cities, the role of ready-to-use coffee products, and the possible use of in-mold labeling for coffee cups and capsule-style containers.

That core story is worth preserving, but its date matters. The interview described a strategy at a particular stage in Lian Coffee’s development; it should not be presented as a verified statement of the company’s current ownership, leadership, channel mix, sales, or packaging specifications. This updated article treats it as a 2021 business case and expands the packaging lessons that remain useful to coffee brands today.

The 2021 Context: From Delivery to Packaged Coffee

According to the published interview, Lian Coffee’s early model grew around coffee delivery and the idea that coffee should be available wherever consumers needed it. The brand later developed its own products and physical locations. After a period of store closures, it restarted online operations in the fourth quarter of 2020 and described pre-packaged products as a new way to deliver the brand rather than a complete rejection of its earlier mission.

The interview framed the transition as the result of roughly seven years of learning about consumers, occasions, products, and digital communication. Instead of limiting coffee consumption to offices and cafes in major cities, the company wanted formats that could reach homes, convenience channels, e-commerce customers, and lower-tier markets. Its 2021 portfolio discussions included concentrated coffee, freeze-dried or powdered products, drip coffee, capsules, and ready-to-drink possibilities.

The strategic idea was broader than replacing a cup from a cafe with a packet from a warehouse. Lian Coffee argued that packaged products needed to translate the flavor, aroma, ritual, tone, and social meaning associated with a cafe. In practical terms, that means the product formula, brewing or mixing method, portion, package, instructions, price, and distribution channel must create one coherent experience.

What Does “Cafe Experience” Mean in a Package?

A cafe experience contains sensory and emotional elements that packaging cannot reproduce on its own. Fresh grinding, extraction, milk texture, temperature, aroma release, service, and atmosphere all contribute. A pre-packaged product therefore needs to decide which parts of that experience are essential and which can be translated into a more convenient format.

The package also needs to set honest expectations. A concentrated espresso product may help consumers build an Americano or latte at home, but the label should explain the serving size, dilution, temperature, milk ratio, storage, and use after opening. A powder-based product may emphasize portability and consistency rather than claim to be identical to a freshly extracted cafe drink.

Match the Coffee Format to the Packaging Job

Pre-packaged coffee is not one packaging category. Ground coffee, capsules, freeze-dried powder, liquid concentrate, refrigerated drinks, shelf-stable beverages, and multi-serve mixes face different risks. Aroma retention, oxygen exposure, moisture, light, heat, seal integrity, portion control, opening convenience, and preparation instructions must be prioritized according to the product.

Where IML Can Support Coffee Packaging

The original Honokage article stated that Lian Coffee intended to use in-mold labeling for coffee cups and capsule-style plastic containers. Publicly available versions of the 2021 interview explain the pre-packaged strategy, but they do not provide a technical packaging specification confirming which products, suppliers, resins, barriers, or IML structures were commercially adopted. The IML statement should therefore be read as the original article’s packaging interpretation rather than a verified current procurement fact.

For suitable rigid plastic cups, tubs, lids, and secondary containers, IML can still offer practical benefits. A preprinted label is placed in the mold and integrated with the plastic during injection molding. This can support broad, high-resolution graphics, flavor differentiation, durable decoration, preparation instructions, and automated production. Honokage’s in-mold labeling overview explains the process.

IML decoration does not automatically provide the oxygen, moisture, aroma, or light barrier required by a coffee product. Nor does it prove seal integrity or shelf life. Those functions depend on the complete package structure, including the container resin, label, barrier layer if used, lidding material, seal, closure, headspace, filling process, storage, and distribution conditions. Product and package must be validated together.

Brand Architecture Across Multiple Coffee Products

A pre-packaged strategy often produces many SKUs: black coffee, latte, oat-based drinks, flavored concentrates, drip bags, capsules, and seasonal releases. Packaging should make the master brand recognizable while helping consumers quickly identify format, flavor, intensity, serving method, caffeine information where applicable, and pack size.

Build a repeatable visual system. Keep the logo position, product category, preparation panel, storage instructions, barcode, date-code area, and legal information consistent. Use controlled colors, names, and imagery to distinguish flavors and formats. For IML parts, approve artwork on a molded sample because corners, tapers, seams, surface texture, and label placement can change how a flat design appears.

Packaging can also continue the social dimension described in the interview. Limited editions, collaborations, consumer-created artwork, gifting, and shareable preparation rituals may help the pack become more than a storage vessel. These ideas work best when they are connected to a clear product benefit rather than used as decoration without relevance.

Food-Contact, Seal, and Shelf-Life Validation

Coffee packaging buyers should request documentation for every relevant component: resin, label film, inks, coatings, pigments, additives, lidding foil or film, sealant, closure, and any barrier layer. The intended conditions of use should reflect the real product, fat content, acidity, alcohol if present, filling temperature, storage temperature, and contact time.

El U.S. FDA explains food-contact substances and intended uses. Requirements vary by destination market, so buyers should confirm the applicable legal framework and migration testing. Honokage’s food packaging standards guide offers additional procurement context.

Shelf life must be established with the final product and final package. Monitor sensory quality, aroma, oxidation, moisture, color, separation, microbial criteria where relevant, seal integrity, and package interaction across the intended storage period. Accelerated work may support development, but it should be correlated with realistic storage and distribution evidence.

Distribution Beyond Major Cities

Reaching smaller cities and new channels changes the packaging brief. The pack may travel farther, pass through more handling points, remain in warehouses longer, and encounter greater temperature or humidity variation. E-commerce also introduces parcel drops, mixed loads, and limited orientation control. A package designed only for a local cafe counter may not be ready for this route.

Test the sale unit, inner pack, case, and pallet as a system. Useful checks include seal strength, leakage, vibration, drops, compression, scuffing, coding, barcode scanning, and temperature cycling. The International Safe Transit Association provides a useful starting point for distribution-focused package design. Honokage’s packaging testing overview can support supplier discussions.

Sustainability Requires a Format-by-Format Review

There is no single environmental answer for pre-packaged coffee. A lightweight sachet, rigid capsule, multi-serve tub, concentrate bottle, and ready-to-drink cup use different amounts and combinations of material. Their product protection, serving efficiency, transport weight, recycling routes, and potential for product waste also differ.

A PP container with a compatible PP-based IML label may support a simpler material design, but the lid, foil, seal, barrier, pigment, residue, size, and local collection system affect recyclability. Claims should be specific to the final package and target market. Compare packaging per serving, product waste, transport density, manufacturing scrap, and realistic end-of-life options rather than relying on the IML process alone.

Coffee Packaging RFQ Checklist

Zhang Hongji’s 2021 discussion remains a useful example of how a coffee brand can think beyond physical stores. Pre-packaged coffee can expand access, occasions, and distribution, but the strongest strategy begins with the product experience and then chooses packaging that protects and communicates it. IML may be valuable for decorated rigid formats, yet the formula, barrier, seal, preparation, compliance, logistics, and shelf-life evidence must carry the rest of the promise.

Preguntas frecuentes

When did Lian Coffee describe its pre-packaged strategy?

The interviews and business reports discussed in this article were published in 2021. They should be read as a historical strategy case, not an automatic description of the company’s current operations.

What did “cafe freedom” mean in the interview?

It referred to making coffee more widely accessible through pre-packaged products while trying to retain recognizable elements of cafe flavor, ritual, quality, and brand experience.

Did Lian Coffee officially confirm using IML packaging?

The original Honokage article stated that IML would be used, but the public 2021 interview sources reviewed here do not provide a detailed packaging specification confirming commercial adoption.

Can IML preserve coffee aroma by itself?

No. Aroma and freshness depend on the complete barrier and seal system, product formulation, headspace, filling, storage, and distribution. IML mainly provides integrated decoration unless a validated barrier structure is specifically designed.

What should be tested for a coffee capsule or portion cup?

Check dimensions, machine compatibility, lidding seal, puncture and extraction behavior, barrier, dose, coding, migration requirements, shelf life, and transport performance.

Which coffee format is best for wider distribution?

There is no universal answer. The brand should compare sensory target, preparation, storage, shelf life, transport, channel, price, serving size, and packaging impact for each format.

References and Further Reading

FBIF interview republished on LinkedIn: Lian Coffee’s pre-packaged coffee ambition and Zhang Hongji interview

Morketing, May 2021: Dialogue with Lian Coffee CEO Zhang Hongji

Beijing News, May 2021: Lian Coffee retail business and pre-packaged product formats

U.S. Food and Drug Administration: Food packaging and food-contact substances

International Safe Transit Association: Getting started with package design and testing

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