Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/491368
76 STiR tea & coffee industry international By Larry Luxner TAIPEI, Taiwan — Mention a traditional Taiwanese beverage, and tea — not coffee — comes to mind. Yet coffee consumption is ramping up here as local chains battle Starbucks and other global rivals for business across this freewheeling, coffee-gulping island nation of 23 million. One of the most successful companies in this booming sector is Mr. Brown Coffee, based in the capital of Taipei. Mr. Brown is a subsidiary of Taiwan's King Car Food Industrial Co. Ltd., which besides ready-to-drink coffee also produces dietary fiber beverages, instant noodles, and various brands of whisky. Recently, STiR Tea & Coffee caught up with Yi-Ling Wu, chief of King Car's re- search and development division; she also heads the 300-member Taiwan Coffee As- sociation. "When our company was launched in 1980, Taiwanese people weren't drinking coffee, only tea health drinks," Wu explained. "Our president, Tian Tsai Lee, wanted to create a coffee product, so the marketing people had to think of a name. They thought, 'coffee is black, sugar and cream are white, and mixing them together is brown.'" Nostalgia also helped the company settle on not only its name, but its mascot too, turning the ubiquitous bearded Mr. Brown — in his white suit and Panama hat — into the Taiwanese equivalent of Colombia's Juan Valdéz. "When we learn English, our first lesson is 'Good morning, sir. This is Mr. Brown. This is Mrs. White. So everybody already knows who Mr. Brown was," she said. "That's why we named the company Mr. Brown Coffee." From that humble beginning, Mr. Brown has grown to 68 retail outlets across Taiwan. It began exporting to the United States in 1986 and in 2008 expanded its retail operations to mainland China, where it now has two shops, both in Shanghai. In Taiwan, Mr. Brown commands a 65% share of the NT$5 billion ($US167 mil- lion) market for RTD (ready-to-drink) canned coffee. King Car, the parent company, reports annual sales of around NT$10 billion ($335 million). Coffee accounts for roughly 50% of the total. Whisky sales make up 25% and Mr. Brown Coffee: Taiwan's local answer to Starbucks Above, roasts are carefully calibrated and checked for consistency. Green cofffee distributon system, below.