Vietnam's F&B companies remain upbeat despite downturn

A Mixue store. Vietnamese consumers could continue to spend in F&B with a tendency of choosing products with more reasonable prices. — diendandoanhnghiep.vn

HANOI (Xinhua): While worries about a possible recession have led to shrinking consumer buying power, the food and beverage businesses in Vietnam remain optimistic about their performance this year, Vietnam News reported on Monday (June 5).

Helped by low franchising fees, Chinese Mixue, whose snowman-logo shops sell ice cream, bubble tea, and a variety of drinks, has reached 1,000 locations in Vietnam over the past five years, far ahead of other foreign and homegrown brands that had previously dominated the market.

Economic jitters seemed to have also failed to dilute the coffee habits of Vietnamese customers as coffee chain Highland Coffee's store count has grown 63.5 per cent from 2021 to around 600 shops; Trung Nguyen has almost doubled its stores to 620 from only 308 stores in early 2021.

Tea and coffee chain Phuc Long, owned by Vietnamese retail giant Masan Group, has expanded quickly from 80 stores in 2021 to more than 900 stores, including 132 flagship stores and more than 770 kiosks through a network of supermarkets and convince stores nationwide.

Unlike the business strategy amid a recession when companies rely on its low-priced menu to retain consumers, tea and coffee chains plan to ride out the expected economic downturn using digital orders and delivery, according to a survey by iPOS.vn, a provider of software and hardware solutions in the field of restaurant and cafe management.

The report noted that 82.8 per cent of food and beverage companies in Vietnam have embarked on digital transformation.

Vietnam's food and beverage market has recovered significantly from the Covid-19 pandemic, hitting revenue of 610 trillion dongs (US$25.7 billion) in 2022, up 139 per cent from a year ago, according to iPOS.vn.

The industry is forecast to expand at 18 per cent this year, and the market size will hit 1,000 trillion dongs ($42.2 billion) in 2026.

A study by market research company Euromonitor showed that Vietnam's bubble tea market has been expanding at around 20 percent per year.

Securities company Viet Dragon forecast the food and beverage industry will blossom in the second half of the year and that consumers would continue to be price-sensitive, thus sticking with products at an affordable price.

The recovery of the tourism sector is reported to also aid the industry, said Viet Dragon Securities.

According to market research company BMI, the spending of Vietnamese households would be on an upward trend in 2022-2025.

Vietnamese consumers are spending 35 percent of their monthly expenditure on food and beverage, said the research firm.