In a partnership that has the potential to benefit both the parties involved, WeChat users in China can now commemorate special occasions or act on an impulse to gift their friends with coffee from Starbucks. The service is available to WeChat users residing in mainland China.
The workings of the new add-on are pretty simple. Users can avail a setting available inside the WeChat (or Weixin, as its more popularly known) to send Coffee or one of the other drinks offered by Starbucks to their friends. The recipient can simply show the gift (which is received in-app) at any Starbucks outlet to receive it.
WeChat, which is the most popular messaging service in China, has come a long way from being a mere medium of communication. In contrast to its global peers like WhatsApp, WeChat offers a range of in-app features to its users. The different services that can be availed through its platform include e-commerce, taxi-hailing, payments and now, piping hot coffee.
This particular partnership between one of the world’s largest chains and WeChat was announced back in December. It uses an already available WeChat pay partnership and interestingly, also marks the first time that a global brand has linked arms with China’s most popular messaging service to exploit the vast potential market.
Gifting is a big thing in China. People gift stuff to others on all sorts of occasions — including the new year. The last festive season for example, saw users of the messaging service exchange over over 14 billion red wallets. In case you are wondering, the red wallets are how WeChat digitalized the pre-existing tradition of gifting cash strapped red envelopes among the Chinese.
Adding Coffee from Starbucks, which holds the status of one of the most premium outlets in its category in Asia, will provide WeChat users with yet another option to share some cheer. While the app is arguably the most popular one in its category, it is facing increasing competition from rivals — a list that includes Alibaba’s Alipay service that has over 400 million users in its own right.
Meanwhile, Starbucks will be hoping to leverage WeChat’s huge audience base that spans well over 750 million users, to popularize its own brand in China. Even apart from the sales made through the messaging application, the partnership will result in more footfalls to Starbucks outlets spread across the country.
