Introduction:When the office building management invited tenants to vote for the on-site coffee brand, a real-life market competition unfolded. A commercial office building in Beijing recently held a time-limited vote, allowing employees to decide which chain coffee brand would set up shop. Manner, Luckin, and Peet’s battled it out, with results showing Manner and Luckin nearly tied in support, while Peet’s lagged slightly due to its higher price. This article analyzes the consumer preferences behind the vote and explores the actual strengths and weaknesses of the different brands, helping readers understand the coffee choices of urban office workers.

For busy office workers, popping into a coffee shop within the building for a pick-me-up and then returning to their desk is already part of their daily routine. It’s precisely because of this steady demand for coffee that many commercial office buildings include the introduction of well-known coffee brands as a key element in their commercial planning.

Recently, the property management of an office building in Beijing was preparing to open a coffee shop within the building. Faced with numerous popular chain brands on the market, the management found it difficult to make a decision. To better align with tenant preferences, they specially organized a time-limited voting event, allowing users to personally vote for their preferred brand and participate in the decision-making process.

The competing brands in this round included Manner, Luckin, and Peet’s, each with their own supporters within the office community. The voting method combined both physical and online participation: users in the building could collect coffee bean-shaped stickers and place them under the candidate brand they supported on the notice board, or participate in the online vote via the property’s official WeChat public account and related notifications. Staff tallied the votes daily and presented the results transparently. The brand with the highest cumulative votes over five days would likely be selected to open a store in the building.

This uniquely themed “brand talent show” quickly garnered attention from many office workers. Some particularly enthusiastic employees even frequently visited the lobby to check the real-time vote counts, concerned about whether their preferred brand was leading.

Judging by the currently available voting results, although Peet’s is regarded by many coffee enthusiasts as a symbol of “high quality,” its relatively high prices and average overall cost-performance led to a significant lag in votes—only a fraction of the numbers for the other two brands. In the eyes of many observers, Peet’s has almost no chance of turning the tide, with some even directly commenting that, based on the data trends, Peet’s may have already dropped out of the competition early.

As for the two most fiercely contested brands, Manner and Luckin, each has a solid base of supporters. Many loyal Luckin customers pointed out that the brand’s signature 9.9-yuan coffee is both affordable and diverse. In addition to classic coffee options, it also offers a range of tea beverages, meeting the varied tastes and budgets of building occupants with high practicality.

However, consumers who are more focused on the essence of coffee and brewing flexibility generally find Manner more appealing in terms of cost-performance. Some users shared that by purchasing a 5-yuan Manner espresso and adding their own milk or water back at their desk, they can easily prepare a latte tailored to their personal taste. Additionally, if the future Manner outlet also offers baked goods, it could address breakfast needs as well, combining practicality and convenience.

Nevertheless, looking at the actual vote count trends, the gap between Manner and Luckin is extremely narrow, with the competition in a heated phase. According to one user who has been closely tracking the votes, “Manner lost 2 out of the last 4 days, with a total vote deficit of 40.” This indicates that support for the two is alternating, with no clear dominant winner yet.

Following this news, some die-hard Manner fans began taking active steps—not only mobilizing colleagues to help boost votes, but some even joked about “manually adjusting the stickers” themselves in hopes of securing more support for their favorite brand. This semi-joking level of engagement also reflects how much office workers value their daily coffee choices.

Although the voting event attracted significant attention, many netizens rationally pointed out that even if a particular brand ends up with the highest votes, it may still be influenced by factors such as lease negotiations and brand expansion strategies. Therefore, it will still take some time before we know which brand will ultimately succeed in setting up shop in the building.

The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.