Vietnam's largest coffee chain delivers on-site in 3 minutes, a stepping stone for IPO?

Highlands Coffee has just opened its first drive-thru store in Ho Chi Minh City, a move that shows the possibility of restarting its expansion strategy towards a planned initial public offering (IPO).

Mr. David Thai (right), founder and CEO of Highlands Coffee and Mr. Mojtaba Akhbari, global operations director of Highlands Coffee - Photo: HP

The model is not unfamiliar in Vietnam.

Besides expanding scale and investing in production, can we consider the launch of this new model as a preparation step by Highlands Coffee to improve operational capacity and increase brand value before going public?

Responding to Tuoi Tre Online , Mr. David Thai, founder and CEO of Highlands Coffee, said it was too early to talk specifically about the IPO plan. However, he affirmed that both this new model and the roasting factory are part of Highlands' commitment to bringing the best quality products to Vietnamese customers as well as exporting to the world .

The drive-thru model is not unfamiliar, as it has become a consumer habit in Vietnam, where motorbikes are the main means of transportation and stopping to buy take-away coffee has become a part of people's daily lives.

Therefore, Highlands’s implementation of this model store is not simply a new business model but can be seen as a continuation of the process of service innovation. This is the direction that this brand started more than a decade ago.

In 2013, Highlands tested the self-service model at some stores. At that time, this form was quite strange and Mr. David Thai called it "scary", because Vietnamese consumers were not used to ordering at the counter and receiving drinks themselves instead of being served at the table.

However, Highlands believes that they are a pioneer, creating a trend. Reality has shown that, when from a strange model, going to the counter to order and receive drinks has gradually become a popular habit, especially in big cities, where many F&B chains also apply a similar form to optimize operations and reduce personnel costs.

Accompanying the drive-thru is the opening of a new coffee roasting plant in April 2025.

According to Mr. David Thai, all of this is part of the commitment to "bring the highest quality Vietnamese coffee products to the world and bring the best of the world to Vietnam".

Coffee is culturally connected

Coffee is a popular product globally, second only to oil in terms of trade volume. According to Mr. David Thai, what makes coffee different is not only the value of the commodity, but also the consumer culture associated with each country.

Highlands’ drive-thru model is designed to serve both sit-down customers and customers driving motorbikes or cars, with a service time of about 3 minutes. Customers can pay in cash or via online methods, with prices similar to other stores in the system.

According to Mr. Mojtaba Akhbari - global operations director of Highlands Coffee, the team had the idea of ​​implementing this model for a long time, aiming to "retain the habits that people are familiar with, but put them in a more modern structure".

Highlands Coffee is currently the coffee chain with the largest number of stores in Vietnam, with more than 900 points of sale nationwide and about 53 stores in the Philippines. The company aims to reach 1,000 stores this year.

According to Jollibee Foods Corporation's annual report, Highlands Coffee will achieve an EBITDA of more than VND1,000 billion in 2024, with total chain revenue estimated at more than VND4,600 billion. Mr. David Thai once said that Highlands accounts for more than 30% of the market share in the coffee chain segment in Vietnam and has the potential to expand its network to 9,000 - 10,000 stores in the future.

Vietnam is currently the world's largest producer of robusta coffee and ranks second globally in coffee exports, after Brazil.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment , in the first half of this year, coffee export turnover reached 5.5 billion USD, a sharp increase compared to 2.7 billion USD in the same period last year. The Ministry forecasts that coffee export turnover for the whole year could reach 7.5 billion USD; an increase of nearly 37% compared to 2024. In particular, the US continues to be an important market for Vietnam's deeply processed coffee segment, especially instant coffee and specialty coffee.

HONG PHUC

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/chuoi-ca-phe-lon-nhat-viet-nam-giao-hang-tai-cho-trong-3-phut-buoc-dem-cho-ipo-20250701234758951.htm