Shuli Ren, Columnist

How to Make Billions Selling $1 Lemonade

Mixue is a fast-growing cash cow, banking on China's shifting labor dynamics to take on the likes of McDonald’s and Starbucks.

March 17, 2025 at 9:00 PM UTC

By Shuli Ren

Shuli Ren is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Asian markets. A former investment banker, she was a markets reporter for Barron’s. She is a CFA charterholder.

A winning business model.
Photographer: Na Bian/Bloomberg

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One can become a billionaire selling ice cream, lemonade and fruit smoothies — all for less than $1. Zhang Hongchao and Zhang Hongfu, two brothers who founded China’s largest freshly made drinks chain, are making a fortune by taking advantage of China’s fast-shifting labor dynamics.

Mixue Group’s blockbuster HK$3.5 billion ($444 million) public listing is a marvel for a difficult food and beverage industry where even the likes of Starbucks Corp. and McDonald’s Corp. are revamping their operations. With its share price surging, the Zhang brothers are now richer than Starbucks’ founder Howard Schultz.