American coffee chain Starbucks has opened a ‘silent cafe’ in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, in which nearly half of the staff are hearing-impaired, as part of an initiative to support the employment for people with disabilities.
Currently, Seattle-based Starbucks dominates China’s coffee scene and has over 3,800 stores in the country. The shop has a specially-designed ordering system that allows people to place orders without saying a word. Starbucks is the single largest coffee chain in China.
However, Chinese coffee brand Luckin Coffee, established in 2017, has quickly become the second largest coffee chain in China after Starbucks. This ambitious brand aims to have 4,500 stores throughout the country by the end of this year, surpassing Starbucks, which has over 3800 branches on the streets of 150 Chinese cities two decades after it arrived in China.
