Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Luckin Coffee's third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen-only mode during management's prepared remarks, and there will be a question-and-answer session to follow. Please be advised that today's call is being recorded. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Ms. Nancy Song, Head of Investor Relations for Luckin Coffee. Nancy, please go ahead.
Thank you, and hello everyone. Welcome to Luckin Coffee's third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. We announced our financial results earlier today before the U.S. market opened. The earnings release is now available on our IR website and via newswire services. Today, you will hear from Dr. Guo Jinyi, co-founder and CEO of Luckin Coffee, who will share a strategic overview of our business. Following that, Ms. An Jing, our CFO, will discuss our financial results in greater detail. Afterwards, we will open up the call for questions. During today's call, we will be making some forward-looking statements regarding future events and expectations. Any statements that are not historical facts, including but not limited to statements about our beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. These statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Further information regarding these and other risks is included in our filings with the SEC.
In addition, for nugget matters discussed today, the reconciliation information related to those matters can be found in our earnings press release. During today's call, Dr. Guo will speak in Chinese, and his comments will be translated into English. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Dr. Guo Jinyi, co-founder and CEO of Luckin Coffee. Dr. Guo, please go ahead.
[Foreign language]
Hello everyone, welcome to today's earnings conference call. Thank you for your continued interest in and support of Luckin Coffee.
[Foreign language]
In the third quarter, our scale-driven strategy continued to yield strong results as we capitalized on the rapid expansion of China's freshly brewed beverage market. Our revenue continued in solid momentum, increasing by 50% year-over-year to around RMB 15.3 billion. While same-store sales growth in our self-operated stores further improved to 14.4%. During the quarter, as food delivery platforms intensified their subsidy campaigns, we saw the shift in volume share to both delivery continued at the current stage. Despite this temporary challenge, we maintained healthy profitability, achieving an operating profit of around RMB 1.8 billion.
[Foreign language]
More importantly, in response to the rising demand in China's coffee market, we accelerated our network expansion to strengthen store coverage and proactively secure white-based locations for future growth. As of the fourth quarter end, our total store count surpassed 29,000, enabling us to effectively meet robust consumer demand. Our scale advantage drove record-high new customer acquisition of 42 million, supporting a milestone achievement of over 100 million average monthly transaction customers. This scaled growth across both store print and customer base has expanded Luckin Coffee's competitive edge and market share, placing us on a stronger footing for long-term sustainable growth.
[Foreign language]
I will now share an update on our operations, and our CFO An Jing will present the financials later. This quarter, powered by Luckin's strong digital capabilities, we continued to enhance our core strengths across people, products, and places, scaling our business at a faster pace and strengthening our market leadership.
[Foreign language]
On the store front, we maintain industry-leading store growth, continuing to strengthen our presence across high-quality locations in high-tier cities while penetrating lower-tier markets. As a result, our store network continued to expand rapidly. By the end of the third quarter, Luckin's total store count reached 29,214, maintaining leadership in China's coffee market with growing customer reach and enhanced fulfillment capabilities.
[Foreign language]
Domestically, we achieved 2,979 net openings, bringing our total store count in China to 29,096, including 18,809 self-operated stores and 10,287 partnership stores, which has now surpassed the 10,000 store milestone as well. As coffee drinking habits continue to take hold and consumer demand grows strongly, China's coffee market still offers much room for growth. Leveraging Luckin's strong brand influence and data-driven site selection capabilities, we can systematically and swiftly identify customer demand, enabling us to open high-quality stores efficiently and in convenient locations that closely align with customer demand. In the foreseeable future, we will maintain a competitive pace of expansion to fully capture the structural opportunities in China's coffee market.
[Foreign language]
Internationally, we had 29 net openings this quarter, bringing our total overseas store count to 118, including 68 self-operated stores in Singapore, 5 self-operated stores in the U.S., and 45 franchise stores in Malaysia. As our first overseas market, Singapore has been steadily improving its performance and initially built a mature and efficient localized operating infrastructure. This has demonstrated the early signs that our digital business model is adaptable and replicable across diverse markets, and set an impactful benchmark for our future expansion across the Asia-Pacific region. Meanwhile, our U.S. business remains in the early stages of exploration, with performance across various areas broadly in line with our expectations and overall consumer feedback being positive. We will continue to take this point and the steady approach, accumulating local market insights and enhancing our localized operational capabilities to lay the foundation for longer long-term scalable growth.
[Foreign language]
On the product front, we launched nearly 30 new freshly brewed beverages and several snack items in the third quarter, continuously driving coffee innovation and shaping market trends. We also diversified our summer lineup with a wider selection of non-coffee options to enrich customer experience. In September, we partnered with our longtime brand ambassador, Tang Wei, to launch Luckin's Drink from Origin campaign, promoting a healthy lifestyle through high-quality, locally sourced ingredients and reinforcing our brand concept from the origin tree. For example, we launched Guanxi Honey Pomelo Latte, featuring famous Guanxi honey pomelo from Fujian Province. We also selected Axel apples from Xinjiang to upgrade our popular Apple Tea Americano and to launch our new Axel Apple Latte. These products expanded our flavored coffee portfolio and received encouraging customer feedback.
In addition, our Little Butter Series surpassed 200 million cumulative cups sold in its first year on the market, underscoring our strong product innovation capabilities and ability to set category trends, which continues to strengthen Luckin's brand leadership. On the non-coffee side, leveraging our fresh coconut sourcing advantage, we introduced the popular Mango Pomelo Sago, which sold over 12 million cups during the National Day holiday, once again demonstrating our broad customer base and strong market appeal.
[Foreign language]
On the customer front, we remained aligned with diversified and use-driven consumption trends, capturing market buzz and evolving customer preferences through engaging and emotionally resonant market campaigns. With these initiatives, we achieved impressive results in customer acquisition, engagement, and purchase frequency during the quarter. For example, we partnered with a wide range of popular IPs, such as hit movies, blockbuster games, and classic animated series, effectively reaching a broader audience, strengthening brand influence, and stimulating customer demand. Building on these efforts, we added over 42 million new transacting customers in the third quarter and achieved an average of over 110 million monthly transacting customers, both record highs. By quarter end, our cumulative transacting customer base surpassed 420 million, further strengthening our ability to cultivate a high-frequency loyal customer cohort, a key driver of our long-term high.
[Foreign language]
In addition, we remain committed to our sustainability strategy, being a force for a brighter future, and continue to fulfill our corporate social responsibilities through charitable initiatives that support communities across our upstream supply chain. To mark Luckin Coffee's eighth anniversary, we partnered with the China Red Cross Foundation's Hao Fund to launch the philanthropy Campus Health Initiative, building multiple philanthropy health centers in schools across Yunnan and Xinjiang. This program enhances campus healthcare infrastructure in coffee regions and other key sourcing regions, helping safeguard the healthy development of local youth. Moreover, as part of our ongoing focus on children's health in origin regions, we have sponsored the Angel Journey project for two consecutive years, funding screening and treatment for local children with congenital heart disease.
Moving forward, we will continue to deepen our engagement in origin communities, giving back to society through charitable efforts to build a brighter future together.
[Foreign language]
This year, fueled by food delivery platform subsidy campaigns, China's coffee industry has seen accelerated growth, with consumer demand demonstrating strong elasticity. This trend further validates the enormous potential of China's coffee market. Amid this complex environment, we have remained focused on our established growth strategy, adjusting our operations dynamically to seize emerging opportunities. As a result, we achieved faster business growth and market share gains in the third quarter, effectively meeting our strategic goals. At the same time, as temperatures have dropped and the freshly brewed beverage industry has entered its seasonal slowdown, we have observed food delivery platforms rapidly scaling back their subsidies, which I expect to become more targeted and refined going forward. In addition, international green coffee bean prices have remained elevated this year, with no signs of moderation at the moment.
These factors will introduce new dynamics and create headwinds for the industry and pose challenges to our fourth quarter or even next year's business development. In this evolving landscape, we will focus more on our long-term growth trajectory. We believe our continued strategic focus and enhanced operational excellence will enable us to weather short-term fluctuations and navigate various external environments. We will continue to strengthen our product and brand innovation, offering high-quality, affordable, and convenient products that better meet diverse customer needs and support store performance. We will also leverage Luckin's robust digital capabilities and deep customer insights to enhance retention and repeat purchases, fully unlocking long-term consumption potential.
[Foreign language]
Finally, we would like to extend our sincere gratitude to our customers, partners, and investors for their continued trust and support of Luckin, as well as to our 170,000 Luckin team members who stand with us through their dedication and hard work. Together, we will continue building a world-class coffee brand and making Luckin a part of everyone's daily life. As we move forward, we remain committed to long-term value creation for our customers, partners, and shareholders.
[Foreign language]
With that, I will now turn the call over to An Jing to go through our financial results in detail.
Thank you, Jinyi. Good day, everyone. Thank you for joining today's call. We delivered another strong quarter, underscoring our sustained momentum and competitive strength. With the continued focus on scale and operational excellence, we achieved record highs in both customer acquisition and in monthly transacting customers. This achievement further strengthens the foundation for our future stock performance and long-term growth. Let's now look at our financial performance in detail. In the third quarter, total net revenues increased by 50% year- over- year to RMB 15.3 billion, primarily driven by a 48% year-over-year increase in GMV to RMB 17.3 billion. This accelerated growth reflected a strong performance across both self-operated and partnership stores, supported by our record monthly transacting customer accounts and the expanded store network to better meet rising demand.
Revenues increased by 47% year-over-year to RMB 11.5 billion, mainly driven by stronger sales performance in our self-operated stores. Breaking down our product sales into three streams, net revenues from freshly brewed drinks were RMB 10.6 billion, representing about 70% of total net revenues. Net revenues from other products were RMB 622 million, or roughly 4% of total net revenues. Net revenues from others were RMB 233 million, or about 1% of total net revenues. Looking at product sales from the perspective of company-owned stores, revenue from self-operated stores increased by 48% year-over-year to RMB 11.1 billion. Same-store sales growth reached 14.4% for this quarter, driven by increased cup sales and ASP reflecting the shift in volume mix toward delivery. Store-level operating profit grew 10% year-over-year to RMB 1.9 billion, with self-operated store-level operating margin of 17.5%.
Revenues from partnership stores increased by 62% year-over-year to RMB 3.8 billion, accounting for 25% of total net revenues. This impressive growth was primarily driven by higher material sales, profit sharing from strong partnership store performance, and increased delivery service fees resulting from greater delivery volumes. Cost of materials as a percentage of total net revenues decreased to 36% from 39% in the same period of 2024, mainly due to our enhanced supply chain advantages. In absolute terms, cost of materials increased by 41% year-over-year to RMB 5.5 billion, in line with our business expansion. Stock rental and other operating costs as a percentage of total net revenues decreased to 20% from 22% in the same period of 2024, mainly driven by improved operational efficiency and scale benefits from increased cup sales.
In absolute terms, this cost increased by 36% year-over-year to RMB 3.1 billion, reflecting higher payroll costs tied to cup sales growth and increased rental costs from ongoing store expansion. Delivery expenses increased by 211% year-over-year to RMB 2.9 billion due to a significant increase in delivery orders from food delivery platforms. As a result, delivery expenses as a percentage of total net revenues sharply rose to 19% from 9% in the same period of 2024. However, on a per-order basis, delivery expenses decreased year-over-year, reflecting improved efficiency and scale. Sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of total net revenue decreased to 5% from 6% in the same period of 2024, mainly driven by enhanced operating efficiency and leverage from accelerated revenue growth.
In absolute terms, sales and marketing expenses increased by 28% year-over-year to RMB 751 million, mainly due to higher commission fees paid to food delivery platforms as a result of rising delivery volumes. General and administrative expenses as a percentage of total net revenue decreased to 5% from 6% in the same period of 2024, mainly driven by enhanced operating efficiency and leverage from accelerated revenue growth. In absolute terms, G&A expenses increased by 25% year-over-year to RMB 793 million, primarily due to increased payroll expenses and share-based compensation, as well as greater investment in research and development. As a result, our GAAP operating profit increased by 13% year-over-year to RMB 1.8 billion. Operating margin was 11.6% compared to 15.5% in the prior year period, mainly impacted by a significant increase in delivery expenses.
On a net GAAP basis, operating profit increased by 15% year-over-year to RMB 1.9 billion, with operating margin at 12.6%. Net profit was at RMB 1.28 billion, with a net margin of 8.4% compared to RMB 1.31 billion and 12.9% in the prior year period, mainly due to a higher effective tax rate. On a net GAAP basis, net profit was RMB 1.4 billion, with net margin at 9.3%. Finally, turning to our balance sheet and cash flow items, our net operating cash inflow was around RMB 2.1 billion in the third quarter of 2025. As of September 30th, 2025, we had RMB 9.3 billion in cash, including cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash, term deposit, and short-term investments, compared to RMB 5.9 billion as of December 31th, 2024.
Our robust cash generation ability and strong cash reserve enable us to flexibly adapt our business expansion pace to different market conditions, letting us fully capitalize on emerging opportunities. In addition, our solid third-quarter results reaffirm our market leadership and business resilience. We are particularly encouraged by the potential of our growing customer base, especially as we continue to expand loyal cohorts. This gives us great confidence in capturing the vast opportunities in China's coffee market, despite evolving external dynamics, while maintaining disciplined cost management and operational efficiency. With that, we will open the call for questions. Operator, please go ahead.
Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question- and- answer session. To ask a question, you may press star, then one on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Once again, it is star, then one to ask a question. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. The first question comes from Ethan Wang with CLSA. Please go ahead.
[Foreign language]
I'll translate to English, good evening management. So, in terms of the delivery subsidy, we understand that it definitely helps our revenue to grow very strongly, in this quarter and the last quarter as well, but it also has an impact, a negative impact on our margin. I think CEO mentions that going to fourth quarter, the subsidy extent of subsidy has faded a bit, but I'm just wondering if it's because of seasonal effects or there's some structural changes behind, and going to next year, shall we worry about, the high base effect? thank you.
[Foreign language]
Thank you. I will answer your question. Regarding the potential impact of the subsidy situations, we think it is important to see this issue through the nature of a coffee business, and also we need to evaluate within the context of the broader industry trend as well as our own operational capabilities.
[Foreign language]
Yeah, so first, coffee is inherently a location-based and store-driven consumer product. This means pickup will remain the primary consumer format over the long term, but delivery will serve as more as a supplemental channel at certain stages as market evolves. There are two reasons for this. One is delivery fulfillment costs are disproportionately high compared to China's mainstream price range of freshly brewed coffee. Delivery is highly sensitive to per cup pricing, and its unit economics are less favorable. The second is longer delivery times can compromise the immediacy and the coffee taste experience that consumers expect, which makes it a less ideal consumption model. Our pickup-oriented store format actually allows us to densely open stores across nearly all of the consumption scenarios. It can keep us as close to customers as possible.
This is actually the core advantage of Luckin and underpins our long-term growth. We believe the coffee business will naturally return to a pickup-oriented model over time, although this transition period will take a longer time to happen.
[Foreign language]
Yeah, so, this year's large-scale subsidies have driven a significant surge in the overall order volumes on food delivery platforms. Next year, these platforms are expected to adopt more refined and ROI-driven operational strategies, and that's, promotional, promotion intensity likely to taper gradually as well. Under such an ROI-driven approach, platforms will likely prioritize partnerships with brands who demonstrate high order density, strong fulfillment efficiency, and effective subsidy conversion. With our extensive store network, efficient operations as a storefront, and our reliable fulfillment infrastructure, Luckin, I believe Luckin remains a preferred partner for food delivery platforms.
[Foreign language]
Yeah, at the same time, we also see that food delivery platforms offered substantial subsidies in the early stages of their campaigns, which objectively fueled a sharp increase in our order volumes and the customer base, creating a relatively high comparison base. As a platform, they have already scaled back their subsidies and will shift towards a more refined approach next year. The industry's overall growth trajectory will differ from this year, and our same-store sales growth next year will also face challenges and pressure. As I mentioned earlier, in this evolving landscape, we believe that only focusing on long-term development is the key to navigating external changes. This means we continuously strengthen our product and brand competitiveness and lock customers' consumption potential, which we see as a core, key driver of our long-term sustainable growth. Thank you.
This is my answer to the question.
[Foreign language]
Thank you。
Our next question comes from Sijie Lin of CICC. Sijie, please go ahead.
[Foreign language]
My question is about, long-term development strategy. we have constantly faced and may continue to face, external environmental changes such as competitive landscape and delivery platform subsidies. How will we balance different targets, including scale in same-store growth and profits? Thank you.
[Foreign language]
Yeah, thank you for your question. This is a very good question, and it's always on top of our mind. We need to take a much longer-term perspective when evaluating the relationship among scale, same-store growth, and our profitability. Considering the current stage of China's coffee industry and Luckin's own development trajectory, China's coffee market is still in its early stages of development and it remains in a high growth phase with vast market opportunities and potential. For us, it's very crucial to capture this historic opportunity and then maximize the long-term benefits from this structural trend. In particular, this year, the food delivery platform subsidies have further accelerated industry consolidation as well as increased market concentration. As these subsidies gradually phase out, this trend is expected to continue as well.
Against this backdrop, our strategic focus will remain on growth and market share. We will continue to steadily expand our store footprint, building a high-quality and efficient store network to meet growing customer demand and pave the way for our long-term growth.
[Foreign language]
Yeah, regarding the same-store growth, we'd like to emphasize that since the financial issue in 2020, maintaining a high store quality has always been the top priority in our expansion. On one hand, new stores can leverage our mature operational framework to quickly ramp up and improve their performance. On the other hand, we continue to improve customer loyalty and repeat purchases through continuous product innovation and brand innovation, driving steady and sustainable store performance. As I mentioned earlier, taking into account the factors above, our same-store sales growth metric in the first quarter and even next year will face some short-term fluctuations and pressure. However, from a long-term perspective, more convenient store fulfillment and improved customer reach play a very positive and important role in fostering coffee drinking habits, as well as naturally increasing consumption frequency among customers.
This in turn can provide lock-in momentum for our continued improvement of our store performance over time.
[Foreign language]
Right, so regarding margins, in the short term, the notable higher mix of our delivery orders has put some pressure on our margins, fully reflected in the decline of our third-quarter operating margin compared to the previous quarter. The positive impact of our improved operational efficiency was actually completely offset by the significantly higher delivery expenses as a percentage of total revenues quarter over quarter. We view this as a temporary and expected impact, reflecting both the current stage of industry development and our strategic execution process. At the same time, as I mentioned earlier, international green coffee bean prices have remained elevated with no signs of moderation, which could also pose some challenges to our coffee bean costs next year, which can also affect margins.
In this environment, we will continue to optimize our structure through refined operations, leveraging our digital capabilities to further enhance the operational efficiency and strengthen our supply chain management. As we scale, we will strive to maintain a healthy and sustainable profit profile.
[Foreign language]
Yeah, so based on above, in conclusion, business growth and market share expansion remain our strategic priority at this stage. We will continue to ensure our store quality while driving product and brand innovation amid our robust expansion. During this period of rapid growth, even if same-store performance shows some fluctuations, the overall trajectory remains within our expectations. At the same time, we will strive to maintain healthy and sustainable profit levels and remain confident in our long-term profitability potential. Thank you.
Our next question comes from Huai Li with Sinolink Securities. Huai Li, please go ahead.
[Foreign language]
Let me translate my question. Good evening, management. I'd like to ask about the company's capital market strategy. At the Xiamen Entrepreneurs' Day Conference a few days ago, Dr. Guo mentioned the company's intention to pursue a relisting on a major U.S. exchange. Could management please share an update on the current status of this initiative? Thank you.
[Foreign language]
Right, thank you for your questions. Luckin is headquartered in Xiamen, where we received holistic and tremendous support since our inception, especially after the financial issue in 2020. With Xiamen's continued support and guidance, Luckin has consistently delivered a strong performance and achieved a successful turnaround.
[Foreign language]
Right, so regarding this question, as we mentioned before, we remain committed to the U.S. capital markets, though we currently have no specific timeline or schedule for uplisting on the mainboard. Our top priority at current stage remains focusing on our strategy execution and the business development. Through offering our customers exceptional products and services, we aim to fully capture the long-term growth opportunities in China's coffee market and expand our market share, creating sustainable long-term value for our shareholders. Thank you.
Due to time constraints, no further questions will be taken at this time. This concludes the question- and- answer session. I'd like to turn the call back to the management team for any closing remarks.
Thank you, everyone, for joining our call today. If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact our IR team. This concludes today's call. We look forward to speaking with you again next quarter. Thank you.
[Foreign language]
Thank you.
The conference has ended. You may disconnect your line. Thank you.