These Chinese Brands Are Dominating U.S. Rivals Like McDonald’s and Apple | WSJ 

China reopened to foreign students. Americans are staying away: on.wsj.com/3Y2StF8

What wrong with Chinese using or eating Chinese brands? In this world, who gives rights to American brands to dominate every aspect of our lives?

Some of these companies are not just failing in China. Nike and Starbucks are falling in popularity in the US.

Chinese older people admire American culture, while young people are more confident in Chinese culture.

I am proud to say, I went from having McDonalds 5 times a week, sometimes 6, to zero, exactly 20 years ago this month!

If the US companies want to make money, they need to compete. If you can get the same coffee at the price of $2, why bother to spend $4 at Starbucks?

Chinese are embracing local brands America: security threat

Nothing wrong when Americans want to buy American, but as soon as Chinese (or any other enemy) want to buy local then there's a problem?

tho in China no one is beating KFC, they're genuinely crazy they'll collab with literally anything 😂

It's not so much patriotism but just consumers looking for the most value. Of course local brand is gonna thrive.

On the other hand, it’s a consumer’s paradise. For example, being forced to compete with rivals like Xiaomi and Huawei, iPhones are often heavily discounted in China. You can get an iPhone 15 Pro Max for $675 on Taobao - no trade in’s, no nonsense. Ultimately, China’s domestic market is fiercely competitive - once an industry, brand, or concept is proven, new money rushes in and tries to displace first movers with price wars. This makes it difficult for any company to truly last, doubly so for foreign brands.

What’s the problem with the Chinese preferring their own brands to foreign brands? Foreign companies have long dominated the Chinese market. American companies have made heaps profits off China. About time for the Chinese to gain their share on their home turfs.

At least Chinese are not banning or putting high tariffs on American brands in national security concerns unlike US

I was in China recently and the Luckin Coffee had so many innovative coffee flavours that incorporated fruits flowers and tea and honestly they were all shockingly good even the simple basics that Starbucks always mess up on. Not just Luckin, there were so many small cafes too that were superb. Coffee culture is big in China, people are passionate about it. Don’t dismiss their ability to innovate on food and drinks.

*Burger with Chinese Characteristics*

The nerve of Chinese companies dominating their own market.

The US was right, China has an overcapacity of delicious and affordable food

Nike has the right not to use Xinjiang cotton, and the Chinese have the right not to buy it.

I don’t know who goes to Starbucks in China. It is more expensive than in the US. A cup of coffee for above ¥40. There are a lot of much cheaper alternatives, like luckin coffee, boba tea. All are more than 50% cheaper.

You're going to have a bad time trying to sell "Made in Vietnam" and "Made in India" to domestic Chinese when they were previously "Made in USA" or "Made in China".

Ridiculous, typical American thinking, was McDonald's defeated by Chinese hamburgers? There is no connection at all. Chinese food is much richer and more diverse than American food. It was only because the market was immature, commercial civilization was underdeveloped, and capital was not abundant that there were no local chain restaurants. It is not just Chinese hamburgers that defeated McDonald's. There are also noodles, buns, pancakes, dumplings, and now they all have corresponding Chinese chain brands. Who will still focus on two slices of bread and a piece of meat patty? The reason why the United States has Burger King and McDonald's is that the only thing the United States can offer is hamburgers.

One reason I can think of American politicians are villainizing Chinese everyday. If you are a Chinese , would you buy and support American brands?

This is called derisking, it goes both ways.

*Money is not meant to control people, rather it is meant to be put to work producing more money for you. You cannot build wealth without putting money in its rightful place*

I live in Indonesia and the trend is the same. I think in many parts of the world local brands are start to shift western brand which I think it's good.

"Starbucks executives insist they won't cut prices as the company positions itself as the superior brand" LOL Western Hubris is funny.

chinese people preferring local brands assuming the quality is comparable, shocking

I had Tasiting twice in Shenzhen. Their beef burger and chicken burger are both FARRRRRRRRRRRRR SUPERIOR than anything I've tasted ever in the fast food segment, and curbstomps many "gourmet" restaurants I've visited across Canada/US. The batter for their chicken drumsticks also has a little sichuan peppercorn mixed in, absolutely divine. Tasiting, please come to Vancouver!

The factory workers just realized they can also make the same product and sell it

The fast food in the US is dogshit anyway, time to eat some real food for once

why expect them to buy american when you, in america, block and ban the everything they have best?

I live in Japan, and many colleagues are complaining about Starbucks quality and how they put a lot of sugar and other flavors instead of coffee. Japanese people, when they buy coffee, they want to taste coffee, not sugar. Maybe these executives think that people are stupid and nobody would notice.

Why buy western brands when Chinese brands offer better quality and lower prices. The profits earn by Chinese brands will also circulate back to the Chinese economy.

Struggling to understand the point of the video. Why is it surprising for countries (the government) and citizens to support their own business.

“Its about whether it tastes good” *takes bite* -video ends 😭

Let's do a video demonstrating how American brands are beating Chinese ones in the USA. Oh wait, it's just tariffs and bans.

It is good for any country to support its homegrown businesses.

They are doing the same thing Chinese EVs have done. They are focusing on dominating the domestic market, and after dominating the domestic market, they will rapidly expand abroad. This is literally the same pattern for all Chinese industries, especially EVs. Sooner or later, we will see these brands all around the world.... Just like Chinese EVs...

Anta sponsoring Kyrie and Klay was a very smart move

"a chinese burger for a chinese stomach" < McDonalds

No one can't be the top dog forever. The age of easy money for US brands in China is over. Everything is fair game now; compete or die. Get used to the changing world.

So...US doesn't like competition? Whoda thunk right?

I was homeless, got into drug's went to prison and then I got to know Jesus and he changed my life...Heaven came through for me in my finances too, getting $50,000 in 2months . I can support God's work and give back to my community. God is absolutely more than enough! Now I have a new identity and a child of God

McDonald's, Starbucks, Nike, Walmart are not premium brands to begin with. I live in the U.S.A. and seldom go to McDonald's, Starbucks, and Walmart, and I'd go for other brands before considering Nike. Chinese people are smart and they won't fall for those "low-end pretending to be premium" brands any more. Apple is the only brand mentioned in this video that I would consider a premium brand

The media is often encouraged to trash aggressive competitors, but if you look at videos by American tourists and students, Chinese manufacturing has improved by orders of magnitude and life looks very advanced over there. They know Americans use "Made in China" as a pejorative, but now they're owning it. Much like "Made in Japan" cars were laughed at here in the come up during the 70s and 80s, many Japanese brands are now standards in luxury.

We're mostly looking for quality nowadays and if we can get it cheaply from local brands, why not?

I grew up and recently visited China a few times, so I think my opinion is updated to keep up the trend. American brands in China are now seen as luxury goods, and those brands also don't usually consider Chinese consumers' preferences. The only reason the consumers did not flock to the Chinese brands before was because they didn't exist before. And like what this video said, why pay more for the same product?

Good for the Chinese they are adopting the Japanese, korean model where they have strong loyalty towards their own country brands

McDonalds & Starbucks are way too overpriced. Makes sense.

In my country, there are local companies trying to sell coffee and tea with cool packaging and charging more.

USA: The World need to embrace innovation. China invented stuff USA: HOW DARE YOU!!!

After Nike/Adidas change to made in Vietnam, the quality is so bad..

ok McDonald's doppelganger in China also sells Coca-Cola and Pepsi

the US:If they're going to beat us under the rules, then we change the rules

Luckin offers at a quarter of the price of Starbucks, to be exact.

Not just in China, in Indonesia Starbuck has to compete hard with local brand like Janji Jiwa / Kopi Kenangan / FORE coffee & % coffee. In Thailand Starbuck compete with Amazon coffee (PTT group)

In the US too. My kids refuse now to go to McDonalds because of everything they read on TikTok about McDonalds being in Israel. They used to go all the time.

I'm Surprise, the store didn't get loot on a daily basis!!😂

I support the local coffee, not Starbucks.

Wait, the same thing is happening in India. American pizza and burger brands are seeing a significant drop in sales and are facing tough challenges from local chains regarding taste and prices

It shocks me when WSJ did not add”but at what cost” in the end.

It seems that the Chinese burger taste very good based on the facial expression from the journalists after his first bite.

Making sure "Made in China" isn't in Chinese language

The editing of the first 20 seconds is very confusing. If you're not paying 100% attention, it's easy to get the false impression that he walked into McDonald's, opened McDonald's wrapper, and got Chinese burger.

"Wait a second, why did the burger have a McDonald's arch? Ohhh, meaningless editing."

Why do the ante ads or whatever the brand is called look so ai generated?

Forgot to write "In China" at the end

In China, Apple should indigenize its name to Pingguo

So companies have to compete harder in a free market with others? Shocking.

That burger looks substantial. They were rolling out dough for the burger bun in house 😮

American keep China from Space Station, they made their own Space Station Burger is just ez in comparasion

I like it promoting local brands is good thing.monopoly on burger is bad.

Once you tried Antra & Lunkin, there's no going back to Nike & Starbuck.

Tastien was a pizza restaurant and it keeps the tradition of freashly baked buns after switching to make burgers. It tastes way better than those McDonald’s factory made burger buns.

This is call market diversity. They just want more options. Btw, this Chinese burger tastes surprisingly well at a cheaper price.

Ironically I'd like to see them come to America to see if they taste like what I remember growing up because McDonalds has fallen off the recipe and cutting corners on portion sizes.

Lukin coffee got caught lying about sales 😂😂

As it should, local owned companies should be competitive and thrive! Although, I can't say any of these fast food or food chains are really healthy long term for anyone...

Not that surprising as we are now well within a generation in of a globalization market. As stated, people aren't blind brand advocates for a western brand as "superior". Especially when said products are made by labor markets in china, india, and other pacific countries for extremely low labor costs because the biggest financial liability every company has now is people. Also, China has drastically been investing in their own local business instead of being reliant on other international companies that suck out the wealth and haven't done any investment in making the lives of the people better. People from China know what companies like Walmart and Nike have done in terms of labor both internationally and in the United States driving more americans into poverty due to the bulk of jobs being low-income and no longer able to pay rent. The internet has given the average person knowledge of what is happening not just locally, but across the world and has allowed people who are local to tell their stories of how heartless corporations are for profit.

Shouldn't be a surprise to anyone..

that's a great video to watch!

In my country (Thailand), local brands do out perform US brands by a lot too. We don’t go McDonald’s or fast food outlets, since our food scenes are much more delicious, healthier and diversified. Our shopping malls are the world’s best and are much better than US malls. Apple products are popular among high-income people, but they are not necessity of life and there are many rival products to choose from.

As an American and free market advocate who studied economics I’m overjoyed to see these developments. I’d love to see an ANTA shoe store in my local shopping district. Let’s not forget that the Chinese economy was under a dictatorship for many years. Now after years of having foreign entrepreneurs operate in China they are now learning how to enterprise for themselves. WSJ keep up the good work. Great story

As younger generation consumer like me from China, I used to buy Nike shoes a lot but what Nike did to joining in American authorities political propaganda campaign to spread fake narratives of Xinjiang I stopped to buy any products from Nike and turned to Anta, I didn't use Huawei before but since Google and all these American companies showed their loyalty to Washinton's delibrate campaign to crack down on Huawei I decided to buy Huawei and it turned out Huawei produce really premium quality products. Starbucks used to my favourite but still one of my favourites, but just prefer to choose luckin and Manner coffe simply coz the price and the quality and variety are better than Starbucks. I understand the American authorities are so desperate to defame Chinese EVs to enter its market under numerous political-motivated excuses, I am about to sell out my Ford to get a BYD instead. Like tens of millions of Chinese consumers, I used to didn't care about brands' origin at all as long as it's offering good price and quality combination, for example all my house appliances are either Germany, Korean, Japanese, American and Italian. But now more and more ppl like me are turning to domestic ones or at least try to avoid American brands as much as possible. Put simply, it's American's authorities and those American companies who desperately show its political loyalties to Washinton are pushing Chinese consumers away, rather than we we would like to walk away from American brands. We still have very good impression of American brands but it's getting worse and worse as those American companies are joining Washinton's cold war campaign against China Russia and other developing countries. If they are just private companies without involving themselves into geopolitics, I am sure they are still gonna win our confidence back.

New Title: "Competitive Local Regional Brands are Competitive to Local Region"

it’s funny you say that because i just visited china with my girlfriend who’s been gone three years and now there are more american brands in her city than before

My Chinese friends said they used to feel “cool” owning Apple & hanging out in Starbucks, but that feeling is no longer there.

Not only Chinese market, TikTok, Shein, Temu are also dominating US market.

Every consumer is similar: good qualitiy and good bargain. They want both.

Is anta's shoe made of quality? Any science into their athletic shoes?

Great to see WSJ catching up to the real news we see from RU-vidrs, Tiktokers, Small Red Book etc. New York Times, unfortunately, still peddles biased news that Americans are wising up to. Kudos to this reporter!

This is why Starbucks doesn't work in Australia

I've seen this burger restaurant, in China, but no goes in.

What is wrong with more competition? As long as it is legal.

A says it in English 😂

The thing is, Starbucks, Nike, McDonalds are global brands. These popular “local” brands are only popular in their home country. Even if that’s a huge market, it’s still just a small slice.

Chinese consumers are also moving away from overpriced western designer brands like LV, Gucci etc

"We're not competing on price." ... That's fine, but price is competing with you.

"their lunch" ?? America thinks the whole world should be "their lunch"

ooooh noooo chinese brands in china... not American brands in china anymore....