How Gotcha’s collab with big brands helped boost tea concept’s sales 

It plans to work with more big brands in the future.

QSR brand Gotcha Fresh Tea, like any other small business, struggled with increasing sales during the COVID-19 pandemic.

To keep up with the trying times, Gotcha worked with well-known brands such as Hello Kitty and Sesame Street to boost its sales.

The tea concept also discussed maintaining a low cost entry for franchisees and expanding its stores by 33 in the region. 

Gotcha also shared the planned launch of make-your-own bubble tea kit, which allows fans to create the brand’s drinks on their own.

Below is QSR Media’s Q&A with Gotcha’s management team: 

QSR Media: How is Gotcha managing risks in its expansion plans?

Gotcha management team: During COVID-19, we realised logistics management was a risk. Therefore, GOTCHA spent almost three years building 3,000 square metres in-house warehouses in Melbourne and Sydney to support our franchisees. 

We adapted to stock challenges and our team worked hard to maintain adequate stock levels, causing no supply issues for franchisees and customers. Our strong logistic change system where we communicate with suppliers to optimise costs. 

By optimising the efficiency of the supply chain, cost savings are further achieved. About 90% of GOTCHA’s ingredient prices have not increased for franchisees over the last two years. Although, a current significant risk for any business is inflation. With GOTCHA's management skills and logistics experience, inflation has not affected stock pricing for franchisees. 

Our biggest asset to mitigating risk is our team. With driven and hardworking team members, we have expanded from 17 stores to 50 stores and also maintained a low cost of entry for franchisees. 

Our founder's background is in industrial design and mechanical engineering. He has a deep passion for a design where he has a requirement to deliver high-quality design. For example, the Hello Kitty and Sesame Street collaboration. 

Our collaborations with international brands such as Hello Kitty and Sesame Street bring in merchandise, which helped franchisees increase sales even during Covid times. We plan to continue to collaborate with big brands in the future - with our next partner being Pokemon. 

Moving forward, we also plan that every season, we will bring in new drinks to attract new consumers and follow current trends.

What are Gotcha's current challenges in the industry?

One of the challenges facing us from a development perspective is the industry-wide issues of staff shortages and high turnover in the hospitality industry.

What can we expect from the upcoming Gotcha and Pokemon collab?

With the founder's strong knowledge and passion for design as well as strong company spirit, like our previous collaborations with Hello Kitty and Sesame Street, Gotcha is aiming to produce elegant designs as well as more merchandise items for Pokemon collaboration. With the unique design and concept, we hope that this will be another great collection for all Gotcha's fans. 

What can fans expect from Gotcha's make-your-own bubble tea kit?

Customers will be able to create their favourite drinks with Gotcha premium tea leaves and fruit syrup in the comfort of their own home. At Gotcha, we aim to bring more fun, exciting designs and events to engage with fans and consumers. As part of the launch, we hope to create competitions for consumers and fans to create and explore new drinks, allowing them to share with friends and upload on social media to win a prize. 

How does using a quick-shake machine rather than the typical shake-by-hand approach contribute to Gotcha's growth?

GOTCHA is known as a revolution in the industry, not only due to the quick-shake machine, but due to the fact that we want to use the innovative technology to replace the traditional way of hand-shaken bubble tea, hence we have our quick shake machine. Our founder, who has a background in mechanical engineering and industrial design, designed a tea brew and quick shake machine that brings hot tea to a chilled beverage in 0.5 seconds. This is the "Ferrari motor" of bubble tea making. 

The tea brew machine will brew tea and maintain its strong taste in 60 seconds. This machine also helps to reduce labour costs, standardise quality, improve taste and fresh brew every single cup.