SUBWAY:
The "Light Meal Benchmark" in the Fast Food Track and Strategic Layout of Coffee Business
As a world-renowned chain fast food brand, SUBWAY takes "EatFresh" as its core concept. It combines "made-to-order, healthy light meals" with customizable products like sandwiches and salads, and owns over 37,000 chain restaurants in more than 100 countries and regions worldwide. While providing customers with fresh and delicious fast food, it also delivers a brand-new lifestyle experience.
As consumers' demands for catering scenarios become increasingly diversified, the "meal + beverage" combination has become the key to boosting average customer spending and repurchase rate. SUBWAY has keenly captured this trend and gradually integrated coffee into its core product line:
On one hand, as a high-frequency consumer beverage globally, coffee can complement SUBWAY's staple foods such as sandwiches and wraps, meeting customers' comprehensive demand for "a meal with a drink";
On the other hand, the premium space brought by high-quality coffee can further increase the revenue of individual stores.
However, how to achieve the standardization and stability of coffee quality while upholding the brand's DNA of "fast food service" has become a core issue for SUBWAY to expand its coffee business. Against this background, Dr. Coffee F200 series fully automatic commercial coffee machines have entered SUBWAY's field of vision, becoming the key equipment support for the implementation of its coffee business.
Recently, we followed Dr. Coffee's maintenance engineers into SUBWAY stores. By visiting the operation and maintenance scenarios of the F200 series fully automatic commercial coffee machines on-site, we gained insight into how professional commercial equipment, from product capability to service capability, helps chain catering solve operational challenges.
01
Coffee Operation Pain Points for Chain Catering:
Multiple Challenges from Efficiency to Quality
For chain brands like SUBWAY that rely on "fast pace and standardization" as their lifeline, expanding the coffee business faces common industry challenges:
// Insufficient Quality Stability
// Operational Efficiency Bottlenecks
// Equipment Operation and Maintenance Pressure
For chain brands like SUBWAY that focus on "fast food service and convenient experience", these pain points are particularly prominent — as an important category to increase average customer spending, coffee quality and serving efficiency are directly linked to brand reputation.
02
Dr. Coffee F200 Series:
A Coffee Solution Precisely Matching Needs
With "intelligent experience, high efficiency and peace of mind" as its core, Dr. Coffee F200 series fully automatic commercial coffee machines directly address the operational difficulties of chain catering and demonstrate significant value in practical applications in SUBWAY stores:
// Upgraded Grinding: Laying a Solid Foundation for Quality Standardization
The core of SUBWAY's brand lies in "consistent taste worldwide", and coffee is no exception. The F200 series is equipped with two sets of new-generation grinding components. Material upgrades reduce wear rate and significantly extend component lifespan; more importantly, they maintain a stable grinding coefficient — this means that in SUBWAY stores in Beijing, Shanghai, or third- and fourth-tier cities, the powder particle size deviation of each cup of coffee can be controlled within a very small range, ensuring consistent taste from the source. At the same time, the dual-boiler system supports simultaneous preparation of coffee, hot water, and fresh milk, fully matching the food serving intensity of SUBWAY during peak hours and avoiding customer flow backlogs caused by slow coffee preparation.
// Adjustable Water Temperature: Adapting to Diverse Product Needs
SUBWAY's coffee menu is not fixed but covers various categories such as hot Americano, iced latte, and flavored milk coffee. The 70-85℃ one-click temperature control function of the F200 series plays a crucial role here: set to 85℃ when making hot lattes to create dense milk foam; adjust to 70℃ when making iced coffee bases to prevent rapid ice melting from affecting concentration; even when paired with self-made flavored syrups such as honey and vanilla in stores, precise water temperature ensures full dissolution of flavor substances, meeting SUBWAY's pursuit of "beverage diversity".
// Full Lamination Touch Screen: Simplifying Operation and Reducing Costs
The catering industry has high employee turnover, and SUBWAY also faces the challenge of new employees mastering operations quickly. The entire F200 series is equipped with a 10.1-inch large touch screen, loaded with IPS Retina full lamination technology and AF anti-fingerprint technology, making the operation interface intuitive and easy to understand — SUBWAY employees only need to click on icons such as "Americano" and "Latte" on the screen to complete the entire process from selection to cup output. The training time for new employees is reduced from 1-2 days for traditional equipment to less than 1 hour. The anti-fingerprint technology also reduces the trouble of frequent screen wiping, keeping the operation platform clean at all times, which is consistent with SUBWAY's store image of "transparency and hygiene".
// Milk Shortage Alert: Ensuring Smooth Operations
For SUBWAY stores that offer milk coffee drinks, the timeliness of fresh milk supply directly affects the customer experience. Models of the F200 series with hot and cold fresh milk functions are equipped with a professional milk pump to ensure stable milk foam texture, and are also equipped with a milk shortage monitoring function — when the remaining amount in the milk tank is insufficient, the equipment will issue an early warning through the screen prompt, allowing employees sufficient time to replenish fresh milk. This completely avoids the awkward situation where "milk is out of stock after a customer places an order" and ensures SUBWAY's operational rhythm of "fast response and efficient service".
03
Dr. Coffee's Professional After-Sales Maintenance:
Safeguarding Stable Equipment Operation
High-quality equipment requires professional service support. Our follow-up to Dr. Coffee's after-sales engineers during their maintenance service at SUBWAY stores more intuitively demonstrated its service concept of "putting customers first". The standardized maintenance process, from appointment to completion, closely aligns with SUBWAY's operational needs.
In addition, Dr. Coffee also provides customized maintenance items according to SUBWAY's special needs, such as conducting key inspections on frequently used functional modules of stores or adjusting equipment parameters based on beverage sales data, truly achieving "service on demand".
04
Dr. Coffee's After-Sales System:
Comprehensive Coverage to Free SUBWAY from Worries
Dr. Coffee's after-sales service capability is not only reflected in the standardized process but also relies on a strong system support to provide comprehensive protection for chain brands including SUBWAY.
05
From Single-Store Empowerment to Industry Synergy:
Dr. Coffee's Chain Service Ecosystem Solution
From SUBWAY's coffee counters to chain catering stores across the country, the value of Dr. Coffee F200 series has long transcended the physical attribute of "a single coffee machine". It ensures standardized taste through grinding upgrades, supports product innovation through intelligent temperature control, reduces management costs through convenient operations, and safeguards operational smoothness through detailed designs such as milk shortage alerts — these functions do not exist in isolation but form a "coffee operation ecosystem solution" adapted to all scenarios of chain catering.
Moreover, the service system that runs through the entire equipment life cycle further deepens this value: from the service network covering over 2,700 cities to achieve "undifferentiated response", to standardized maintenance processes to ensure "each service is precise and controllable", and then to customized training to empower "efficient collaboration among people, equipment, and scenarios". Dr. Coffee is redefining the relationship between commercial equipment and chain brands through the dual-wheel drive of "product + service" — it is not just a simple "supplier-customer" relationship, but "ecological partners" growing together.
For SUBWAY, this means transforming the coffee business from a "cost item" to a "growth driver"; for the entire chain catering industry, this model of "hardware iteration + service upgrade" is driving the beverage segment to leap from "accessory" to "core competitiveness".
In the future, as consumer demands become more segmented, Dr. Coffee will continue to inject new momentum for "intelligent operation" into more chain brands through technological innovation and service accumulation, making every cup of coffee a link connecting brands and customers, and making every equipment operation a cornerstone supporting industry upgrading.
