At a Glance (China Coffee Network): (Source: Shangguan News) Inside the Caihongwan Party-Mass Service Center sits a rather different café, "Qi Coffee." There is no standardized chain-brand fit-out and no uniform com…
(Source: Shangguan News) Inside the Caihongwan Party-Mass Service Center sits a rather different café, “Qi Coffee.” There is no standardized chain-brand fit-out and no uniform commercial air. In their place is the relaxed ease of a “neighborhood where everyone knows each other” — residents drop in for a coffee and a bagel on their way to work, while older neighbors meet friends over a pot of tea that lasts all afternoon, talking until the sun slopes west.
From chain to community: a Jiangwan local’s “return”
The owner of Qi Coffee describes herself as an “old Hongkou native” from Jiangwan. She has lived in Hongkou since high school and feels a deep attachment to the area. Previously she ran two chain-brand coffee shops around the Zhonghuan Industrial Park in Jiangwan Town Subdistrict. But the chain model always left her feeling that “the connection with local residents was not close enough.”
“I really wanted to open a warm café that could interact deeply with residents,” she said. That idea happened to align with the Jiangwan Town Subdistrict’s philosophy of community co-building. The Caihongwan Party-Mass Service Center had exactly such a service space available, and so Qi Coffee moved into Caihongwan in the form of a “co-built” project.
The menu is “customized” because the residents are “specific”
Qi Coffee’s menu is not a copy of a chain brand’s standard lineup, but was redesigned around the actual needs of residents near Caihongwan. It serves not only coffee but tea as well. The current best seller is the Little Butter Americano — an ordinary Americano with an extra layer of buttery, animal-fat aroma and a full body, very popular with residents. A Little Butter Americano in the morning plus a bagel makes a simple, healthy breakfast.
In the afternoon the shop offers a tea set: a small bun with a pot of tea, with black, green or oolong tea to choose from. During her early research the owner found that many older residents especially like this combination — two or three people order one pot and drink and chat the whole afternoon. “It feels very warm,” she said.
The “community logic” behind a cup of coffee
Qi Coffee sits in the Caihongwan Party-Mass Service Center of Jiangwan Town Subdistrict. It is both a base for serving the public and a microcosm of exploring “party-building-led good governance in large residential communities.” The resident mix around the Caihongwan block is diverse, including young talent in public rental housing as well as elderly groups needing community care.
A café opening inside a party-mass service center may look like a “crossover,” but in fact it fits a current trend in community governance: using warm commercial services to shorten the distance between people and their community. As the owner puts it: “I hope residents will come by often.”
A cup of coffee, a pot of tea, an afternoon. In Caihongwan, the café inside the party-mass service center is brewing Jiangwan’s own “human warmth” in the plainest possible way.
Qi Coffee
Address: No. 229 Hongwan Road, Hongkou District
Written by: Qian Xueying
Editor: Wang Jie
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