Coffee sales boost Jollibee Group as supply costs pressure profits
Coffee is powering Jollibee Group’s growth, but rising input costs are now forcing the company to rethink openings and capital spending.
Coffee is doing the heavy lifting inside Jollibee Group, even as bean costs, logistics and broader supply-chain pressure make the category harder to turn into profit. In a mixed first quarter, Compose Coffee in South Korea and Highlands Coffee in Vietnam helped drive sales and outlet growth for the Manila-based group, while overall profit declined.
The coffee and tea business is no longer a small add-on. Jollibee said in March that the segment had grown to more than 5,000 stores globally, was 78% franchised and delivered 37% growth in system-wide sales. Compose Coffee alone contributed 22.6% of that segment’s system-wide sales growth, underscoring how much the group now depends on coffee to offset weakness elsewhere in the portfolio.
Highlands Coffee has also become a major piece of the story. On April 16, Jollibee said the brand posted high double-digit revenue growth in fiscal 2025 versus fiscal 2024 and delivered high single-digit same-store sales growth in the first quarter of 2026. That kind of performance gives the group a visible traffic driver on paper, but it also adds exposure to a commodity category where sourcing volatility can quickly eat into margins.
The pressure is now reaching the planning stage. On May 13, Jollibee said it was reviewing 2026 assumptions, including store openings and capital spending, because geopolitical developments had increased near-term input-cost volatility. The company said it was taking mitigation steps across sourcing, productivity, selective pricing and disciplined cost management, a clear sign that the cost problem is influencing more than just quarterly earnings.
Compose Coffee shows why investors are watching the segment so closely. Jollibee completed its deal for effectively 70% of the brand in 2024, and by September 2025 Compose had reached 3,000 stores in South Korea. Jollibee later said the chain had opened more than 1,000 outlets in the 18 months after the acquisition. In January 2026, the company said Compose Coffee had 17.59 million cumulative mobile app users, including 8.3 million new subscribers from a collaboration with BTS member V.
The brand’s international push is still gathering pace. On April 15, Jollibee said Compose Coffee’s Taiwan debut generated about NT$70,000 in opening-day sales, with peak sales of one cup every 20 seconds and wait times of up to two hours. Richard Shin has said the company wants to use K-culture momentum as a springboard for broader expansion, with a Philippine launch also planned.
Jollibee has already budgeted P13 billion to P16 billion in 2026 capital expenditures, but the May 13 review makes the trade-off plain: coffee is helping Jollibee grow, yet the same category is now forcing the group to balance expansion against a margin squeeze that is still building.
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