Retail & Hospitality Branding Strategy

Retail & Hospitality brand success comes from creating deep desire. We do this by telling an authentic story with great design around shopper experiences in a connected world.  Retail and hospitality experiences can drive the deepest emotional connections a consumer has with a brand because there are countless opportunities to serve, delight and create desire.

We develop rigorous and inspiring brand strategy recommendations that address your business and brand experience goals. Brand strategy blends insight and transformational thinking to determine the character and tone of a brand, as well as drivers of relevance and distinction. Branding is the heart beat of any great company.

Branding is one of the most tainted words in the business world. It is often used to portray a business, a product, a logo, or a colour palette. Having a chic logo, a clever tagline, or a polished website, doesn’t mean a company has a brand. What you have is the visual expression of the brand created by a graphic designer, it is not the brand itself. In its most fundamental form, a brand is a storage of trust. It is a story toll by its creator and more importantly by the customers when branding is expertly crafted. That is why great branding starts with a brand strategist not a graphic designer. MBA vs Art School.

At Gregory Lui Consulting our expertise in deep cultural insights drives us to deliver exceptional executions. We maintain brand and message authenticity to drive connections and impact across different audiences and geographies in the food and beverage industry.

Advisory

Gregory Lui Consulting  Advisory offers bespoke services encompassing the full range in the coffee, tea and natural food industry, building on the longstanding expertise in retail service hospitality and wholesale marketing, together with access to the global resources in third party manufacturing and direct tea buying—an extraordinary combination without peers or precedent. Whether you are a small startup, a multi-unit chain, or a global coffee roaster,  we spend time getting to know every client and their individual needs, tailoring each relationship accordingly.

Authentication & Valuation

Gregory Lui Consulting Authentication & Valuation (only available for tea) provides bespoke inventories and appraisals which are recognized around the world by government agencies, financial institutions, international insurance brokers, and fine tea collectors.

We tailor each valuation around the client and the collection, working with single items to large multi-category collections. Our expertise in the tea world allows us to offer the highest level of service with the strictest policy of confidentiality for inventory collections, insurance claims, fiduciaries, and bankruptcies.

Example of an Authentication: the age and origin of a vintage Pu'erh Tea Cake.

Example of a Valuation: the market value of an existing tea inventory for the purpose of liquidation, the sale of a business or bankruptcy value from a creditor.

Global Strategic Sourcing of Teas and Botanicals

Global Strategic Sourcing is Gregory Lui Consulting's core competency.  Strategic sourcing is all about the process by which organizations procure goods and services and manage key parts of their supply chain. Effectively managing what, how many, and from whom you buy can have a dramatic impact on overall profitability. That’s why strategic sourcing and procurement can have such a big impact.

Leveraging 20+ years of supplier relationships at origin, we have the absolute confidence to help your company source any commodity in the tea world. Our disciplined approach with deep category experiences deliver extraordinary results with a Return-On-Investment (ROI) often measured in months. This includes but not limited to Certified Organic products, Certified Fair Trade products, Rainforest Alliance Certified products and CO2 Neutral products. With our expertise in authentication, we are able to source commodity CTC teas starting at less than 1 USD / KG to rare and limited Longjing and Bilo Chun green teas at prices over $1,500 USD/KG or rare vintage Pu'erh tea cakes valued at over $20,000 USD/cake.  With Gregory Lui Consulting on your team, you could now buy with confidence.

An example of Complex Souricing from our sister company: leilanifinetea.com

Tea Formulation

Gregory Lui is the world's undisputed leader in tea formulation. After winning 200+ Global Tea Championship accolades, more than another tea specialist in the world, he is reigned supreme in tea blending and formulations. The following is Gregory Lui's tea blending philosophy in his own words:

" Some people believe that creating a tea blend is just mixing ingredients and flavorings added to dried tea leaves, but it’s much more than that. To start with, you need to understand the tea leaf. Each tea from each different regions of the world will give you a completely different product.

Behind each tea blend there are days if not months of preparations from concept design, to sourcing of raw materials, to flavor tastings to documentation. And when it is all said and done … to give it the perfect name.

In its most fundamental form, tea blending is a symphony of art, and science in harmony with flavors, mouth feel and aromas. It is breathing life and spirit into this noble leaf."

Specialty Coffee House / Tea Shop
Pre-Opening Management

Gregory Lui Consulting Pre-Opening  Management is a bespoke service that we offer to the specialty coffee house and tea shop industry.

There is a lot to take into consideration and organize during this critical period, building up to the launch of your beverage venture. As part of our Pre-Opening  Management services we can help you with the pre-opening planning and project management.

Gregory Lui Consulting can take all the troubles out of your hand, setting up the operations and strategies for your new venture. We have extensive experiences in this field turning F&B projects into a great success. Focusing on the unique selling points of your property, our consultants will develop a customized and creative strategic  opening plan. Our proven and creative methodology of positioning new coffee and tea ventures  has brought our clients solid results with a very positive return on their investment. With our best practices and hands-on approach we will turn your new venture to become a market leader and uncover its hidden revenue potential, driving both top line revenue and bottom line profit.

A strong foundation is critical for the success and it all starts at the pre-opening phase.  Having Gregory Lui Consulting managing your Pre-Opening is taking the first step to a profitable future.

On-location Specialty Tea Training

Some say tea is "humanity in a cup".  Others say it is the global beverage of choice for over 2,000 years. At Gregory Lui Consulting, our view is, "it does not matter how you view tea." We know it will make you money after you understand the fundamentals. We are not a tea school. We do not offer certifications. What Gregory Lui Consulting offers is a Masterclass in specialty tea. You will have true confidence from  mastering tea steeping skills and understanding tea knowledge  in the shortest amount of time. Our bespoke training could be as short as one afternoon to as long as two weeks. This on-location training is designed by professionals for professionals: from coffee house managers, to  tea room owners, from restaurateurs to wine sommeliers.

Tea Menu Development

An unforgettable tea experience begins with knowing . Fine dining restaurant or casual eatery? Coffee shop or tea room? Multi-unit franchise or independent single operator?  Upscale/luxury market or mass market? There are so many seemingly arbitrary decisions that go into planning an innovative tea menu concept.  How is anyone supposed to know if they are making the right choices or where to begin? Gregory Lui Consulting can help you to identify who your target audience is; what they will be willing to spend; what type of offerings they are likely to want, and how that will impact your operation’s financial stability.

Tea Menu Development is our specialty. With a deep understanding of how back-of-house efficiencies and supply chain management can impact profits, we deliver innovative tea menu items that balance unique flavors and presentations against targeted food cost, profit contribution and a focus on consistent execution. Blending gastronomy, psychology and mathematics, we deliver tea menu design solutions that influence guest behaviors, optimize brand loyalty and deliver consistent operations.

An example of Menu Development from our sister company: leilanifinetea.com