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In the first half of this year, financial reports disclosed by a number of branded restaurant companies brought the delivery business back into the industry spotlight. After domestic and international brands tried various "second growth curves" in roundabout ways, everyone found that delivery still seems to deliver the best growth results. Data shows that in the first half of the year, delivery revenue accounted for 9.2%, 21.9%, 24.3% and 28.4% of revenue at Haidilao, Jiumaojiu, Green Tea Group and Yujian Xiaomian respectively. Western fast food and pizza, which are the most standardized, have gone even further on the delivery track. Delivery sales as a share of store revenue at Yum China (mainly KFC and Pizza Hut) climbed from 45% in the second quarter of 2025 all the way to 54% in the second quarter of this year, delivery revenue accounted for 65.7% of directly operated store revenue at Tims China, and online revenue at Domino's China reached 51.7% in the first half.
This means delivery is becoming the main battlefield for branded restaurant companies. Currently, the overall restaurant market is not exactly booming. In the first half of this year, growth of the broader restaurant sector slowed to 2.8%. Under these circumstances, expanding delivery scenarios is an unavoidable path for restaurant companies to open up new growth space. But for restaurant companies to enter delivery is not simply about moving dine-in products online, nor about passively accepting platform orders. Delivery is a business different from dine-in, with fundamental differences in cost structure and value for money, and its essence is proactively operating a new consumption scenario, with a profit model better able to help restaurant companies cope with current industry difficulties. To gain new incremental growth, restaurant companies must adopt a new playbook.
Delivery Accounts for Half the Business at Some Leading Chains
Just two or three years ago, many chain brands, especially big names unwilling to lower their stature, were hesitant about whether to do delivery. But data for the first half of 2026 shows that delivery already occupies an important position in the operations of a considerable number of chain companies. A briefing by the China Chain Store & Franchise Association on the development of chain restaurant companies in the first half of 2026 shows that delivery orders accounted for more than 30% of orders at 54.4% of sample companies. The figures for some leading restaurant companies are even more intuitive. Delivery sales as a share of restaurant revenue at self-operated stores of Yum China (mainly KFC and Pizza Hut) climbed from 45% in the second quarter of 2025 all the way to 54% in the second quarter of this year, with single-quarter delivery sales up 26% year on year. Company management predicted at the earnings conference that Yum China's delivery share will continue to rise in the future. By comparison, delivery revenue accounted for an even higher 65.7% of directly operated store revenue at Tims China. Dasein Shares (Domino's China), which focuses on pizza, posted delivery sales of 1.619 billion yuan in the first half, up 44.7% year on year, with its share of total revenue rising to 51.7%. Radar Finance noted that Domino's China has been continuously increasing its bet on online business. On August 21, the Domino's China Wuhan smart supply chain center was officially completed and put into operation, with core businesses including 30-minute delivery service and an online ordering platform and delivery orders accounting for 73%, ranking third in China's pizza market. According to statistics from LatePost, apart from Xiaocaiyuan, the delivery share of listed restaurant brands has almost all been rising. In the first half of 2026, delivery revenue accounted for 9.2%, 21.9%, 24.3% and 28.4% of revenue at Haidilao, Jiumaojiu, Green Tea Group and Yujian Xiaomian respectively. This shows that, in the face of potential risks in the current industry, going heavy on the delivery business has become a collective choice of leading chain restaurants.
Restaurant Giants Proactively Ramp Up Delivery
The sharp rise in delivery revenue share at tea drink, fast food and international chain brands is an inevitable result of responding to changes in consumer demand. As early as 2003, Haidilao launched a telephone ordering service, allowing consumers to order hot pot to their homes by phone. In July 2022, Haidilao set up a "community operations business division" to reshape its delivery system, forming a community operation model of "delivery + community + livestreaming + online mall," making delivery its second-largest business. In June 2023, Haidilao launched rice with hot pot dishes, a new product line focused on single-person delivery scenarios. It mainly takes the form of a "maocai + rice" combo set priced in the 30-40 yuan range, forming Haidilao's delivery business matrix together with "Happy Banquet" and "Haidilao Hot Pot Delivery." Haidilao's delivery layout has brought generous returns. In 2025, the company's delivery business revenue grew 111.9% year on year; in the first half of this year it continued to double, with its share of group revenue rising from 4.5% in the same period last year to 9.2%. A large part of the increment came from "single-person meal" products such as mixed rice bowls. According to Haidilao's disclosure, sales of single-person meal products represented by mixed rice bowls grew significantly in the first half, with delivery products extending from hot pot to everyday main meals. To adapt to the explosion of the delivery market, Haidilao continued to build self-operated delivery stations, separating part of its delivery capacity from the back kitchens of dine-in stores, increasing delivery coverage density and easing the squeeze of delivery orders on store capacity.
Jiumaojiu originated in Haikou, founding and operating five niche brands: "Jiumaojiu Northwest Cuisine," "Tai Er Sauerkraut Fish," "Song Chongqing Hot Pot Factory," "Shan De Shan Waimian Guizhou Sour Soup Hot Pot" and "Chao Nabian Chaoshan Grilled Fresh Beef," with about 600 stores, and listed in Hong Kong in 2020. On July 30, 2024, Tai Er Sauerkraut Fish under Jiumaojiu announced a strategic cooperation with Meituan, with the two sides exploring more in delivery and in-store business segments. To open up the delivery market, Tai Er Sauerkraut Fish opened a number of "satellite stores" that are "smaller, have fewer staff and do not offer dine-in." In addition, Jiumaojiu incubated multiple single-person rice meal sets starting at 35 yuan, such as mao xue wang and boiled beef, forming a delivery product matrix independent of the dine-in gathering menu, which laid a solid foundation for the rise in the company's delivery revenue share. Jiumaojiu said the growth drivers came from platform traffic dividends, expansion of the single-person meal product line for delivery and improved operating efficiency. Yum China has continued to develop delivery menus, adjust store delivery ranges and operate its own app and membership system. Tea drink brands have also connected mini-programs, memberships, in-store pickup and third-party delivery into their store operating systems.
Delivery Opens Up New Incremental Growth for the Restaurant Industry
Currently, growth of the overall restaurant sector is under pressure. Statistics show that in the first half of this year, national restaurant revenue totaled 2,825.5 billion yuan, up 2.8% year on year, with growth continuously slowing. Restaurant companies pushing into delivery has opened up new growth space. Growth cases of many chain brands show that delivery does not divert dine-in business but opens up independent scenarios, independent customer groups and independent store formats, bringing incremental traffic and orders to chain restaurants. For a long time, the restaurant industry has been constrained by the three mountains of rent, labor and ingredient costs, with weak risk resistance, while the cost of delivery is calculated order by order, and such a profit model can better help restaurant companies cope with current industry difficulties. For example, Haidilao's delivery, because it reaches new customer sources, has brought it impressive incremental value. For a long time, hot pot dine-in has focused on group gatherings, and many households and young renters would not go to a store to eat hot pot but are willing to order delivery hot pot sets or single-person hot pot dishes, which belongs to entirely new scenario traffic. Haidilao's delivery growth is significantly higher than dine-in, with the increment mainly from home scenarios rather than competing for store gathering customers. Traditional Jiumaojiu stores focus on gatherings, and weekday lunch dine-in itself is relatively weak. By launching single-person rice meal sets starting at 35 yuan and supporting pure delivery satellite stores, Jiumaojiu gained entirely new traffic. Pizza naturally fits scenarios such as staying at home, binge-watching shows, simple family meals, office afternoon tea and late-night snacks, and many orders come from consumers who had no intention of visiting a store at all. Many families and young people ordering Domino's pizza delivery while at home represents demand that dine-in cannot cover. And the new demand brought by the delivery channel is large enough to support Domino's China in continuously densifying community stores. Tims has opened a large number of small directly operated stores in office buildings with very few seats. Many white-collar workers want to order coffee at their desks to stay alert and have no need to visit a store and sit down to consume, a typical incremental order created by delivery. Yujian Xiaomian's dine-in is mostly concentrated on nearby in-store dining. Its delivery version uses separate packaging for noodles and soup, opening up home and office single-person lunch scenarios.
Doing Delivery Well Requires Unlocking a "New Playbook"
In the past, many restaurants rejected delivery because their thinking had not changed, directly putting the entire menu online for delivery, with most orders coming from existing dine-in customers ordering online, which was merely a transfer of the existing base without new traffic, while also squeezing the back kitchen and dragging down the dine-in experience. To do delivery well, product restructuring is needed, creating a delivery-exclusive menu. Restaurant companies need to screen out dishes that withstand delivery, whose flavor declines little after cooling, that are not easy to spill and not easy to become soggy or release water. Dishes with fresh wok hei and extreme sensitivity to temperature can be left off delivery. Restaurant companies should separately develop set meals matching mainstream delivery scenarios: single-person meals, two-person simple meals, family sets and so on, to improve packaging efficiency. At the same time, packaging techniques should be adapted to achieve soup separation, thickened leak-proof packaging and adjusted pre-cooked doneness, making product compromises for the delivery experience. The pain point for many restaurants is that if dine-in peaks coincide with hot delivery, food comes out more slowly, dine-in table turnover falls and bad reviews surge. Drawing on the experience of Green Tea and Tai Er Sauerkraut Fish, internal renovation can be carried out in existing large stores, with an independent delivery preparation area and packing station set aside in the store and an independent food dispatch route. Alternatively, dedicated delivery stores can be added to achieve complete capacity isolation. In terms of channel mix, channels such as Meituan can be used to acquire new customers and gain incremental public-domain traffic, while self-operated mini-program channels can retain members and drive repeat purchases. In terms of operating strategy, layered operations can be carried out by business district, with office districts mainly promoting single-person lunch sets and community districts mainly promoting family sets and late-night snack sets. In terms of cost management, restaurant companies need to take into account channel fees, fulfillment fees, labor costs and so on to price reasonably. To adapt to the delivery business, restaurant companies need organizational transformation, building a data-sharing middle platform, setting up a delivery management team and reforming assessment indicators to achieve a closed loop of quality control. While seeing the new incremental growth that delivery brings to chain restaurant companies, one must also understand the efforts these companies make behind it. As more and more restaurant companies treat delivery as a strategic-level business rather than a supplementary channel, competition on this track has moved from a battle for traffic to a battle for capability. Whoever can make this delivery business deep and thorough will be able to seize the initiative in the next cycle.
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