Bakery brands are winning hearts with guochao — a trend seeing younger buyers drawn to products with Chinese cultural elements. [Photo/WeChat account: hongqiaoshangwuqu]
The 25th Bakery China, the world's largest professional exhibition for baking, confectionery, and sugar products, kicked off on May 22 at the National Exhibition and Convention Center (Shanghai) in the Hongqiao International Central Business District, attracting more than 2,000 brands from all over the world and showcasing over 20 categories of niche products and more than 10,000 new items.
The event held this year was an exceptional achievement, showcasing a remarkable total exhibition area of nearly 280,000 square meters. The venue was composed of 10 halls that were exclusively dedicated to equipment, packaging, raw materials, and prefabricated baking, representing a significant increase of 30 percent from the previous peak.
In recent years, baking has been put on the fast track of prefabricated food, creating a new path that satisfies diversified scenarios and convenient and nutritious demands — pre-made baking.
Guochao, a trend that is seeing younger buyers drawn to products with Chinese cultural elements, has become a new fashion and extended to the baking industry.
Guochao baking related to traditional Chinese cultures is expressed in an innovative and fashionable way, revitalizing traditional Chinese pastries while giving them new life. Many industrial chain enterprises followed suit to make Guochao baking a highlight during this year's exhibition.
XinCan Food showcased a range of guochao pastries, including the waking lion, the jade rabbit, and the flower cake, at its booth. These small, exquisite snacks boasted not only unique tastes but also adopted new flavors like Longjing tea, Sichuan-style beef filling, and grapefruit mojito, which attracted many consumers.
The independently packaged pastries make them suitable for various scenarios such as breakfast, afternoon tea, and leisure activities. The new products of Chinese-style baking tend to be more in line with the fast-paced modern lifestyle.
In addition to traditional Chinese desserts such as mooncakes and green bean cakes, guochao baking brands also introduced innovative Chinese-Western products during the event. For instance, Shanghai Tairui Food Co put the traditional puff pastry technique on Western-style bread, making products like the Western-style puff pastry chicken leg. This combination of Chinese and Western cuisine satisfied young people's pursuit of novelty.
