When Ancient Medicine Meets Modern Consumer Culture
In the heart of Shanghai, a curious scene unfolds nightly at Niang Qing, a bar where traditional Chinese medicine practitioners double as bartenders. Customers don’t just order drinks—they first submit to pulse readings and tongue examinations before receiving personalized herbal cocktails designed to balance their qi. This fusion of nightlife and healthcare represents one of the most intriguing consumer trends emerging from contemporary China: the commercialization of traditional Chinese medicine through food and beverage products.
This phenomenon extends far beyond cocktail bars. Across China’s urban centers, consumers can now purchase wolfberry gelato, ginseng-infused bubble tea, milkvetch root bread, and monkfruit americanos. The trend reflects a broader cultural shift as young Chinese professionals, stressed by demanding work environments and seeking alternatives to Western wellness products, rediscover traditional medicine through modern, accessible formats.
But beneath the aesthetic appeal and Instagram-worthy presentations lies a complex debate: Is this trend genuinely promoting health and preserving cultural heritage, or is it simply clever marketing that exploits wellness anxieties while diluting the scientific principles of TCM?
The Niang Qing Model: Legitimacy Through Credentials
The Business Structure
Niang Qing represents the more serious end of the TCM food and beverage spectrum. Founded by students from Shanghai University of TCM, the bar operates with a level of medical legitimacy that distinguishes it from purely commercial ventures. The founders maintain dual lives—studying TCM by day and running the bar by night—lending authenticity to their enterprise.
The business model is ambitious. After opening its first outlet in Anhui in 2024, Niang Qing expanded to two Shanghai locations in 2025 and has secured funding to open six additional outlets spanning from southeastern Zhejiang to northwestern Qinghai. This rapid expansion suggests strong investor confidence in the concept’s viability.
The Customer Experience
The Niang Qing experience follows a deliberate process designed to mirror traditional TCM consultation:
- Diagnosis Phase: An in-house “physician”—typically a recent TCM graduate—conducts pulse readings and tongue examinations
- Constitutional Assessment: The practitioner evaluates the customer’s body constitution according to TCM principles (such as yang deficiency, dampness, or heat patterns)
- Prescription Cocktail: A bartender creates a customized blend of yellow rice wine and herbs tailored to the diagnosed constitution
For example, customers diagnosed with “yang energy deficiency” might receive a warming cocktail containing angelica root, longan, dried ginger, and cinnamon—ingredients traditionally used to tonify yang energy in TCM theory.
The Legitimacy Question
Co-founder Wang Weijie, whose family grows Chinese herbs in Anhui province, is careful to position the bar within appropriate boundaries. He acknowledges they are “not a medical facility” and cautions against excessive drinking, while promoting their beverages as “less harmful to the human body” due to lower alcohol content.
This positioning is crucial. By maintaining medical credentials through their TCM education while disclaiming therapeutic intent, Niang Qing navigates the regulatory gray area between food service and healthcare provision. However, this ambiguity also raises questions about accountability and consumer protection.
The Broader TCM-Infused Product Landscape
Product Diversity and Market Penetration
The integration of TCM into food and beverage extends across multiple categories:
Beverages: Ginseng bubble tea, monkfruit coffee, herbal teas, and TCM cocktails create familiar delivery systems for traditional ingredients.
Baked Goods: Milkvetch root bread and “eight treasure scones” (offered by a TCM hospital in Yangzhou) represent attempts to incorporate herbs into staple foods.
Frozen Desserts: Wolfberry gelato and ice cream flavored with ginseng, angelica, and even hydrangea blur the line between treat and tonic.
Established Chains: Luli, a TCM bubble tea brand with over 160 outlets in China, has expanded internationally to Singapore, Malaysia, and Vietnam, demonstrating the concept’s export potential.
Institutional Involvement
Significantly, traditional TCM hospitals have entered the market, lending institutional credibility to the trend. When a TCM hospital in Yangzhou introduced medicinal buns in April 2025, long lines formed despite online skepticism. This institutional participation blurs the boundaries between medical treatment and commercial food service, raising both opportunities and concerns.
Market Economics: The 51.28 Billion Yuan Question
Quantifying the Boom
The financial dimensions of this trend are substantial. According to iiMedia Research, China’s wellness tea market grew approximately 25% in 2024, reaching 51.28 billion yuan (approximately USD 7 billion). Projections suggest this figure could more than double by 2028, indicating sustained momentum rather than a passing fad.
This growth occurs against the backdrop of China’s otherwise tepid consumer economy, where spending has remained constrained. The wellness sector’s resilience suggests it addresses genuine consumer needs rather than discretionary wants.
Demographic Drivers
The primary consumer base consists of young urban professionals, particularly those in their twenties and thirties, facing:
- Workplace Stress: Intense work cultures, long hours, and career pressure
- Mental Health Concerns: Rising rates of anxiety and insomnia
- Preventive Health Orientation: Shifting from reactive treatment to proactive wellness
- Cultural Identity: Desire to engage with Chinese traditions in contemporary ways
As TCM physician Tang Yao in Beijing observes, post-pandemic awareness has accelerated this trend, with more young people proactively seeking wellness solutions before developing serious health problems.
The Instagram Effect
Social media platforms amplify the trend through visually appealing content. Herbal cocktails in elegant glassware, colorful gelato labeled with medicinal herbs, and aesthetic tea presentations generate organic marketing through user-generated content. The trend benefits from being both culturally meaningful and visually shareable.
The Skeptics’ Perspective: “Paying an IQ Tax”
Public Skepticism
Not all consumers embrace the trend. An online poll by Beijing News revealed that 80 of 110 respondents would not purchase “medicinal bread,” dismissing it as “paying an IQ tax”—Chinese internet slang for wasting money on worthless products through gullibility.
The Economic Information Daily, a Xinhua subsidiary, published an article in May 2025 questioning whether the trend represents “genuine wellness or fake marketing,” reflecting mainstream media skepticism.
The Gelato Shop’s Honest Admission
Perhaps most tellingly, a shop assistant at a TCM-inspired gelato shop in Shanghai acknowledged the limitations candidly: “It’s just a psychological thing… in itself, there’s no real effect.” This admission reveals the disconnect between marketing implications and actual health benefits.
This honesty, while refreshing, also exposes the potential for consumer deception across the industry. If products are marketed with health associations but provide primarily psychological comfort, questions arise about truth in advertising and consumer protection.
Concerns About Misuse
Dr. Zhao Dandan, an assistant research fellow at Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, articulates a balanced but cautionary perspective. While acknowledging that increased exposure to TCM could promote wider acceptance, she warns of several risks:
Inappropriate Herb Consumption: Without proper diagnosis, consumers might consume herbs unsuited to their constitutions, potentially causing harm rather than benefit.
Dosage Issues: Food and beverage products may contain insufficient quantities to provide therapeutic effects, or conversely, excessive amounts that create health risks.
Gimmickry: Market saturation with low-quality products could dilute TCM’s reputation and obscure legitimate applications.
Knowledge Gap: Most consumers lack the expertise to evaluate whether products align with TCM principles, creating information asymmetry that favors marketers over consumer welfare.
The Cultural Preservation Argument
Popularization vs. Dilution
Proponents argue that commercial TCM products serve important cultural functions:
Accessibility: Traditional TCM consultations require time, expense, and often intimidating clinical settings. Food and beverage products lower barriers to entry.
Educational Gateway: Exposure through familiar products might inspire deeper interest in TCM principles and practices.
Cultural Continuity: Younger generations disconnected from traditional practices can reconnect through contemporary formats.
Economic Sustainability: Commercial success ensures TCM remains economically viable and can support practitioners, researchers, and institutions.
Wang Weijie of Niang Qing explicitly states this educational mission: “I hope people will have a new understanding of TCM culture, and come to like Chinese herbs.”
The Dilution Risk
Critics counter that commercialization threatens TCM’s integrity:
Oversimplification: TCM’s diagnostic and treatment principles are complex. Reducing them to flavor profiles in cocktails and ice cream may trivialize the medical system.
Profit Over Principles: Commercial incentives may prioritize marketability over medical appropriateness, selecting ingredients for exotic appeal rather than therapeutic value.
Loss of Rigor: If consumers view TCM as merely trendy flavoring rather than serious medicine, it may undermine efforts to establish TCM as evidence-based practice.
Cultural Appropriation Concerns: As products expand internationally (like Luli’s Southeast Asian outlets), questions arise about whether TCM’s cultural context is preserved or exploited.
Regulatory and Safety Considerations
The Regulatory Gray Zone
TCM-infused food and beverages occupy an ambiguous regulatory space between food products and medical treatments:
Food Safety Regulations: Apply to preparation, storage, and hygiene but typically don’t assess therapeutic claims or herb-drug interactions.
Medical Device/Drug Regulations: Apply to products making explicit health claims but may not cover “wellness” products with implied benefits.
TCM Practice Regulations: Govern practitioners providing diagnosis and treatment but may not extend to “consultations” at food establishments.
This regulatory ambiguity creates risks for consumers who may assume oversight protections that don’t exist.
Potential Health Risks
Several safety concerns merit attention:
Herb-Drug Interactions: Customers taking medications might not realize that herbal ingredients could interact with their prescriptions.
Allergic Reactions: Some traditional herbs can trigger allergies, particularly in concentrated forms.
Pregnancy and Health Conditions: Certain herbs contraindicated during pregnancy or with specific health conditions might be consumed unknowingly.
Quality Control: Unlike regulated pharmaceuticals, herbs in food products may have inconsistent potency, contamination, or adulteration.
Alcohol Interactions: In TCM bars, the combination of alcohol with herbs creates additional interaction risks.
Comparative Analysis: Global Wellness Trends
The Broader Context
China’s TCM commercialization parallels global wellness trends:
Adaptogenic Cafes in Western markets offer mushroom coffees and ashwagandha lattes, similarly blending traditional botanicals with modern beverage culture.
Ayurvedic Products have entered mainstream Western markets through turmeric lattes, golden milk, and dosha-balancing teas.
Functional Foods incorporating probiotics, CBD, nootropics, and other bioactive compounds represent a similar impulse to merge nutrition with therapeutic benefits.
Distinctive Elements
However, China’s TCM trend has unique characteristics:
Cultural Heritage: TCM represents indigenous medical tradition rather than imported exotic practice, carrying different cultural weight.
Institutional Support: Government backing for TCM development provides legitimacy and resources unavailable to alternative medicine in many countries.
Scale: China’s enormous domestic market and concentrated urban populations enable rapid expansion and experimentation.
Integration Depth: The involvement of TCM hospitals and medical students suggests deeper institutional integration than typical wellness trends.
Future Trajectories and Implications
Scenario One: Maturation and Regulation
The optimistic trajectory involves market maturation accompanied by appropriate regulation:
- Standards Development: Industry and government collaborate to establish quality standards, appropriate herb usage guidelines, and truthful marketing requirements
- Consumer Education: Increased public understanding of TCM principles enables informed choices
- Medical Integration: Legitimate establishments maintain high standards, while questionable operators are identified and regulated
- Research Validation: Scientific studies assess which applications provide genuine benefits versus placebo effects
Scenario Two: Market Correction
A more pessimistic trajectory involves market saturation and consumer backlash:
- Oversaturation: Excessive competition and declining quality lead to consumer fatigue
- Safety Incidents: Adverse events (allergic reactions, herb-drug interactions, contamination) generate negative publicity
- Regulatory Crackdown: Government intervention restricts or heavily regulates TCM food and beverage products
- Reputation Damage: Poor-quality commercial products undermine broader TCM credibility
Scenario Three: Bifurcation
The most likely trajectory may involve market splitting:
Premium Segment: Establishments like Niang Qing with legitimate TCM credentials maintain standards, charge premium prices, and serve educated consumers seeking authentic experiences.
Mass Market Segment: Lower-priced products emphasize flavor and trendiness over therapeutic authenticity, functioning primarily as novelty foods with tenuous health associations.
Medical-Grade Segment: TCM hospitals and clinics develop proprietary products with rigorous standards, creating a distinct category from commercial food service.
Conclusion: Beyond the Binary
The debate over TCM-infused food and beverages cannot be resolved through simple dichotomies of authentic versus fake, beneficial versus harmful, or cultural preservation versus exploitation. The phenomenon is simultaneously:
A Genuine Response to legitimate wellness needs among stressed urban populations seeking alternatives to pharmaceutical approaches and Western medical models.
A Marketing Opportunity that capitalizes on cultural nostalgia, wellness anxiety, and Instagram aesthetics, sometimes prioritizing profit over therapeutic integrity.
A Cultural Evolution adapting traditional medicine to contemporary lifestyles, potentially preserving relevance for younger generations while risking oversimplification.
An Experiment in Progress whose outcomes depend on choices made by regulators, entrepreneurs, medical professionals, and consumers themselves.
Key Considerations Moving Forward
For Consumers: Approach TCM food and beverage products with informed skepticism. Enjoy them as cultural experiences or pleasant treats, but don’t substitute them for proper medical care. Consult qualified TCM practitioners for genuine health concerns.
For Entrepreneurs: Balance commercial success with ethical responsibility. Maintain transparency about what products can and cannot do. Consider working with qualified practitioners to ensure appropriateness.
For Regulators: Develop frameworks that protect consumers without stifling innovation. Distinguish between products making explicit health claims (requiring stricter oversight) and those offering cultural experiences.
For TCM Professionals: Engage constructively with commercialization rather than dismissing it entirely. Provide guidance to ensure commercial products align with TCM principles and don’t misrepresent the medical system.
For Researchers: Conduct studies assessing whether these products provide measurable health benefits beyond placebo effects. This evidence base can guide both regulation and consumer choices.
The 51.28 billion yuan wellness tea market represents more than commercial opportunity—it reflects evolving relationships between tradition and modernity, culture and commerce, medicine and lifestyle. Whether this trend ultimately strengthens or weakens traditional Chinese medicine depends not on the trend itself, but on how stakeholders navigate its complexities and contradictions.
As customers at Niang Qing sip their personalized herbal cocktails after pulse readings, they participate in an experiment whose outcome remains uncertain. They are simultaneously consumers and cultural actors, their choices shaping whether TCM’s commercialization becomes a sustainable pathway to wellness or a cautionary tale of tradition commodified beyond recognition.
The question is not whether TCM belongs in bars and ice cream shops—cultural practices inevitably evolve and adapt. The question is whether this evolution will honor TCM’s medical sophistication and cultural heritage, or reduce it to trendy flavoring in service of social media aesthetics and profit margins. That answer is still being written, one herbal cocktail and wolfberry gelato at a time.