Fried chicken and stinky snail rice noodles.....

KFC localizing with stinky snail rice noodles in China. Luosifen (螺蛳粉) is a local specialty from the city of Liuzhou in Guangxi, Southern China. This traditional dish uses fermented bamboo shoots, green snails, fungus and fried beancurd along with spices to make up the soup base. The fermented bamboo shoots exposes a unique stench, even more smelly than stinky tofu, another traditional food in China.

Luosifen became popular all over China since 2013 after a feature in the documentary ‘a Bite of China’. Some celebrities have their own branded Luosifen on the market, including Li Ziqi, a famous youtube vlogger for traditional Chinese foods.

During the pandemic, the instant self-heating packaged Luosifen sales surged, both domestically and for export.

KFC has launched a series of self-heating instant foods under the brand KAIFENGCAI. Jumping on the bandwagon of an old joke that people in China were asking what KFC means, they were told it means KaiFengCai (meaning local food from the ancient city of KaiFeng). Besides Luosifen, the brand also includes chicken soups, chicken breast and fried rice.

KFC is no stranger to localization in China, since last year the fast food chain is delivering typical Chinese street foods.

#china #chinesesociety #chineseretail #chinesemarket