Real Cases: How Restaurants Won (and Lost) the Chinese Traveler
Strategy articles are useful. Real businesses with real results are better. Here are four cases from the past two years — three wins, one cautionary tale — that every ANZ restaurant and hotel operator should study.
Case 1: Black Star Pastry (Sydney) — one photogenic cake, compounding returns
Black Star Pastry's Strawberry Watermelon Cake is now legendary, but the mechanics of its China success are worth understanding precisely.
In 2019, The New York Times named it "the world's most Instagrammed cake." Chinese travelers and students in Sydney started posting it on Xiaohongshu and Weibo. The hashtag translated as "first-love watermelon cake" (#初恋西瓜蛋糕#) accumulated over 200 million views on Weibo — organically, before the brand had any China operation at all.
The result? When Black Star Pastry finally opened its first China flagship store in Shanghai, it landed with pre-built brand recognition most brands spend years buying. Today the "Xigua" (watermelon) cake is a registered trademark, and the brand's Chinese identity is so established it named the cake after Sydney itself.
The lesson: You don't need a China marketing budget to start. You need one photogenic signature and happy Chinese customers with phones. But note — the virality only compounded because the product delivered. Chinese social platforms are brutally honest; the cake's quality earned the 200 million views.
Case 2: Hakata Ramen Shin-Shin (Fukuoka, Japan) — the Must-Eat List effect
This is the cleanest measurable case from Dianping's overseas expansion. A beloved local ramen shop — a 10+ year-old "hole in the wall" that started as a street stall — made Dianping's 2025 overseas Must-Eat List (必吃榜).
The owner's report: Chinese customer numbers grew nearly 40% after listing.
Notably, the 2025 overseas list favored exactly this kind of business: nearly 60% of listed restaurants were institutions operating 10+ years, and "authentic local flavor" beat luxury. Dianping's 900 million users aren't looking for white tablecloths — they're hunting for the real thing. That is excellent news for genuinely local ANZ businesses.
Case 3: Dubai's restaurants — what happens when a destination takes Dianping seriously
Dubai offers a preview of what a coordinated China strategy delivers. The Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism formally partnered with Meituan-Dianping on its "Welcome China" strategy, and Dubai hosted the first-ever overseas Must-Eat List launch in November 2025.
Results for listed businesses:
Review volumes for Dubai-listed restaurants grew more than 100% after the launch
Dubai food-related searches on Meituan/Dianping grew 80% year-on-year; related notes grew 452%
The restaurant Markette reported Chinese guests at 15% of its covers, targeting 25–30%
The lesson: When a destination's business community engages Chinese platforms systematically, Chinese traffic follows within months. Individual restaurants that move early ride the wave; those that don't watch competitors get listed around them.
Case 4: Fergburger (Queenstown, NZ) — the cautionary tale
Queenstown's famous burger institution was, for years, a Chinese-traveler "must-visit" — promoted across Chinese social media, with visitors famously queuing two hours.
In February 2025, a customer received a receipt with a racial slur printed in the name field. Within days the incident went viral on Chinese social media. The story escalated to the point where Fergburger wrote a formal apology letter to the Chinese Consulate in Christchurch; the employee was fired, and news coverage appeared across China.
Chinese visitors who had queued proudly for "the big burger" stopped coming. Local observers noted the queues no longer contained Chinese faces. Years of accumulated goodwill evaporated in a week — not because of the initial incident alone, but because the brand's reputation among Chinese consumers had never been actively managed, so there was no reservoir of trust, no established Chinese-language channel to respond through, and no relationship with the community whose word-of-mouth built the brand.
The lesson: Your Chinese reputation exists whether you manage it or not. It lives on Xiaohongshu and Dianping, it's permanent, and it compounds in both directions. Brands with active presence and goodwill can survive a crisis; invisible brands can't.
What the four cases add up to
Case | What they did | Result |
Black Star Pastry | Signature photogenic product + organic Chinese user content | 200M+ views, effortless China market entry |
Hakata Ramen Shin-Shin | Earned Dianping Must-Eat List status | ~40% more Chinese customers |
Dubai restaurants | Destination-level Dianping partnership | +100% review volume, Chinese guests to 15–25% of covers |
Fergburger | No active Chinese reputation management | Years of goodwill lost in one week |
The pattern is clear: visibility on Chinese platforms is now an operational asset, like food safety or your Google rating. It can be built deliberately, it compounds quietly, and it protects you when things go wrong.
BridgeReach helps ANZ restaurants and hotels build exactly this kind of presence — accurate Dianping listings, consistent Xiaohongshu content, and a reputation you control.
Tell us about your business and we'll show you where Chinese travelers can (and can't) find you today. Free.
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