The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2025
Chayan Yuese, a brand built on original design, was caught copying twice in under 50 days
The tea brand's co-branded notebook copied independent designers. It admitted 'unauthorized appropriation' and pulled it — its second plagiarism in 50 days.
Chayan Yuese · 2025-08
What happened
茶颜悦色 (Chayan Yuese) is a milk-tea brand from Changsha that grew into one of China's best-known 'new consumption' names, building its identity on an original '国风' (national style) aesthetic — illustrated packaging, literary copywriting, carefully designed merchandise. Originality was the brand's selling point. Ironically, it had long been a victim of copycats itself: as early as 2017 it printed a self-mocking line on its receipts — 'once we have money, we'll sue them!'
In July 2025 customers noticed that the packaging of one of Chayan Yuese's snacks looked extremely similar to the cover of 方大同 (Khalil Fong)'s album 《梦想家》 (The Dreamer). After the comparison spread online, the brand took the product down and apologised. Within weeks it happened again.
On 22 August 2025 Chayan Yuese and the Shanghai Rainbow Chamber Singers launched co-branded products, including a notebook called '活在爱里面' (Living in Love). Independent designers pointed out that a calendar page mirrored one of their 2024 designs, that a back cover and badge used another's collage without permission, and that a travel cup 'borrowed' a third designer's character. On 24 August the brand apologised, admitting the notebook '确实存在部分未经授权的挪用' — contained some unauthorised appropriation — and the product was pulled. It later obtained the designers' retroactive authorisation.
Why it happened
- Chayan Yuese sold on original design, so copying struck at the very thing that distinguished it — the brand had more to lose from plagiarism than a generic competitor would.
- Co-branding spread the work across partners and suppliers, and the brand's review did not catch that contributed designs were taken from independent artists without permission.
- The first apology in July did not change the process, so the same failure recurred in August — turning an isolated lapse into a pattern that the second apology could not contain.
- Having once been a copycat's target, the brand knew exactly how the harmed designers felt, which made being cast as the infringer especially damaging to its story.
The lesson
A brand built on original design has the most to lose from copying. A collaboration outsources the making, never the blame. Chayan Yuese, once a copycat's victim, was caught copying twice in 50 days.
Aftermath
Chayan Yuese said it had contacted the designers, apologised, and reached agreements with three of them to keep using the designs with their authorisation. But two plagiarism controversies in under 50 days left a mark on a brand whose identity rested on originality, and commentators noted the irony of a onetime copycat victim now cast as the infringer. The lesson for other brands was about a collaboration's supply chain: when a product carries your name, the originality of every contributed element is your responsibility, and a design 'borrowed' without permission becomes your apology to make.
Sources
- Sohu: 50天内2次抄袭，茶颜悦色为何从受害者变为侵权者 (two incidents, admission, takedown)
- National Business Daily: 涉嫌抄袭，茶颜悦色道歉! (August notebook incident, apology)
- 36Kr: 茶颜悦色为什么总是在'抄'? (two apologies in two months)
spotted an error? The club wants to know.
More like this
A snack brand called itself 'nationwide No.1 in sales' on a survey nobody could check
Haihe Milk's livestream host used sexual innuendo to sell milk
A Guilin bakery turned a nearby earthquake into a '520' promotion
Somewhere, someone solved the problem this company failed at. 2nd Opinion →
Comments · 0
Sign in to join the comments.