In March 2025, a Mixue Ice Cream & Tea branch in Sri Sinar Segambut (泗岩沫), Malaysia, put up a job advertisement for waiters and supervisors with a note that only 'experienced Malays and Chinese' need apply, excluding Indian applicants.
The wording was flagged as racial discrimination — a sensitive issue in multi-ethnic Malaysia — and spread quickly on social media, drawing criticism of the Chinese-owned chain's hiring.
Mixue Malaysia responded by removing the advertisement, saying it contradicted the brand's values, and stated it was reviewing its recruitment process at the branch.
The company promised to strengthen messaging on diversity and equal opportunity in its hiring, treating the incident as an error by a single branch rather than company policy, but the episode still drew attention to how a local hiring decision can land a global brand in a racial-preference controversy.
The company removed the ad and promised to review hiring, but the screenshot had already spread, costing the brand its inclusive image.
In multi-ethnic Malaysia a hiring preference stated in an ad reads as institutional discrimination, not a local staffing choice.
A single branch's wording was enough to put the whole brand on the defensive, because the ad carried the Mixue name.
The job posting was written into the public record, so there was no way to walk it back as a misunderstanding.
A brand that markets itself as affordable and everywhere cannot afford to look like it picks customers or workers by race.
A local hiring ad is a brand statement. One Malaysian branch's 'Malays and Chinese only' note put the whole Mixue chain into a race-discrimination controversy — pulled too late to undo the screenshot.
Mixue Malaysia removed the advertisement and promised to review and correct the branch's recruitment process while reinforcing its commitment to diversity and equal opportunity. The incident was reported by Malaysian media as an example of how a small, local human-resources decision can escalate into a brand-level reputational issue for an international chain, and it underscored how sensitive hiring wording is in a multi-ethnic market.
FOLLOW THE EVIDENCE