Cotti Coffee

It’s super rare for any business to open 10,000 franchised locations within its first three years of operation, and generally a sign that something unusual is going on. That certainly appears to be the case with Cotti Coffee, a Chinese coffee and tea company that opened its first location in October 2022 following its founders’ forced exit from rival chain Luckin Coffee, where they were implicated in an accounting scandal. Cotti is apparently luring franchisees by taking no franchise or branding fees, and the first Orange County location has opened in Tustin – kind of.

Tustin’s Cotti Coffee isn’t a standalone coffee shop: Instead, it bizarrely shares space, seating, management, and service staff with the decade-old boba and acai bowl shop Leaf N Cream, even though they’re being operated as separate businesses with different hours, menus, and even ordering systems. There are signs for both businesses outside – Cotti’s temporary – and inside, a mix of posters and menus that would bewilder pretty much anyone who didn’t already know what separated one concept’s offerings from the other’s.

Unlike Leaf N Cream, which we’ve really liked for years, our Cotti experience was so confusing and mediocre that we can’t easily understand the appeal. Cotti’s menu is roughly two-thirds coffee drinks, divided into “classic,” “fruity,” or “milk” versions – with fruit teas, milk teas, and frappes as the balance. By local standards, little stands out in Cotti’s menu, which aggressively offers oat and coconut milks, spotlights periwinkle-colored pampas crema drinks, and nestles several somewhat unusual fruit options, such as grape coffees and mango-coconut drinks. There are no pastries or other accompaniments for these drinks, unless you’re also interested in an acai or ice cream bowl from Leaf N Cream when the two concepts’ operating hours overlap; Cotti’s open in mornings, while Leaf N Cream is not. Even during lunch hours, you may need to order using a touchscreen for Leaf N Cream items and through a person for Cotti orders. Very little of the customer experience appears to have been properly thought out.