Mass snack retail sector welcomes Hong Kong stock market players again: Huitongda partners with Snack Selection

The capital landscape of the bulk snack industry is once again stirring.

On February 28, Hong Kong-listed company Hui Tongda Network signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Snack Preferred. The announcement states that both parties will establish a joint venture as the sole operator of the “Snack Preferred” brand chain.

In the future, Snack Preferred will maintain regional autonomous operations, continuing to deepen its focus on the hard-discount bulk snack sector; Hui Tongda will provide support in platform development, ecosystem building, capitalization, and AI capabilities.

As a result, another participant with a listed company background has entered the bulk snack track.

This cooperation occurs at a point when the industry landscape is rapidly consolidating. The business logic of bulk snacks is not complicated: the more stores, the more centralized procurement, the stronger bargaining power, and the more stable gross profit margins; once scale is achieved, it becomes increasingly difficult for latecomers to catch up.

Since 2023, the two leading companies in bulk snacks have been expanding through mergers and acquisitions, now approaching a total of 40,000 stores, with a combined market share exceeding 70%.

Among them, Mingming Busy has completed its listing in Hong Kong, and Wancheng Group’s “A+H” process is also underway. The combination of capital and scale further strengthens the Matthew Effect.

In contrast, as a regional brand, Snack Preferred has a certain scale foundation but faces constraints in nationwide expansion and capital operations.

Hui Tongda values the offline network expansion potential brought by the high-frequency consumption scenario of bulk snacks.

As an industrial internet platform, Hui Tongda has recently been promoting the integration of AI with offline store scenarios, strengthening systematic support for physical retail terminals.

On the supply chain front, its member store system is expected to access Snack Preferred’s hard-discount snack resources, optimize product mix, increase customer flow and repeat purchases, and explore a standardized replication path of “fast-moving consumer upgrade + small store chain,” thereby enhancing platform and store loyalty and profitability.

In terms of AI and digitalization, Hui Tongda has commercialized applications based on its self-developed “Qiancheng Cloud AI Large Model” and related AI Agents in retail chain scenarios.

After this cooperation, the relevant systems can be quickly deployed to Snack Preferred’s 2,800 stores, integrating data, decision-making, and operations—covering product selection, warehousing and distribution, store management, and community operations—achieving more refined management.

The high-frequency consumption nature of bulk snacks and their community scene stickiness will also help Hui Tongda fill an important piece in the hard-discount track.

Whether it can overtake on the bend remains to be seen over time. But it is certain that, against the backdrop of increasing industry concentration, expansion along a single dimension is no longer enough to shake the existing pattern. The competition will ultimately shift toward supply chain efficiency and systemic capabilities.

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