Haidilao operates roughly 1,490 restaurants across four continents. Three of them sit in the United Kingdom. None sit in DACH.
That gap is not a backlog. It is a decision – and the corporate structure that produced it changed in December 2022, in a way that makes the decision durable.
What we see
Haidilao Group splits into two listed entities. Haidilao International Holding (HK:6862, IPO 2018) holds China, Hong Kong, and Macau. Super Hi International (HK:9658 since 30 December 2022, NASDAQ dual-listing since May 2024) holds every restaurant outside Greater China – 122 units across 14 countries at end of 2024, including the three UK locations (London Piccadilly, London O2, Birmingham Bullring). Zhang Yong remains the controlling shareholder of both.
Super Hi's CEO told Bloomberg in September 2024 that the company "will not do much exploration in the near term for the next 2 to 3 years" in Europe. Capital priority: the United States, plus deepening the existing 14-country footprint. DACH is not on that list. It has never been on that list – the 2019 real-estate brief that Haidilao circulated to property agents named eight UK priority cities, none in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland.
What it tells us
The DACH skip is structural, not tactical. Three variables overlap to make it so:
Diaspora density. UK ethnic-Chinese population: roughly 440,000 (ONS Census 2021). Germany: 160,000. Austria: 13,000. Switzerland: 30,000. The UK base is more than twice the combined DACH base. For a brand whose first-cohort customers are reliably the diaspora, that ratio decides which European country gets store one.
Real-estate economics. Haidilao's format requires 600–900 sqm in A-locations (one third of that floorspace is the wait-area amenity zone – manicures, snacks, games). Prime monthly rents (EUR/sqm, 2024): Leicester Square 120–180; Berlin Friedrichstrasse 180–280; Munich Maximilianstrasse 250–380; Zurich Bahnhofstrasse 450–700. London is the cheapest A-location option. DACH A-locations are also structurally short on gastro-zoned floorplates above 500 sqm – UK shopping-mall stock offers more.
Category readiness. YouGov 2024 Asia-Food-Familiarity: 34% of German consumers say they "know" hot pot, 11% would try it. UK comparison: 58% / 29%. The DACH category is a niche. The UK category is a mainstream-adjacent format with a built-in audience.
Why it matters now
A US-incoming chain reading "Europe" as one market will mis-allocate. Super Hi's read of Europe is granular: UK first because the variables align, DACH skipped because they don't, and the next 2–3 years committed to the US and deeper penetration of existing markets. That is a more disciplined market-entry sequencing than most Western chains apply in reverse – DACH operators evaluating US or APAC expansion routinely treat geographies as undifferentiated capacity.
The Haidilao calculus is the inverse of the standard playbook: read the consumer-base density first, the real-estate math second, the brand-stretch ambition third. Skip any country where two of three break.
The Super Hi spin-off changes who decides
For the first 28 years of Haidilao's history, one balance sheet held every restaurant. The 30 December 2022 distribution-in-kind listing of Super Hi separated that. No new capital was raised. 90% of Super Hi shares were distributed pro rata to existing Haidilao shareholders. The result: two separate management teams, two separate capital-allocation mandates, two separate strategic horizons.
The 6862.HK parent, post-spin, runs China only. 1,368 restaurants at end of 2024 (+62 year-on-year), RMB 42.75 billion in revenue (+3.1%). Domestic margin compression in 2024 (interim net profit –9.74%) prompted a 2024 announcement: a controlled franchise pilot in Tier 3/4 Chinese cities, breaking three decades of direct-operation doctrine. That decision is about home-market saturation, not Europe.
Super Hi runs everything else. 122 restaurants, 14 countries, USD 778 million revenue in 2024, adjusted EBITDA margin around 8%. Profitable since the spin-off. Direct-operation only – no franchise model planned outside China.
Two facts compound. Super Hi is small (USD 778 million is roughly 3% of group revenue). Super Hi is profitable. Smallness plus profitability produces conservatism: deep cultivation of the 14 existing countries, US push, no exploratory expansion. DACH falls outside that perimeter by design.
The UK proves the model travels – and shows what gets cut
The three UK stores are the cleanest read on what Haidilao will and will not localise.
Localised: Halal certification (London demographic). Spice scale reduced from 7 grades to 5. Exotic offal removed (duck tongue, goose blood). Broth menu trimmed from 30+ varieties to 12.
Not localised: the service theatre. Hand massages and manicures during the wait. The noodle-pulling performance. The face-changing show. Free phone covers, hair ties, glasses-cleaning cloths. None of it was softened for the UK market. Noodle-master training: 4–6 months, identical to the China standard.
The UK presence is small (3 stores after seven years against the 2018 announcement of "first of 20 planned London restaurants") and was kept that way deliberately. London Piccadilly and London O2 anchor the brand in the most-visible Western city. Birmingham Bullring tests a regional shopping-mall format. No Manchester store exists despite earlier reports – it never opened.
That sequencing – flagship plus mall test, hold and observe – is what a conservative Super Hi management does in a market where the variables broadly fit. In a market where they do not, the same management does nothing.
What would change the calculus
Three triggers, in declining order of likelihood:
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A Super Hi M&A event. A strategic buyer (Reliance Retail, a US PE platform, a regional Asian conglomerate) acquiring Super Hi could re-prioritise full-EU coverage as a portfolio storyline. Without an ownership change, capital discipline holds.
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Diaspora crystallisation in a DACH metro. A measurable expansion of Chinese tech-expat or student communities in Berlin, Munich, or Zurich (current Chinese student count in Germany: roughly 43,000, trend slightly down) could lift the early-customer base above the threshold Haidilao reads as viable.
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Automation reducing labour intensity. Haidilao's Beijing flagship runs robot servers and AI kitchen automation. If that stack matures enough to absorb DACH minimum-wage pressure (MiLoG 2024: EUR 12.41/hour, hitting service-theatre formats disproportionately), the unit economics could close – earliest realistic window: 2028.
None of these are imminent.
The pattern beyond Haidilao
The DACH skip is not a Haidilao quirk. It is a category. Premium-positioned, service-intensive, A-location-dependent foreign concepts with a diaspora-anchored early customer base will read DACH the same way: smaller diaspora than the UK, tighter A-location supply, weaker category awareness, sharper labour-cost gradient. Each variable is a friction point. Two together delay entry. Three together cancel it.
Germany is, again, the legible case. Long data series on diaspora demographics, transparent commercial-real-estate reporting, well-documented foodservice category data. The same calculus runs in Austria and Switzerland with smaller absolute numbers and a worse rent denominator.
For DACH operators reading this from the other side: Haidilao's seven-year UK presence at three stores is not a failure of nerve. It is what disciplined international expansion looks like when capital is finite and management bandwidth is the actual scarce resource. The lesson translates back. Three excellent stores beat twenty average ones, and the market that says no to you twice is telling you something the spreadsheet should have caught the first time.
Super Hi reads it the same way – and its read of DACH is no.
Sources
- Bloomberg (11.09.2024): "China Hot Pot Chain Plans US Expansion to Escape Slump at Home"
- Super Hi International IR (ir.superhiinternational.com): HK:9658 listing 30.12.2022; NASDAQ dual-listing 2024; FY/Q reports 2024
- Law.asia: "Haidilao restaurant spin-off Super Hi lists on HKEX"
- HKEX 6862.HK Prospectus (26.09.2018)
- Caixin Global (06.11.2018): "Hot Pot Chain Haidilao to Open First of 20 Planned London Restaurants"
- Retaildestination.co.uk; squaremeal.co.uk; haidilaouk.com (accessed 2026-04-19)
- ONS Census 2021 (UK ethnic-Chinese population); Destatis, BFS, Statistik Austria (DACH ethnic-Chinese demographics)
- YouGov (2024): Asia-Food-Familiarity panel
- CBRE / JLL DACH commercial real-estate reports 2024
- TipRanks; Companiesmarketcap: 2024 FY revenue and store-count data