Does it feel like the 9.9-yuan "extra-long egg tarts" are being sold everywhere across the globe? "The factories are running at full steam nonstop and making massive profits, but the tarts are so overly rich that you have to throw half of them away halfway through eating."

The 9.9-yuan extra-long egg tart has almost the same cost as the previously viral 48-yuan corn egg tart. When logistics, marketing, channel and other related costs are added up, the extra-long egg tart seems like a benevolent tart that comes to crack down on "baking price gougers"?

This Mid-Autumn Festival, the whole baking industry has fully stepped into the "extra-long" era.

The whole trend originated from the "extra-long egg tart", a 60cm standard-length viral internet-famous product that rose to fame unexpectedly. Its length is equivalent to 7 to 8 ordinary round small egg tarts, with a price ranging from 9.9 yuan to 18 yuan per piece. Many netizens revealed that they had already bought extra-long egg tarts on the market as early as last year, but the special-shaped tarts did not go viral back then, until September this year. The exact same product with the exact same appearance, at a different time point, the old tart has made a comeback and spread to bakeries, coffee shops and roadside stalls run by independent operators across the country.

Source: Photo by Hydrogen Business

The full name of this new internet-famous snack is actually "extra-extra-extra-extra-extra-long egg tart". Looking back at all the internet-famous foods that became popular for their extreme length over the years, including tornado potato, strawberry tower and long candied haws, almost none of them needed to use the word "long" for 5 times. Its length breaks common cognition, making this new viral product a perfect prop for social media photos.

"The first thing to do after getting it is to take photos", some people hold the extra-long egg tart and wave it towards the screen to perfectly replicate the male protagonist in the animation "Sword of Coming", roaming the world with it; super fans of "iPartment" also found that the iPhone 18 held by Hu Yifei in the show back then was actually an extra-long egg tart. This kind of egg tart has a fatal attraction to Chinese men, because their most common hobbies are suddenly doing an air basketball shooting gesture while walking on the road, and picking up a straight long stick on the roadside.

The extra-long egg tart is not only long enough, but also has a feature different from previous internet-famous foods: it is so cheap that people can hardly believe it. A regular egg tart at KFC and Holiland costs 8 yuan, and Yulian Tea House, a milk tea brand that became famous for selling egg tarts, charges 12 yuan for a basic egg tart. Now, the discounted price of extra-long egg tarts in many bakeries is only 9.9 yuan, which carries a kind of down-to-earth beauty of daily life.

Some people are asking if it is worth it. To be reasonable, even Luckin Coffee has long stopped its 9.9-yuan promotion. A dessert that can satisfy at least 5 adults is no longer the most important question of whether it is worth it. Because we have not seen such a internet-famous snack suitable for people of all ages for a long time. You can even play with it for eight days and nights without eating it, and for egg tart lovers, they can really enjoy it to the fullest.

On September 20, after Baoshuifu launched the extra-long egg tart, Hydrogen Business bought one for 17.8 yuan immediately. "It tastes just like ordinary egg tart, with thinner crust and more filling". The 6 people in the editorial department shared it, the taste was not particularly amazing, and we only remembered that it was extremely crispy.

"We have not been in such a mess for eating something in the editorial department for a long time", the egg tart started to shed crumbs the moment it was taken out of the box, and after dividing it into 6 portions, there were so many crumbs that we almost needed to apologize to the cleaning aunt.

Source: Photo by Hydrogen Business

Sharing and social interaction are the top priorities of eating internet-famous egg tarts. Many netizens shared that "they felt greasy after eating only one third of it and had to throw the rest away". Many media estimated that the calorie of one extra-long egg tart may exceed 1000 kcal, close to even two meals. "For adults, it is simply a calorie bomb."

Many netizens also feedback that "there is not enough egg tart custard, it is almost all crust", and some even don't know how to take it to the subway because it is too long, even if they take it out, they don't know how to eat it, "Should I use a spoon?"

Even so, it does not affect this highly visually impactful egg tart to become viral all over the internet. "Where can I buy it in Beijing?" "Is it available in Xi'an?" A few days ago, some media reported that in stores in some regions, each person is limited to buy 5 pieces, and some stores require queuing for 2 to 3 hours to purchase, with the daigou (proxy purchasing) price soaring to 56.8 yuan per piece.

There are even exclusive extra-long egg tart shops in Tianjin, and the female protagonist who gets rich in AI manhua has started to amaze the silicon-based code with extra-long egg tarts. Now this new viral product has even become popular in the different dimension, but no matter the appearance of the egg tart or its outer package is almost the same: a whole brown rectangular outer box, with light yellow text printed on it: "Extra-long, 60CM, Crispy, Fragrant".

Source: Xiaohongshu @Xiaozhi aigc

The explosive popularity of extra-long egg tarts was actually expected long ago.

This category itself is classic enough. As a dessert that has been born for about 300 years, even the basic version with round basin-shaped tart crust and caramel egg tart has become the stable income guarantee for many brands, such as KFC, Holiland and Yulian Tea House mentioned above.

Besides, egg tart is a high-incidence area of pre-made desserts. With pre-made frozen tart crust, you only need to prepare the egg custard, put it in the oven and bake for 15 to 18 minutes, then you can open your own bakery.

After that, egg tart brands started to make efforts on "toppings", such as the viral Heytea egg tart last year, which made egg tarts in the same way as making milk tea: added finger biscuits, cream, tiramisu powder on the top, stuffed all kinds of flowing heart fillings inside, and even mixed vanilla seeds into the egg custard; as well as the corn egg tart that also became popular last year, with a roasted crispy sweet corn on the basic version, sold for 48 yuan and teased by netizens as "the Hermès of egg tarts".

Bakeries even want to build a single-family villa on the egg tart, but consumers no longer buy it as the price keeps rising.

Therefore, brands like KFC started to work on the size of egg tarts. The dessert as big as a child's fist was forcibly made into a milky sweet pizza, a giant round tart sold for 29.9 yuan, which is more expensive but not suitable for taking photos for social media. If you walk on the street holding an egg tart bigger than your face, passers-by will only think that a Uyghur person is baking naan.

After all kinds of attempts, there are not many choices left to make new innovations on egg tarts. However, nowadays extra-long egg tarts have also started to add all kinds of fillings, with various fruits and milk tea toppings placed on top, which is no different from a kind of "semi-open roujiamo".

Compared with netizens' purchasing demand, the factories may be more nervous. These days "all the pastry sheeters across the country have been overloaded to the point of smoking".

Dongdongyun, the supply chain service provider of the currently on-sale extra-long egg tarts, revealed on its official account that "this Mid-Autumn Festival, mooncakes have been squeezed out of the shelves in advance by extra-long egg tarts". After adding several egg tart crust suppliers, Hydrogen Business found that their WeChat Moments are all promoting "limited stock of extra-long egg tart crusts, first come first served", but there was no reply after we asked for an interview. Presumably all the bosses are too busy making money to chat.

Jiupai News interviewed Mr. Chen, the founder of Dongdongyun, and learned that since this product was launched in August, 16,000 boxes have been sold so far. Since it was put on shelves on September 10, the turnover on Taobao has soared from 2000 yuan to 15000 yuan, and even reached 60000 yuan on September 15.

At present, 2 factories in Wuhan are stepping up production, with a daily capacity of 1000 to 2000 boxes per factory, and the standard specification of one box is 60 pieces of semi-finished products. "We are urged to deliver goods by customers as early as 6 a.m., and often reply to messages until 2 a.m." There are also large-volume purchases from Henan, Shandong and even Xinjiang.

Source: Photo by Hydrogen Business

An egg tart is mainly composed of tart crust and egg custard, and the most sought-after part of the "extra-long egg tart" is the crust.

Because the packaging paper factory can produce the packaging boxes in large quantities easily, Yang Xiaoqing, the founder of Zhongbei Tart, the supplier of Baoshuifu and Holiland, developed the "four-in-one" frozen egg custard as early as 2011. That means the only problem left to solve is the "tart crust".

Traditional egg tarts need to be eaten right after they are made. The tart crust needs to go through processes such as low-temperature slow proofing and constant temperature fermentation, but most of the extra-long tart crusts in bakeries on the market are purchased. "This product is a frozen semi-finished product. After purchasing, the bakery bakes it with a baguette baking tray, and the baking time for each piece is about 30 minutes", Mr. Chen also pointed out.

Zhongbei Tart also solved this problem. In 2019, Zhongbei Tart developed the 64-lamination crisping technology. By precisely controlling the ratio and temperature of dough and butter, as well as the "rolling precision", the egg tart can keep crispy for 8 hours at room temperature, no matter it is eaten cold or hot. Since then, many consumers have become keen on eating "frozen egg tarts", "the filling becomes as soft as cream ice cream after slightly thawing, while the tart crust remains crispy and fragrant."

The only remaining difficulty may be the shaping of the tart crust. Mr. Chen also revealed in the interview, "At the craft level, the core difficulty lies in using special crisping equipment to make the layers, to ensure that the whole tart crust is straight and the layers are crispy."

From egg custard to tart crust, the extreme industrialization allows extra-long egg tarts to quickly flow to thousands of consumers. Zhongbei Tart once estimated that the daily consumption of egg tarts in China has reached 40 million pieces, and it is expected to increase to 60 million pieces by 2027, with a compound annual growth rate of over 10%.

Source: Xiaohongshu @POKONI Dandelion Cake Dessert

Industrialization also brings down the cost of extra-long egg tarts. An industry insider revealed that the wholesale price of the raw semi-finished product is about 4 yuan per piece. When the corn egg tart became viral before, a raw material supply chain also revealed that the total cost of all raw materials is about 5 to 6 yuan.

That means, the 9.9-yuan extra-long egg tart and the 48-yuan corn egg tart have almost the same cost. When logistics, marketing, channel and other related costs are added up, the extra-long egg tart seems like a benevolent tart that comes to crack down on "baking price gougers". Why is it so cheap?

For chain baking brands such as Luxihe and Baoshuifu, the extra-long egg tart is more like a drainage item.

Baking is an industry highly dependent on internet-famous hit products. Meituan's "2024 Baking Consumption Report" shows that egg tarts account for 35% of the search volume in the baking category, becoming the top 1