Forum Settings
       
Reply To Thread

Kao - How'd they do it?Follow

#1 Jan 06 2004 at 7:31 PM Rating: Excellent
Do you know how Starbucks gets all those people into their coffee shops in the morning? I'm only 2 months old but want to pull a bigger crowd quicker. Or anyone out there. I've done the marketing 101 techniques plus other things, but Starbucks or other popular coffee shops must have a gimmick I don't know.
#2 Jan 06 2004 at 8:08 PM Rating: Excellent
Avatar
******
29,919 posts
Starbucks has a reputation for quickness in the mornings. They have very fast registers and a fairly quick turnaround time for most coffee products and cocoa in the morning, when speed is prefferential to atmosphere. That, and the Starbucks brand has alot of recognition, so even if their coffe isn't the best in the world, peope know they can go there and get a cup that will taste pretty much like any other starbucks coffe whereever they are.

I think another main advantage of alot of starbucks is the pairing between Starbucks and Barnes and Noble. People like being able to walk in their coffee shop, grab the latest newspaper/magizine on their way to work.

One of the things that a coffee house that most of us Intel guys frequint in the mornings does is send out a "mornings only" coupon to an e-mail list. It seems to work quite well.

The wifi and internet access stuff seems to mostly come into play in the afternoons and lunches from what I can see. Although I wonder if a well placed TV showing news in the morning or maybe stock tickers would be helpful? I dunno.

I have a newsticker application that looks really spiffy on a wall mount flatscreen I could send you if you want to take a look at it. it would need some modification most likely, but it would be something unique that I bet the other guys don't have.
#3 Jan 06 2004 at 8:36 PM Rating: Excellent
I'd appreciate that. With us being new we just have to wait it out till people find us. But I'm always looking for that edge over the other guy. Thanks.

Edited, Tue Jan 6 20:37:55 2004 by Stok
#4 Jan 06 2004 at 8:44 PM Rating: Excellent
Avatar
******
29,919 posts
alright, look for a zip file from piercet@.... sometime tomorrowish.
#5 Jan 06 2004 at 8:44 PM Rating: Good
Lunatic
******
30,086 posts
BRAND IDENTITY

Have you read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?

Buying starbucks coffee is like having a towell. People who see you drinking Starbucks coffee assume that you're a hip upper middle class pseudo intelectual who listens to jazz and the Rolling Stones, drives a Volvo and is worried about Global Warming.

People who see you drinking Java Time cofee assume that you were to cheap to go to Starbucks because they don't accept foodstamps.

Also Predictibility

People know what they're getting when they go to Starbucks. Decent quality, high prices, and qucik service. People like comfort. It's not comforting to go to a new coffee shop when you know what you're going to get at Starbucks. This is also the reason most people don't open up Burger Time! In places that have a MacDonalds near by. It doesn't even matter that MacDonalds hamburgers suck, as long as they suck consistently so people know what to expect. Xenophobia is the death of most small retail buisness.

There is also the little matter of the fact that
STARBUCKS HAS A BILLION TIMES THE MARKET SHARE, NAME RECOGNITION, AND ADVERTISING BUDGET THAT YOU DO

Every heard of BeOS? Probably not. It was stunningly well thought out and designed operating system in the early '90s. Sold for less than Windows, did more, was super stable, destroyed Windows in any sort of benchmark testing etc.

No one bought it.


Want some free advice?

Find a targeted demographic you want to sell to and HAMMER them with geurilla advertising. Do stupid things that get you name recognition. Loose money on purpose. Give cofee away on Tuesdays for a month all day. Hire strippers. Light the store on fire once a week. Whatever it takes to get people to know that your place exists at all. Then you'll be past the hardest part of comepting against a Fortune 500 company.

There's a place called Fuel in Boston, in Kenmore Sq. Right across from Fenway. It's a coffee shop, it was also right next to a Starbucks. They were able to tailor their marketing to a specefic demographic to the point that the Starbucks moved. I remember being there at 2am during the celebration they threw when the Starbucks closed down. (of course there's still like 98 of them in Boston, but that's not the point).

This is what they did. I realize it's not your style, but it's a demonstration in how targeted marketing can work.

On weekdays they opened at Midnight and closed at 4pm. They were open continuously from 6pm Friday till 4pm Sunday. They developed ludicrously silly custom drinks to compliment their normal offerings. My particular favorite was "the Melvin". It was 9 shots of espresso in 32 ounces of steamed milk flavored with orange syrup. $10 a pop, but if you couldn't make it to work or class after a Melvin at 3 AM you were likely dead. They employed hip young college kids, didn't care if they showed up late and let them play whatever music they felt like.

Did this drive away 40 year old Volvo driving soccer moms getting the morning skim decaff latte? Sure, but they were going to Starbucks anyway. They let people post things on a massive buliten board and didn't care much what it was. They lit kids sit around for four hours and not buy anything. They sold about 1000 tee shirts (designed by one of the kids who worked there) the first year ($20 each). They became in short a destination rather than a coffee shop. They became the place everyone went to sober up, as well as the place people went in the morning to feel connected to the college kid scene regardless of how old they were.

They established a demographic (young, don't give a **** and free) and marked toward that demographic untill they became INDENTIFIED with it. People who wanted to be young and carefree bought silly $10 cups of coffee in the way they wear Dock Martens on casual Fridays. "Hey look, I'm cool too!"


I'd recomend you do smoenthing simmiliar.

You need to do something to get people *IN* to the place. If your coffee sucks, well you're screwed anyway. If it's great then people will come back. If you can provide with them a $3 feeling that they're something they're not all the better. Hire 19 year old coeds named "Missy" and dress them up like Pilgrims. Anything to get people to say to other people "Have you been to Java Time? That's the strangest place I've ever been. Good coffee though."

Just my humble recomendation.

Edited, Tue Jan 6 20:45:58 2004 by Smasharoo
____________________________
Disclaimer:

To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.

#6 Jan 06 2004 at 9:04 PM Rating: Excellent
You are correct Smash and your opinion is very much appreciated. We are starting a guerrilla marketing campaing and gearing it towards the college a mile down the street. Don't mistake my online personality with my business persona. 2 totally different makes and models. I do like the Melvin idea though, too bad Starbucks isn't closer then I would have some place to steal customers from.

And I did read Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy - perhaps I need to pull it off the book shelf again.

Edited, Tue Jan 6 21:06:14 2004 by Stok
#7 Jan 06 2004 at 9:23 PM Rating: Excellent
Quote:
It was 9 shots of espresso in 32 ounces of steamed milk flavored with orange syrup. $10 a pop,


I like this idea. But I need a name and this is the drink...

6 shots of espresso in a 20 ounce cup with steamed milk and flavored with butterscotch syrup.

Rag Tail - was the original name I thinking about because all the waitresses at the Bar & Grill next door put their towels in the back pockets of their jeans and they swish like tails when they walk.

Does anyone else have a name for the elixir above?

I'm working on getting a couple of good looking girls to hand out coupons to the patrons of the local QT as they leave theparking lot. I had wanted them dressed as Ms Claus but it never came about. Trying to think of a different "costuming" idea.

FYI - and I know you where not being malicious about my coffee being bad. I have the best coffee in the area, I am pulling customers away from other shops just not as fast as I would like. I'm greedy, I want to be able to pay all the bills and have money left over after being open for just 3 months :)
#8 Jan 06 2004 at 9:37 PM Rating: Decent
Lunatic
******
30,086 posts
Nobody with the exception of crack dealers turn a profit the first 3 months :)

I have no idea what to name something with butterscotch in it. In fact I'm not certain what butterscotch actually is. "The Mad Cow" would be a nice topical name for a high caffine drink though.
____________________________
Disclaimer:

To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.

#9 Jan 06 2004 at 9:41 PM Rating: Decent
Add lots of froth to the mad cow though
#10 Jan 06 2004 at 9:46 PM Rating: Excellent
Damn, But I like both ideas.
#11 Jan 06 2004 at 10:34 PM Rating: Good
Not sure why, but I think "Coffee's answer for Sex" is a good name for a drink. But you'd better have some chocolate in it.

--DK
#12 Jan 07 2004 at 12:52 AM Rating: Decent
****
7,486 posts
butterscotch is similar to caramel. there is a slight taste difference, but 95% of people wont notice the difference if they ask for butterscotch and you give them caramel.
#13 Jan 07 2004 at 5:02 AM Rating: Good
***
1,309 posts
You could target the Collage students with it and call it the "Cram Session".

Dark
____________________________
If you don't have anything nice to say, at least have the decency to be vague.
#14 Jan 07 2004 at 6:33 AM Rating: Good
Nexa
*****
12,065 posts
Do you have your own travel mug? A local coffee shop near the college I went to had their own travel mug and if you had one, your first cup of coffee on Wednesdays was free. It was always crowded on Wednesdays and people who forgot their mug on Wednesday would often just buy another one (at $3.00 a pop) for the free refill, haha. I always thought it should have been Mondays, it would have been a redeeming quality, but there you go. You get more people to come in to the store, then they go to class with your name on their coffee mug. Word of mouth.

Good luck,

Nexa
____________________________
“It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But a half-wit remains a half-wit, and the emperor remains an emperor.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
#15 Jan 07 2004 at 8:53 AM Rating: Excellent
*****
18,463 posts
A coffee shop I loved in school had couches and displayed local art on the walls, poetry, guitar acts, etc. You couldn't just lounge indefinitely, but ambiance is a huge plus. Once you get them to see it as a hangout, they'll just come there for anything, be it mornings or evenings.
#16 Jan 07 2004 at 8:58 AM Rating: Excellent
We have all that plus me ;), it's just getting them in the door :) I liked the travel mug idea and will offer the free cup o' joe on mondays.
#17 Jan 07 2004 at 9:23 AM Rating: Good
****
5,135 posts
Quote:
Does anyone else have a name for the elixir above?


Personally I’d call it the:

Look out!! Goat!

Hell, you name it that and I’ll make a pilgrimage to your coffee shop myself. Smiley: grin


Edited, Wed Jan 7 09:24:33 2004 by AegisfangBattlehammer
#18 Jan 07 2004 at 10:47 AM Rating: Good
**
426 posts
Hey Stok - where is this coffee shop? I travel a fair amount and if I end up in your town, I'd like to drop in on you and try your coffee.

EagleFlight/Dyciere
#19 Jan 07 2004 at 11:38 AM Rating: Excellent
The shop is in Johnson County, Kansas.
#20 Jan 07 2004 at 12:20 PM Rating: Good
Just a little SSW of Kansas City? Johnson Community College? You in the Oak Park Mall? Looks like a nice place. I would definitely stop in any time if I was in the Kansas City area...

#21 Jan 07 2004 at 1:05 PM Rating: Excellent
I'm a mile west of Johnson County Community College. Oak Park Mall is about 2 miles north east as a crow flies. It's a nice area, I just need to pull people from *$'s. :)
#22 Jan 07 2004 at 1:12 PM Rating: Good
Get those folks from JC Penny's over to your place - they should have some $$...
#23 Jan 07 2004 at 1:22 PM Rating: Excellent
All right MikeinSB are you originally from this area?
#24 Jan 07 2004 at 2:54 PM Rating: Good
Quote:
Personally I’d call it the:

Look out!! Goat!


Akiea, a name like that would be reserved for the drink that punts you in the *** with horn like force. 12oz of espresso before 8:00 AM. DAMN that'll stick toothpicks in your eyelids.
Reply To Thread

Colors Smileys Quote OriginalQuote Checked Help

 

Recent Visitors: 376 All times are in CST
Anonymous Guests (376)