A coffee shop, mostly known as a café, is part of an elaborate beverage industry that often deals with retail customers. This industry focuses on products and services. First, the product is the coffee beverage. Second, the service includes different services being offered in the café. When considering to start a coffee shop, one has to carry out research depending on the specific product you intend to sell, services to be offered and the business location. These are the most significant considerations to be made for a coffee shop startup. Therefore, as agued in this paper it is prudent to have the right information, which will guide the business venture to become a success in the competitive coffee industry.
When starting a coffee shop, the most significant competitors of your product include processed and packaged retail coffee companies. Examples of the companies include Nestle and Jacobs Douwe Egberts. These two companies control over 70% of the coffee industry. Their products are mostly retail consumer oriented. The processed coffee that is packaged and stored in cans is consumer driven, and therefore price is relative to retail considerations. Furthermore, consumer coffee is soluble in water. Therefore, one only needs to have hot water, a cup, and honey or sugar. This creates quite a competition for coffee cafés located in residential areas.
Secondly, services offered in the café need to be up to the modern standards. The waiter’s in the café need to be professional and consider the customer’s expectations when serving them. Furthermore, what other services is the coffee shop going to provide to their customers? For instance, most coffee shops are attributed to a fast and reliable internet connection. Customers might come to the café to drink coffee and get access to the fast and reliable internet connection. Creating value addition and a corresponding added advantage for the coffee shop over its competitors.
The location of the café must put into consideration the potential number of customers, beverage preferences in the given location and whether it is a residential area or a business district. Most coffee shops are located in the central business districts of most cities. This is because the working class prefer coffee while on the job. Furthermore, the number of coffee shops in the intended business location makes a great impact on the success of business. There may be few coffee shops serving an overflowing number of customers. This will create a business opportunity for a new entrant into the market. However, a location may be characterized by many cafés while the customer population is relatively low, which would make it an inappropriate location to set up business.
Media strategy is an important tool for starting a business. It is concerned with the delivery of messages concerning specific products to the customers or niche market. According to Moriarty et al., media strategies aim at influencing the behavior of the consumer with regard to a specific product (50). The media strategy that will be used for the coffee shop will entail right-brained marketing. Right-brained marketing is concerned with the fictitious, colorful, emotional and imaginative marketing strategies that takes a creative and art oriented approach (Baker 79). The right-brained media strategy will entail the advertising of a café that has a creative and art-oriented interior and décor that will entice the consumers. This will create an emotional attraction of customers to the coffee shop due to their relative preference in the interior design of the coffee shop. Furthermore, the media strategy will display a sense of comfort and aesthetic authenticity attached to the coffee shop. Therefore, creating a significant advantage over the other coffee shops in the same vicinity.
The Unique Selling Point (USP) for the coffee shop would be defined by high-quality raw coffee that is not served by any other coffee shop in the same area. Consequently, the coffee shop would retain a USP through using the modern roasting profiles, new grinding techniques and fashionable taste characteristics that identify with the target audience (Baker 79). All these will be aimed at differentiating the product being offered by using factors that will create a sustainable competitive advantage over your competitors.
Consequently, the issue of selling style is very important in the modern business environment. Selling style refers to a marketing style that tends to specify and explain the features and benefits of a certain product (Baker 79). Coffee is a beverage that is popular worldwide, and its benefits are widely known. However, the features of coffee are not widely known and are not that important in selling the product. Therefore, by taking the soft selling style, which tends to focus on building a relationship with the client, one can realize a good amount of sales. Soft selling does not employ the use of aggressive sale tactics but tends to find other passive methods of informing the customer that you have what they require (Hollensen 221). For example, an advertising campaign on high quality and affordable coffee will inform the client that you provide the features that they require in that specific product. Therefore, the implementation of the media strategy mentioned above and the analysis of competing products, location and services will significantly assist in the successful startup of a coffee shop.
Works Cited
Baker, Michael J. Marketing strategy and management. Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.
Hollensen, Svend. Marketing management: A relationship approach. Pearson Education, 2015.
Moriarty, Sandra, et al. Advertising: Principles and practice. Pearson Australia, 2014.
