Local vs Name-Brand Coffee Shops
Yesterday morning I sat in The Dancing Goat local coffee shop, and today I’m writing this short blurt from a Caribou Coffee down the street. I’ve spent time observing the atmosphere and people in both, and there seems to be a difference in customers, traffic through the store, and time spent in the different coffee shops. I think the biggest problem facing local coffee shops is just plain obscurity! More people tend to go to brand-name stores simply because they don’t know about the local shops. Local shops seem to make up for unawareness by serving better products in a better atmosphere, but still I noticed much less traffic in The Dancing Goat compared to Caribou Coffee. It makes sense right? People like to go to places they are familiar with (like Starbucks or Caribou), but local shops tend to have a more grounded feel to them with better products! National chain brands use a cookie cutter layout to drive revenue and traffic into their stores, and they even have good awareness of what customers desire, but chain brands lack small details that can make something truly great. Small details keep customers coming back instead of only drawing in people passing by. For example, I accidentally spilled some of my coffee at Caribou after sitting down at a shaky table. It was my own doing of course, but for the local shop it just wouldn’t make sense for them to have cheap mass-produced tables like this. The learning point here for chain stores I believe is to pay attention to the details. Quality over quantity. It is the small things that keep a customer coming back, like the art on the wall, music playing overhead, or the quality of the tables they’re sitting at. The learning point here for local coffee shops is to get the hell out of consumer obscurity. Focus on simple brand awareness and give new customers the opportunity to love your space. Both of these stores are only micro-examples and vast generalizations of an entire industry, but I think something can be learned from both sides to improve business and customer satisfaction. A way to localize chain brand stores could be interesting ...
