Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, ‘Make me feel important.’ ” —Mary Kay Ash
What makes Starbucks your favourite coffee store chain? When you want to go someplace to relax, or enjoy with your friends, you immediately think of a place like ‘Starbucks Cafe’. Starbucks was founded in the year 1985, as a nine-store operation in Seattle, Washington and other cities. With time and continuous strategic efforts Starbucks became the top coffee brewing company of the world. The vision of the company makes it a unique coffee chain: “Establish Starbucks as the premier purveyor of the finest coffee in the world while maintaining our uncompromising principles while we grow.”
Starbucks’ Marketing Strategy
Since the time the company was founded, the company has focused on making it a ‘third place for the customers. This third-place experience is a unique concept, as it refers to a place that is completely away from home and work. You can chat, work or relax in the store, as it offers that kind of suitable environment and ambience to the customer. The stores are equipped with free wi-fi services, so that that the customers spend longer hours in the store and also come back for a repeat visit.
This goes very well with the mission statement of Starbucks: “To inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup and one neighbourhood at a time.”
Let’s Take a Deeper Dive into the Strategies Used by Starbucks to Compete in the Tough Coffee Market
The strategy used by any company should focus on providing high value and high differentiation. Starbucks provides a generous mix of both the strategies as it focuses on bringing the organization, the customers and the employees under one single umbrella. It is not an easy task to connect the customers with the most important customer touchpoints: the store and the organization. How does Starbucks manage to do that successfully?
Training the Baristas to serve a wide variety of specialized coffee drinks in order to provide satisfaction through personalized experiences to the customers
Starbucks has been the pioneer in bringing specialized coffee drinks like cappuccinos, lattes and macchiatos to the mass market in the United States. This kind of variety in the drinks easily established Starbucks as a unique Coffee Barista in the market. These drinks helped the customers to personalize their coffee drinking habits. Requests for drinks like Raspberry mocha and Butter Beer Latte were easily fulfilled and the customers really enjoyed the satisfaction achieved through the consumption of a personalized coffee mug.
Excellent Store experience and an extra emphasis on elevating the customer experience
Any marketing strategy revolves around the fact “customer is the king”. It stands true in any market situation, as the companies all over the world are trying continuously to win over the attention of the customers with their product designing, product launch or product marketing efforts. Starbucks made every effort to study the details regarding the mood and ambience of its each and every single store. The ambience of the store was created strategically to match the personality of the neighbourhood and the community. The store was decorated with attractive banners, merchandise displays, colours, music and the artwork and the whole strategy for decorating the store revolved around emphasizing the brand image of the company which actually reflected Starbuck’s passion for coffee. The customers who visit a Starbucks coffee store get into a romance with their coffee mug and this romance and passion is rewarded with ceremonies, stories and surprise.
Roasting only Premium Quality Beans
Just imagine walking through a place where you pass through a Starbucks coffee store. The smell of roasted coffee beans is enough to entice your taste buds and you definitely land up buying your very own personalized mug of coffee. Roasting only premium quality beans is the USP (Unique Selling Proposition) of Starbucks. The company holds a practice of purchasing only the top- quality arabica beans and these beans are roasted to the perfect standards of quality and flavour.
Strategic Expansion of Stores Domestically and Internationally
The company is flexible when it comes to the selection of store size and format. This strategy helped the company to establish stores in downtown areas, shopping arcades and office premises. Starbucks focuses on opening at least 2 new stores every day since 1987. This strategy is in alignment with the company’s vision of increasing its stores to 55,000 by 2030.
Refreshing other in-store offerings apart from coffee
Apart from coffee Starbucks also sells tea, fresh pastries, coffee mugs and other associated goodies. This makes the store menu relevant for non-coffee drinkers also. According to Forbes ‘Food sales now represent 20% of Starbucks’ revenue. The company is experimenting with a brunch menu for the weekends in almost 70 locations in the western part of the U.S.
Using Technology for Digital Marketing and Customer Service
Starbucks uses technology innovation to improve its in store processes, marketing efforts and customer service experience. Starbucks created an example of value innovation through technology by introducing the concept of ‘Mobile Order and pay Feature’ for the customers in Seattle. This feature allowed the customer to order without getting in a line and getting notified through a text message when their order was ready.
Since then, Starbucks has made a continuous use of technology in order to make ordering and delivery easy and time saving for its customers.
Creating a space for yourself in a competitive market requires a good strategic effort. Starbucks commitment towards its vision of providing an excellent customer service and an unbeatable in store experience has definitely helped it to create a strong competitive position for itself in the market.
