Caribou Coffee capitalizes on coupons
Talk about a smart move. Caribou Coffee has turned a Starbucks gaffe into an opportunity to promote itself.
In case you missed the story, Starbucks hastily canceled a promotion it had launched to get people to try its iced coffees. A coupon for a free iced coffee was linked to an email Starbucks sent to employees to share with friends and family in the Southeast. How Starbucks didn’t see this email going viral is beyond me, but they didn’t. The coupon spread and counterfeit versions appeared. Starbucks pulled the plug, earning them “loser of the week” designation on Joseph Jaffe’s Across the Sound new marketing podcast.
Most marketers would kill for a promotion to go viral like that. Most marketers would swallow the cost of all those drinks they hadn’t planned to give away in order to get that many people into their stores to try an iced coffee…and maybe get them to come back again and again to buy more.
Among those who see the value of such a giveaway are the folks at Caribou Coffee, who recognized the potential in Starbucks’ mistake to serve its own interest. The company quickly communicated that it would accept those coupons—but for only this Friday from noon to close of business and only while supplies —for a medium-sized cold-pressed iced coffee, iced Americano, or iced tea. The same offer went out to subscribers to Caribou’s email mailing list.
Caribou’s CEO Michael Coles, quoted in a Denver Post article, said, “We want to introduce gourmet coffee lovers to a great new product, Cold Press iced coffee.”
When CC Chapman passed this story along to me, he noted he’d never heard of Caribou Coffee. (I have—they’re all over Washington, DC. It was a Caribou Coffee barista who told me that light roast has more caffeine than dark roast, leading me to switch. I love caffeine.) I bet CC isn’t the only person who’s heard of Caribou now. Caribou’s quick thinking is Starbucks’ loss.
This isn’t the first time Caribou has trumped Starbucks. The ubiquitous Starbucks offers WiFi, but only to those with a T*Mobile WiFi account. Late last month, Caribou announced free WiFi for its customers (PDF of press release). Smart marketing like that could result in some of Starbucks sales migrating over to Caribou.
09/05/06 | 7 Comments | Caribou Coffee capitalizes on coupons