• INTRODUCTION

• India is 3rd largest producer of coffee in world.

• Per capita coffee consumption in India is 55 grams a year.

• Four southern states account for about 80% of country’s coffee

Success of Coffee Chains

• Increased exposure to international lifestyle

• People are looking for more leisure

• People are spending more time outside homes

• Climbing up the hierarchy of needs

Major Coffee Chains in India

• Barista

• Qwiky’s

• Café coffee day

• Movenpick
•

BARISTA

• Offered ambience and experience of typical Italian espresso bar

• It promoted itself as a place where consumers could hang around

• Build the team of ‘Brew Masters’ instead of ‘Glorified Waiters’

• In 2001, Tata Coffee Ltd acquired 34.3% equity in Barista for Rs. 26 cr.
•

SWOT ANALYSIS

STRENGTHS

• Geographically well-distributed

• Alliance with TATA Coffee

• Effective supply-chain management

• Usage of top-grade Arabica Beans

• Brew-masters from Italy to create blends

• Best Italian Machines for brewing

• Perfect ambience providing a complete experiential lifestyle brand

• Rigorous training procedures for its employees

• Flat management structure which stimulates ideas

• Provides stock-options to its employees to create a sense of ownership

• Re-defining the service model

WEAKNESSES

• Not dominant in the South

• Poor penetration into the home- brewing market

• Lack of awareness amongst consumers

• about their promotional activities

• Limited Food-range

• High Pricing (Iced Cappuccino costs more than the daily pay cheque of 2/5th
of India’s
• 1.1 billion people
•

OPPORTUNITIES

• Rising urban disposable incomes

• People looking for new vistas in

• leisure and lifestyle oriented concepts

• Global expansion starting with South- East Asia

• Tie-ups with leading hotels-chains,airlines & railway stations

• In-house cafes in office complexes, call- centres & national highways

THREATS

• India is pre-dominantly a tea-consuming country

• Local per-capita consumption is only 55 grams a year

• Competition from domestic players like Café Coffee Day, Qwiky’s etc.

• Competition from foreign coffee bars like Starbucks

• Vulnerable to currency fluctuations

• Government- mandated tender process which is slowing down expansion at

POSITIONING OF BARISTA

Barista chooses the Benefit positioning possibility, whereby it positions Barista

VALUE PROPOSITION

Barista offers a lively, amicable and charged ambience where coffee-lovers

Barista focuses on a niche market, gets to know it intimately and then pursues
differentiation strategy by concentrating on achieving superior performance in an
important customer benefit area, “experience”, which is valued by a large part of the
coffee-lover market.

Let us start the Barista Marketing Mix:

Product:
Barista is one of the leading coffee chain outlets. Barista provides a wide range of
products primarily focused towards coffee drinkers as a part of its product strategy in its
marketing mix. Their products comprise of types of coffee (espresso, cappuccino, latte,
affogato), cold coffee, iced teas, smoothies, indulgent coffee, lemonade, mojitos, tea
(Darjeeling / Assam) and coffee add-ons. Each product is available in two types; i.e.
large and regular; except for the add-ons. Barista has positioned itself as experts in
espresso. All of Barista coffee products has the base made with espresso.

Image: company website

Price:
Barista’s pricing is dependent on the type of your consumption preferred by customers.
Regular is low priced while large is high priced. Since it started its operations Barista has
lowered its price and its price is set at a standard just like its competitors by
implementing the skimming policy. On comparing the prices, it is found that Barista
prices its products a bit lower than its competitors like Café Coffee Day. By providing a
wide range of products with attractive pricing for its customers, Barista is able to serve
and cater across a variety segments of the society. Hence, this gives an overview on the
pricing strategy in the marketing mix of Barista.

Place:
Barista provides delicious coffee only through its outlets. No home delivery service is
undertaken. The primary segment of its customers is in the age bracket of 15 to 30
years. Thus, majority are students. Therefore, Barista outlets are strategically located in
and around colleges, shopping malls, hospitals and in and around most happening
places of metropolitans. Barista has most of its outlets at the Northern part of India
followed by South India. There are fewer number of stores catering in the eastern and
western India. Barista has approximately 200 outlets across India, primarily concentrated
in the major cities viz Kolkata, Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. Barista franchises its
stores like most of its competitors do.

Promotion:
Barista is actively involved in promoting its brand. Primary customer segment of Barista
is of the age group of 15 to 30 years. So, in order to cater to their requirement, Barista
always upholds the quality and uses fine Arabica beans and uses Italian method of
brewing. It advertises its brand as a place “where the world meets”, which attracts
people who like to socialize. Its “Beanoholic” card which will be integrated with their
services soon, is aimed to be a loyalty card and gift card. It will provide discounts to
repeat purchases from Barista. Barista promotes itself to deliver the highest level of
experiential services. It strives for excellence in providing the apt environment where
coffee lovers enjoy the time spent over it.

Since this is a service marketing brand, here are the other three Ps to make it the 7Ps
marketing mix of Barista.

People:
The espresso bar industry is choked up with fierce competition; Barista understands this
fact. So, in order to survive this Barista maintains a high quality of services and product
offerings. This is achieved only by having a superior quality of employee base.
Competent employee base helps them maintain high standard of offerings. Thus, further
enhancing the commitment and maintain good relationship with their customers.

Physical Evidence:
Barista stores are its biggest aspect of physical presence. The physical presence of
Barista can be felt in and around places where people hang out. It serves its offerings
only through its café centres. These can be found in any metro city in India, especially in
shopping malls, theatres and business areas. With quality staff and state of the art café
centres Barista provides its customers the best way to enjoy espresso drinks. Thus,
customers tend to visit its café regularly and make multiple purchases.

Process:
From entering a Barista counter till leaving it, Barista provides an experience which
customers tend to recall. This is achieved only by maintain high standards and ensuring
step by step processes being met out. Barista focuses in reducing waiting time for the
customers, this factor is one of the most important consideration in case of bars. Barista
also focuses in reducing the error while serving to minimum cases by charting out error
historical error cases to its employees, so that they are able to keep a note of it and not
repeat it again. Thus, overall the processes which help Barista keep running is in place
and tend to improve over the years as they gain experience of customer handling.
Hence, this concludes the Barista marketing mix.