Coffee to the People
The baristas at my local Starbucks know my name. They know my usual order. They ask how my kids are. They have achieved an almost impossible task: they've made a behemoth global coffee giant seem personal - almost bespoke. My wife often asks - with a voice tinged with judgment and disappointment - why I choose to spend my hard-earned money on a daily fix of sugar-soaked caffeine. And my answer is always, "It's part of my ritual." She scoffs and adds a few numbers to the line item on our monthly expenses marked "husband's addiction."
But it's true. Just after I drop the kids at daycare and before I head to work, I grab my large - sorry, "venti" - caramel macchiato and take a few minutes for myself before driving to work.
Or, at least, I did.
Amidst a global pandemic and social distancing because of it, my morning Starbucks visitations like just about every other aspect of life, have changed greatly. With vaccines far off, and winter coming, I started looking at other options. And with my digital transformation hat on, I found something intriguing (and, admittedly, satisfying): the rise of the bespoke coffee truck.
When I worked construction in my early 20s, coffee trucks would roll into the site, sell their mostly-mediocre brew and days-old pastries, and head to another site to prey upon energy-sapped workers. These new trucks are anything but that.
Usually built out of vintage European firetrucks or horse trailers, and outfitted with state-of-the-art espresso machines, these rolling cafés are bringing exquisite coffees, baked goods, and service to parking lots across the nation. And it's the perfect solution to a disrupted world craving some sense of normalcy.
Open-air (and mask usage) all but ensures you'll be COVID-free throughout your experience.
Lack of in-office work means these trucks have left the office parks and can typically be found sitting near parks, markets, and commercial streets.
Locally-owned, you're putting money back into the pockets of your community.
And chances are, if you frequent them, they'll learn your name and order, too.
As a senior associate at Arcspring, my mind is always looking for ways to improve an enterprise via technological means - whether it's an operational improvement or value creation. Coffee trucks are perfect for digital transformation.
The biggest problem facing these operations is also their greatest asset: mobility. But not knowing where your local coffee truck might be each morning can be a problem for those of us who count on their morning fix. I'd love to see a GPS-tracked app that pinpoints where the trucks are, along with their specials and incentives.
Contactless payments aren't just a nice-to-have, they're becoming a requirement. I'd ensure each of these was outfitted with a plethora of mobile payment options such as Apple Pay or Square.
There's always that one person in Starbucks using the free wifi to write their screenplay, but many of us use their service to catch up on the morning news. To bring this same service to coffee trucks, I'd utilize a solution like Simplifi to create a local WiFi hotspot and let customers surf while they're in line.
While the trucks themselves run off of gasoline, the espresso machines and ovens require a bit more juice than the typical car batteries produce. Most trucks use generators to bring in extra power, though with electric fuel storage options becoming cheaper, many operators might find it cost-effective (in the long term) to use solar, storage batteries or a combination of both to create a green solution.
Finally, and this would work for just about any coffee shop, not just a mobile one, I'd introduce subscriptions. For those of us who make daily coffee runs, provide a monthly fee that provides us with a free cup every day.
There may be a time when it's safe to head back to Starbucks, but now is the time for smaller, more scalable, and more mobile options to make a play for a piece of the market.
