Who Goes to Coffee Shops and What Coffee Drinks Do They Buy?
Learning who goes to coffee shops helps you find the right customers. Targeting the paying coffee drinkers, who will buy more cups of coffee, is the quickest way to boost your coffee sales. In this article, we will share stats on coffee consumption worldwide so that you can build a better coffee shop customer persona and reach the correct coffee drinkers.
And this article conclusion, by using the stats around the coffee world, we will assist you to firm up at least 1 variable for your coffee shop persona, i.e. should you focus on the male or female coffee drinker.
Table of Content | TOC
The two main group of coffee shop customers
For any coffee shop, there are only two main groups of customers.
- The Coffee Shop Visitors
- The Coffee drinkers.
1. Coffee Shop Visitors
Let’s talk about the coffee shop visitors first.
These folks that visit your outlet do not care about any of your coffee drinks or food. They are here for the following purpose:
- Using your wifi to relax and watch a show
- Students hanging out with their friends
- Students using your cafe to study
- Professionals using your wifi to do some work
- Professionals using your coffee shop as a meeting place
- Individuals taking a break and using your wifi to relax and watch a show
The list goes on, but they are there simply because of your proximity (a location that you are in) and maybe sometimes your promotion, learn more about why people buy coffee from cafes.
Learn more about JTBD and shopper intent in: Why people buy coffee from cafes.
2. The coffee drinkers
These folks love coffee and know their Arabica and Robusta. This is also the group that is more likely to be speciality coffee drinkers. This is the group that you should market to and retain as your regular customers.
If they like your coffee product, they will frequent your shop and contribute to your coffee sales. They are also the group that will spend more in your shop.
Who drinks the most cup of coffee?
In the stats shown above tracking the frequency of coffee drinkers in Turkey, majority of people drink 2 to 5 cups of coffee a day. The second highest numbers are those that drink 1 cup of coffee per day.
In both set of data, there are more women than men coffee drinkers. So, if you are drawing up your coffee shop buyer persona between women and men, this is the first data point suggesting the focus on women coffee drinker.
Looking at customers order: Finding popular coffee product
Cold brew has been the coffee market trend for a while, but in this particular chart, you noticed that coffee with milk is the go-to for many people. So, most people that go to coffee shops are more likely to drink milk-based coffee. Other than the usual milk drink, you can also consider trending alternatives such as oat milk.
Once again, women make up the majority of this segment as well. This is the second data point suggesting the focus on female coffee drinker.
Case Study: Who Goes To Starbucks
In this case study on who goes to Starbucks, rather than the usual Starbucks target audience that includes individuals between the ages of 22 and 60, with an average age of 42 and a high income. We look at what people are searching before they landed in Starbucks online properties.
In this case, you noticed that other searching for proximity and direction, Iced caramel macchiato and Frappuccino brings more people into the Starbucks compared to other search term.
Looking at the intent of the audience is another way of assessing who goes to coffee shops (in this Starbucks).
To download the Who Goes To Starbucks report.
Social Media and Coffee Sales
We know that many cafes skyrocketed their coffee sales because of good social media engagement. In this group of stats from Korea, you noticed that the two popular coffee chain in Korea that have the higher social media outreach are also the ones that enjoy more customers orders.
This stats showcase the importance of social media in building the awareness and the revenue for cafes, i.e. if the content is what your targeted audience is looking for, they will visit your cafe after engaging your content.
Learn more about how to use social media such as Using Instagram to sell coffee.
In this third data point, we once again noticed that the majority of coffee drinkers that are influenced by the social media are the ladies.
Choosing Coffee Drinkers target market
While there are numerous factors to consider in setting up your audience persona for a targeted marketing campaign, from the various countries and stats, the commonality shared by all three sets of data are the female coffee drinkers. They are more represented in all of the higher stats.
So, if there is one thing for you to consider, giving the recommendation from these facts is for you a coffee shop owner to put on focus on the female buyer persona.
If you enjoy reading our breakdown of who goes to coffee shops, do check out our other articles in our food services information section. We have also compiled the full report for you to download below, and we also look forward to chatting with you if you have any questions with regard to your coffee shops.
Who Goes to Coffee Shops Report
In the link below, you will find:
- A compiled report similar to what we shared on this page, with the breakdown of coffee drinkers from Vietnam, Poland, the US, Turkey and South Korea. Included are some recommendations on how to boost your long-term coffee sales (download Compiled Reports)
- This is a sentiment study report that we did a while back, and it covers more countries on their social media posting after and when they are drinking coffee. (download coffee sentiment Study)
OCM Coffee Shops Consultation
Drop us a message below to tap on our coffee consultant's wealth of knowledge in:
- Refining your coffee business concept to avoid industry pitfalls
- Planning the specifics of your coffee shop, such as location, menu, pricing, and branding
- Identifying and understanding your target audience and competitors in the speciality coffee industry
- Developing a business plan and financial projections for long-term success
- Preparing for launch, including legal requirements and staffing needs
Learn more about our coffee consultants and the events or classes that they are conducting.
About US | OCM Profile
OCM (OnCoffeeMakers.com) was started in 2007 with the first webpage about coffee machines. And for a number of years, we focused on helping people find their desired coffee machine (we still are helping folks with that! So, if you are looking for coffee machines for office or restaurants - check out the link).
In 2010, we started getting enquiries on restaurant marketing and we start to help food and beverage brands with their marketing. Below are campaigns and events that we have done over the years:
OCM's campaigns: F&B Marketing Ideas by OCM
OCM's Events: F&B Industry events by or with OCM
Check out this restaurant marketing guide to learn more about the many campaigns and companies we have worked with.
Since then, we have also created many marketing workshops and classes for the F&B industry. Many of these modules are still running in tertiary institutions such as Temasek Polytechnic Skillsfuture Academy and also ITE College East COC classes, below are some snippets of our lectures and workshops:
OCM’s F&B workshops: Food and Beverage Marketing Lectures | Workshops - click to watch classes on customer journey map, JTBD and more.
So, if you are looking for industry practitioners to help you scale your coffee or F&B businesses, do drop us a message or book an appointment. Do also check out our various social media platforms on regular F&B and coffee market updates:
For regular coffee (F&B) related videos: OCM Youtube
For Daily Coffee Inspiration (fun coffee content): OCM IG
For insights into the coffee (F&B) industry: OCM LinkedIN
PS: For the coffee lovers, we continue to share coffee articles (and videos) and have also started a free coffee class section (with free online coffee training supported by coffee partners).
