Local Coffee Trends

I’ve been thinking a bit about coffee trends. Here are a few random thoughts for you.

1. Will more coffee shops ditch food? I found it fascinating that Echo Coffee has suspended all of their lunch options, except for pastries and muffins. They just didn’t make enough money from food sales to cover the costs. It makes me wonder if more coffee shops will cease their food experiments, or if they’ll simplify food options.

2. Maybe more local coffee shops will try to have unique local prepackaged food options. Nearly ever coffee shop is selling oatmeal in those little “single serve” boxes, but I wonder if coffee shops will start to sell more local options.

3. Beer is drawing in a new type of crowd. Cartel got into the game, and now several other coffee shops sell beer. Sip Coffee, for one. Another huge side business is the wine-bar. That’s a big moneymaker around the valley.

4. The rest of the coffee shops will start using Square like everyone else. Tons of local shops switched over to Square (or similar) in 2014. I wouldn’t be surprised if more of them did that this year.

5. Email newsletters will become more popular. Companies will start to realize a big email database is more valuable than followers on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

6. Instagram will become more popular for coffee shops than Facebook. This is probably already the case, but I bet lots of coffee shops barely use Facebook.

7. Video grows up. I bet more local coffee companies use video, and YouTube to tell their story.

What do you see as trends in the Arizona coffee scene?

I’m looking forward to another terrific year! Arizona Coffee will turn 10 years old this March! Let me know if anybody is interested in a get-together in March. Here’s to a great year, Arizona!