As Starbucks faces growing competition in the U.S. market, a new wave of international coffee brands is making its mark. Many foreign brands like Luckin and Black Sheep Coffee are expanding into the U.S. market, seeking to set themselves apart with unique strategies that differ from competitors.
For example, Black Sheep Coffee, one of the largest coffee chains in the U.K., is setting itself apart by using 100% specialty-grade robusta coffee beans as a stronger and smoother alternative to traditional Arabica beans. Here’s how & why this coffee company is taking on a coffee bean that most specialty brands avoid.
What makes Robusta beans different?
Black Sheep Coffee was built on the idea of disrupting the market by championing 100 percent specialty-grade Robusta beans, a stronger and smoother alternative to traditional Arabica beans. But according to the co-founders of Black Sheep Coffee, Eirik Holth & Gabriel Shohet, Robusta is often dismissed in specialty coffee circles, often due to its harsher flavor profile and association with lower-quality production.
This perception is changing, however, as brands like Black Sheep Coffee develop innovative processing and roasting techniques that change the flavor of Arabica beans.
“We were passionate about coffee and thought we could deliver a better customer experience and a more exciting store environment than the existing coffee chains. The market was very consolidated with a lot of similar concepts. The newer ‘challenger’ coffee shops were mostly serving super-light roasted arabica. This was suitable for drip coffee, but through an espresso machine (short extraction cycle and high pressure that increased the acidity in the coffee), it was more akin to lemon juice than coffee and a very acquired taste,” says Holth & Shohet.
“We couldn’t understand why nobody was serving specialty-grade robusta coffee. Robusta had a lot of properties that we really liked – it was higher in caffeine, lower in acidity and lighter on your stomach when you’d drink it in the morning, more full-bodied so the coffee flavour would really punch through the milk in lattes, and smooth taste notes of walnuts and chocolate all of which made for a delicious espresso that had a great kick to it,” they share.
Standing out in the crowded U.S. market
Given that the U.S. market is the largest coffee market in the world, Black Sheep Coffee always knew it’d enter the U.S. market. The mission began by trying all the robusta coffees they could get their hands on(and traveling extensively to source the best beans across the coffee belt from South Asia, East Africa, and South America.
“Our Robusta Revival always represents the best of the best. All of our robusta beans are shade-grown for a slower ripening and more sweetness, double-washed for a clean & bright taste, and sorted by size for roasting uniformity. The beans are slow-roasted to our defined profile and immediately packaged in a lab-style environment, nitrogen flushed to prevent any oxidation, and then served up in our shops during the optimal freshness window and to our exact recipes.”
With so many coffee players in the market, “It’s good to look over your shoulder a little bit to see what others are doing, but generally speaking, it’s more important to look straight ahead and stay focused on what you’re trying to achieve: better product quality, better speed of service, better customer experience, better tech, better vibe,” says Holth & Shohet. “If you don’t think you’re doing that, then there’s no point starting a company, and if you do, it won’t matter what others are doing; you’ll win the hearts and minds of the communities where you open shops, and competition won’t be something you think much about.
