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Businesses are having to adapt to survive in the midst of the Covid-19 restrictions. One coffee supplier, Roasted Brown, has come up with a way to extend its own online sales, while also supporting its customer base. Here, Ferg Brown tells how he had to think fast to put the scheme into play in order to keep going:
IT WAS SUNDAY 15 March that the reality of Covid-19 really hit us. I was scrolling through Instagram with a glass of red and, one-by-one, the cafés we supply our coffee to started putting up notices that they were closing. By Monday morning we had effectively lost all of our business. It had unravelled, just like that.
Our coffee business up until now had been going really well, we had a tough enough year in 2019 but 2020 was carrying all the promise we’d hoped for. We’d just taken on some new customers and there was another three or four due to open by the end of March. The week before we had just roasted more coffee than we’d ever roasted on a regular week and we were all set to make up for last year and have our best year yet.
The Covid-19 shock
The first few days were surreal, there was a buzz in the air, everyone huddling around talking about the same thing and a strange experience almost like excitement at this crazy new emergency. The only comfort I could devise from this was knowing there was nothing I could do to stop this and that almost everyone was in the same boat.
As a business owner, there was this ever-increasing pressure setting in and as the hours passed, the realisations around cashflow, losing sales, honouring contracts and salaries and “what about the money owed to us” all bore down heavier and heavier. I think in times like this I tend to get upbeat and try to reassure the people around me, so my first reaction was to reassure my staff they still have a job and they’d be paid as normal for the foreseeable. After that, one by one all the bigger picture stuff started to land.
I realised very quickly that in order to survive, we as a business would have to adapt to this new reality and fast. Our positioning in the industry in which we work felt like an opportunity that could be harnassed, we just had to work out what we could do in practical terms.
A coffee roaster sits right in the middle of this chain of hard-working people, from farmers and producers on one end to passionate baristas and grafting hospitality folk on the other. The stark reality of the impact of Covid-19 would not only hugely affect my company but also the companies we buy from and the those we supply. It was in this moment I started to brainstorm ways to try to support both ends as much as possible.
Our online shop has always been very solid, we have a healthy number of subscriptions and a wonderful crew of loyal home brewers buying coffee regularly. I knew this would grow, but I had no idea by how much, with so many people working from home and realising their local cafés were now closing too.
As someone who has owned and run cafés for a few years now – Roasted Brown in Temple Bar and Laine, my love on Talbot street – I know well that on the best days maintaining margins is a fine art.
My heart was immediately pulled in this direction as I could already sense the level of stress coming from café owners with sales so abruptly ended and costs still largely coming in.
We worked hard on ideas and finally came up with a system that could work for our customers, the end customer (the coffee drinker) and our own business. Eventually, we launched “Our Shop is Their Shop”.
With the terrible effects of Covid-19 on business, I figured this was a rare opportunity to show our appreciation for our customers’ loyalty over the years. We are hoping this initiative can significantly help with the future of everyone’s business.
How it works:
1. We did a two-week promotion in partnership with our wholesale customers. We offered a 10% discount online and gave our cafés all the markup with a discount code specific to them. That meant that customers could buy from us but also support their favourite cafe in the process.
2. After the initial two-week offer we kept our online shop open to the cafés we supply and now it continues to operate as “Our Shop and Their Shop”. The idea is simple. If you frequent a café or coffee shop that uses our coffee, then you’re most likely making your coffee at home now. When you purchase coffee for home, you’ll be prompted at our check-out to name the café you normally buy our coffee in, pop in the name of that cafe, they make the sale and we process the order. This way, we make our sale to them and they make their sale to their customer and they get free shipping over €25.00 Everyone wins.
The campaign has gone really well so far and it’s continually growing. We’ve since been asked can we donate the sale to other shops that we don’t supply, but we’ve limited it to only the cafés we supply so that the sales generated can build up and actually make a difference.
This isn’t a PR stunt and the last thing I want to do is use it to try get new business off another coffee roaster by giving their customers money.
Time to jump out of the box
This is really a time where creativity is needed in truck loads, staying caffeinated helps with that so I’m lucky! Being in the food and beverage industry, we’re in a unique position to work together help our clients do business online. We’re simply helping them continue to sell to their regulars through our platform.
At the end of the day, Their customers are Our customers so why can’t Our shop be Their shop?!
That being said, creativity and community is great but we will really need our government to do something amazing in this season. They did it for the banks in the last crises, Simon Harris is doing an incredible job for health and I think Pascal Donohoe needs to step up more as Minister for Finance.
Businesses need a bailout this time, we don’t need loans. I think the government should literally put money into business accounts to ease the pressure and shore up our industries and job creation sector.
For years, small businesses have felt overhwelmed by banks and Revenue. It’s tough out there anyway as a small business, let alone during a pandemic. I think now is the time for the government to show an appreciation for SMEs, the backbone of our little country.
Ferg Brown is the owner of Roasted Brown, A husband and a father of 4 lives a full life of parenthood and coffee adventures, says he may get a job some day but right now he’s busy!
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Look at me. I’m a great businessman. Look how brilliantly I diversified my business in a short space of time. P.S. Any chance of a bailout Leo?
@Mattress Dick:
What business do you run ” Dick”?
I am small restaurant business. Make good contributions to revenue normally . Business close 1 months already . Still paying the high rent and bill. Don’t know what will business look like when is reopen.
@Wen Qin Joe: didn’t see any sign that government will doing something for small business’s rent and rate .
Nice read. Thank You. I agree that government should help more to small businesses. They are core of our economy.
What’s he doing again? Undercutting his customers?
TLDR. Blah, blah, blah
But of you’re at home you can drink tea which is much nicer. Cafes make disgusting tea, that’s the only reason I get coffee in them.
@SC: Sure why don’t you just bring your own tea bags and flask of water then you whinge bag.
@Bio_Man: I use a mug and a kettle in work like a normal person.
Is he right or wrong not use this as an opportunity to gain business from his competitors? If he did would it be good business savvy or unscrupulous morally corrupt monster that knows no bounds?
@devils avacado: if you read the article, you would see that this is done in conjunction with the cafes he does wholesale business with, and he has been asked to expand that discount to customers but he felt that would be taking business and customers from other roasters, so he refused. F&B businesses are one of the hardest hit industries because of this pandemic, and the vast majority of his customers would be SMEs, so he’s actually doing a fantastic thing, not only keeping his own business and staff going, but also doing his best to help keep his SME customers afloat. But sure isn’t this the comment section of the journal, there’s always nasty and begrudging commentators here.
@Paula Leavy: who put 50cent in you??? Calm down there Paula, and if you could point out where I was being nasty to anyone I would appreciate it.
@devils avacado: ah don’t be so patronising, you commented on whether he’s taking business from other roasters and asked if this was ‘unscrupulous’. If you don’t want people to respond to your opinion, don’t post them on a public forum. It also helps if you actually read and understand the article in full, before you post your hot-take fyi.
@Paula Leavy: since when is a question an opinion you numpty ??
@devils avacado: it’s how you framed it, and you know it all too well. I’d lay off calling people numpties when you clearly haven’t even read the article before you post your ‘questions’. Go off and buy yourself a big spoon, instead of begrudging a decent person trying to keep their business and other SMEs afloat now.
@Paula Leavy: oh it’s how I framed it now is it?So did you take a look back at my original post and realise that you went off like a child having a temper tantrum for no reason, not once did I say he was taking business from competitors, I actually said he was NOT taking away their business in my question. But if you bothered to read my post properly you wouldn’t have made a fool of yourself with your rant, and FYI, I did read all the article before i posted, and I feel that my questions were valid, because like it or not, this pandemic is going to bring business opportunities for people. I just wanted to know if people think that’s a good thing or a bad thing to take advantage of,, but sure you continue with your virtue signalling, it’s probably the only thing that makes you happy…
@devils avacado: ‘Is he right or wrong not to use this as an opportunity to gain business from his competitors?’ That’s your exact quote. That is what you said and went you also went on to insinuate further. And you saying that I went on to act like a child having a temper tantrum while going full caplocks…on the irony is delicious. Jeez give yourself a day off lad , for your own sake at least.
@Paula Leavy: LOL,, I just had quick glance at your tweeter feed to see who I was dealing with,, didn’t take long to find out,, you are the type of person that thinks someone with a different political view to yours is inbred,,, now that I know what type of “person” you are, I will bid you adieu,, I can’t stand ignorant people that think their opinions plant them at the top of some moral ground,, when in your case nothing could be further from the truth. ;)
@devils avacado: oh, and the reason the caps were on was for the word “not”,, you missed it in my original post when you accused me of asking if he was taking business off other people, when what I actually said was he was “not” taking business from other people. I just didn’t want you missing it again pal, try to keep up :)
@devils avacado: so sorry my anti Neoliberalism, anti Imperialist and anti Catholic Church offends you so much, if you’re that sensitive I’d advise you to stay away from public forums and Twitter, you sound like you’re having a right conniption fit. Your original post didn’t feature the word ‘not’ so keep backpeddling there. Would love to know what you’re doing to help SMEs, probably nothing..like I said go buy that big spoon, it might turn out meditative for you.
@Paula Leavy: .
@Paula Leavy: well said
First post,, First line, sixth word, “not”
I came back just to point out that you are a liar (or someone who only sees what she wants to see)as well as a bigot. Your welcome. :)
@devils avacado:
Your A Tool.
@devils avacado: you’re ;D
@Aideen Pollard: oooppps, sorry Aideen, I will admit my grammar and spelling can be appalling at times,, I will try to do better….:)
@Robert Kennedy: are you ok there pal?? Did I do some ti upset you??
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