An Over View Of The Costa Coffee Campaign Marketing Essay

It has always been said that distinguish a correct market place for a business is very difficult as well as to gain sustainable interest from a customer as a steppingstone when there is such a fragmented marketplace with many competitors. However the ‘Costa coffee’ campaign will make a definite difference. It will emphasize the quality of the coffee and its value of spending time discovering your favourite coffee.

This will take place in shopping centre in Auckland City as well as on television, radio and magazines. This initial advertising is sure to establish ‘Costa Coffee’ as a new brand name for the New Zealand Coffee Lovers. Sending the message to our target consumers – both male and female aged between 18~45 years old – that drinking Costa coffee can be enjoyable and worth experience than other brand outlet’s coffee. Then when the target consumers realise a positive impact (benefits) the ‘Costa Coffee’ is having on their daily life the product is sure to be promoted through word of mouth. This initial advertising is sure to establish ‘Costa Coffee’ as a brand name for the leading New Zealand Coffee shop in future.

Coffee consumption in Australia and New Zealand has increased massively in the past few years. It is easy to find lots of different cafes around that are open and lots of people drinking coffee steadily inside and outside the café. New Zealander loves drink coffee in their daily life and a ‘Flat white’ is a good example. A ‘Flat white’ is one of most popular coffee beverage served in Australia and New Zealand which created by New Zealander called Derek Townsend in the early eighties.

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Coffee is actually one of the healthiest beverages that billions of people consume regularly and it is one of the most widely researched ingredients. The growing body of scientific research has shown that coffee is safe for healthy adults and can even have beneficial health implications as a part of a healthy diet and physically active lifestyle. For example, the most predominant fact is that regular consumption of coffee decreases the risk of type II diabetes and many other health risks.

Therefore, the concept of creating healthier, pleasant and high quality coffee beverage of ‘Costa Coffee’ will be implemented. This idea revolves around the importance of reinstating the value of spending time with their favourite coffee beverage more effectively, and also the attempt to break into the competitive market of Coffee shops (including private cafes) in Auckland City.

Costa Coffee is one of the largest and fastest growing coffee chains in the UK. It was founded in 1971 in Italy by two Italian brothers – Sergio and Bruno Costa. Costa Company which introduced the first Costa coffee shop in the UK in early 1980’s had as a main objective to create and serve the finest authentic Italian coffee. Costa became part of Whitebread PLC in 1995 and has followed an expansion program, so to become recognised nationally. With over 1,000 stores in the UK and over 400 internationally, Costa has enjoyed a remarkable period of growth since it opened its first store. Costa is now the leading UK branded coffee shop with over 300 stores that now operates in 25 countries (Costa Coffee, n.d.). In addition, it opened its 1000th milestone store in March 2008 in Moscow (Whitbread PLC, 2010).

Costa Coffee has a specially blended coffee called ‘Mocha Italia’ that created by Sergio and Bruno Costa 37 years ago, made of their own special blend of coffee beans. It’s a unique blend as it manages to combine the sweetness, bitterness and body needed to make the perfect cup of coffee. As for the blend itself, that’s a closely guarded secret, but you can enjoy a cup of its distinctive flavour and a warm Italian welcome at any of our Costa coffee shops (Costa Coffee, n.d.).

Just beyond the Mocha Italia, Costa Coffee provided variety range of coffee beverage selections like other coffee shops have, it also includes non-coffee beverages (tea, juice and hot chocolate etc) and snacks (sandwiches, muffins and cakes etc).

(Costa Coffee, n.d.).

TARGET MARKET

In the advertising plan, the target market would be divided into smaller segments as geographic, demographic and psychographic.

Firstly, geographic includes of the country, town, place or city. This advertising plan is for Auckland City, and it covers all central city area and it also including areas such as Parnell, Newmarket and Mission bay. Auckland Central city is known as a heart of Auckland; consequently, large populations can be found because this is where most universities and the business are located. After 12 months, the target market can be extended to other area such as North Shore, Waitakere City and Manukau City.

Secondly, under the demographic, both male and females aged between 18 – 45 years old is our product’s target market, but it does cater for everyone’s needs. The reason for this is primarily because the product itself is ideally for the adults (business men and women). They usually go to Costa at the office-going hour to take morning coffee before starting the work and at lunchtime. Costa coffee is relatively high price is the reason why working people take a bigger part of customers than students despite their similar using hour. However, it will also include university students who can afford to buy priced coffee. Overall, our advertising will directly towards to people who are interest to spend their money on coffee beverage.

Additionally, Costa introduced the Kids menu for new target market – Family. As many Costa stores are located in high streets and shopping malls in UK, there is an massive potential for family target. To meet this demand Costa has launched a specific range of food for children- Costa Kids, comprising a little sandwich, new Smarties American style cookies, yoghurts and Robinsons Fruit Shoot drinks placed in special Costa Kids bags so that children can take the food with them (Costa Coffee, n.d.)

Under the psychographic, all internet users can be our target market. It includes students of final year in college or in university and young employees who could be Costa coffee’s potential customers. Yet, not many coffee shops offering free Wi-Fi, therefore, open 24 hours and providing unlimited free Wi-Fi will attracting those

ADVERTISING OBJECTS

Our advertising objectives have been created to be something that advertising can accomplish, for instance a shift in perception or to create awareness. In order to launch the advertising plan effectively, both the marketing objectives as well as the communications objectives are important to be considered.

Marketing Objectives

These are the marketing objectives that Costa Coffee should achieve after launching the advertising campaign.

To increase the brand recognition

To increase unit sales of both coffee beverage and non-coffee beverage

To generate steady profit over the next 12 months

To increase the market share by 10% over the next 12 months

Communication Objectives

These are the communication objectives that Costa Coffee should achieved after launching the advertising campaign.

To increase the quality of blended coffee beverage and excellent customer service

To maintain Costa Coffee as the preferred brand of coffee shop among 50% business men/women and student customers in Auckland city next 12 months

To build the awareness of Costa Coffee among 70% of the target audience in the next 12 months

To enhance the brand and corporation image in the consumers mind-set over next 12 months

ADVERTISING STRATEGIES

Our campaign plan for the advertisement of the ‘Costa Coffee’ mainly covers the aspect of interaction between customers and Costa Coffee and how this will ultimately effect customer’s daily life. Definitely its focus based on the activity of customers spending time at one of Costa coffee outlets for relax. Strategy is the means by which we aim to achieve the objectives (White, 2000). Our strategy is to encompass a significant aspect of advertising, incorporating elements of the marketing mix. As White states that “enable advertising to fulfill its role in the overall marketing mix” (2000), it also covers the development of identifying specific objectives that can be met by advertising.

Strategies

It is recommended to Costa Coffee to use the three types of strategy to achieve its marketing and communications objectives as stated earlier. Those three strategies that are suggested to implement are position strategy, message strategy, and media strategy.

Position Strategy

Costa Coffee position for its product as high quality blended coffee beverage which using affordable pricing strategy. In order to accomplish this position strategy, it is suggested to Costa Coffee to emphasize its quality and excellent customer service in all outlets. These will creates a trust and strong commitment on Costa Coffee and its coffee bean’s quality and customer service. Once the customers have trust and believed the quality and the services provided by the Costa Coffee, they will go around talking more about Costa Coffee to others. Costa Coffee will be the first on to choose among other competitors, likely, Starbucks could be the second choice.

 Message Strategy

Costa Coffee may use a new theme or slogan called ‘Costa Coffee – A little taste of Italy worth waiting for’. This message conveys the customer who used to drink American style blended coffee beverage. To create Italian heritage, interior of Costa coffee shop will provide the image of Italian heritage for their customers as well as a unique taste. It will guarantee the customers’ highest satisfaction.

Media Strategies

In order to achieve the objectives which was stated earlier, various types of advertising media will be use to communicate the selling theme to the target audience such as television, newspapers, Internet banner, billboard and magazines. All of this media may increase the Costa Coffee Company’s sales, profit and awareness of the product as it can deliver the message very wide to all target audience and leave a deep impact on the target audience’s mind at the same time.

Tactics

There are many types of media and direct marketing that can be used for advertising campaign, each media has its own advantages and disadvantages. However, it is very important to choose the best media to reach the target audience. In this case Costa Coffee may choose television, newspapers, Internet, billboard, and Magazine for the advertising campaign.

Television

Television is the best media to advertise the certain product/service, however, it is relatively expensive than newspapers and magazines. The main reason for this is, it contains the combination of sound, visual images, motion and colours. It offers national coverage where it can covers large amount of audiences within short period of times. Television does easily grasp consumer’s attention and create awareness on them. Through television, Costa Coffee will be able to achieve its objectives by creating awareness on the consumers.

The advertisement will advertise equally in three most popular television channels such as TV1, TV2 and TV3 and Sky TV. The advertisement would advertise in all months throughout the year. However, more advertisement would advertise on early April, May, June, July, August and late September. The main reason for this is, these are the months that New Zealand’s autumn and winter season started and ends. Theoretically, more people would preferred to drink hot beverage especially in winter time. Moreover, this advertisement will advertise on daily on both the TV channels during the prime time, which is between 8.pm and 11.pm. This is considered the best timing because, most students and working people would back from colleges or work, and this is the time where they will be resting in front of the TV. However the length of advertisement would be 15 to no more than 30 seconds.

1st scene – A man with a bulk of paper work in his office

2nd scene – A group of university students with loads of assignments

3rd scene – It is morning tea time and two seniors sitting down on the

couch in their living room and willing to drink something with their snack

5th scene – Showing Costa Coffee with its slogan

‘A little taste of Italy, worth waiting for’.

6th scene – Happy and satisfaction faces of the working man, the

college student, and seniors with the take away coffee beverage in their hand. And at the bottom of the last screen the Costa Coffee’s website and locations will appear saying ‘Visit today!’

Newspapers

Costa Coffee will choose two most popular newspapers in Auckland religion; it would be The New Zealand Herald (The Aucklander) and The Sunday Star times.

According to the latest Nielson national newspaper survey, the both readership of the Weekend and Daily Herald were up strongly in 2009 (“Weekend herald readers grow”, 2009). For Weekend Herald was read by an average of 618,000 people aged 15+, up by 17,000 from a year ago, and about 568,000 people read the Daily Herald and as well as the combined print edition and website readership was also up 5.5 per cent to 685,000 (“Weekend herald readers grow”, 2009). This figure clearly shows that The New Zealand Herald is the highest readership of any newspaper in the country. Additionally, over a week the Herald audience has increased by 52,000, reaching 1.15 million New Zealanders; six out of 10 Aucklanders read a print edition of the Herald or visit nzherald.co.nz each week (“Weekend herald readers grow”, 2009).

The Sunday Star-Times is New Zealand’s only national broadsheet newspaper with a readership of over 608,000 (Murphy, n.d.). Sunday Star-Times is a newspaper provides the backgrounds stories of national significance, at the same time providing quality leisure read for an audience which has time to take it in.

Due to this, these two newspapers are selected in this advertising campaign. Newspaper advertisement would be done in every month throughout the whole year. The advertisement would be done only on Monday, Saturday and Sunday, where it would be in full page in colours.

This is because on Monday all business people going back to their office. Of course, Saturdays and Sundays are the days that people usually rest in their house and spend enough time to go through each and every pages on the newspapers. And furthermore there are lots of special editions on weekends about lifestyle and so on, which will attract many people, read newspapers. While going through the newspapers, definitely they will come across Costa Coffee advertisement because it covers the full page with colourful image. Thus, this will create awareness on the consumers.

Internet Banner

The Internet banners are the best media for online advertisements. The internet banners will be advertised on the best New Zealand websites such as Trade me, Yellow pages, Stuff, TVNZ, and NZ Herald, yahoo!xtra and Google NZ and more. Banners will show with the advertising campaign and it will put for the 24/7, 12 months. It will place at the top of the search machine or the websites, therefore target audience will be aware these banners while searching or surfing the internet. To make sure, all the banners should flash shifting from one screen to another and it will only goes off when the user clicks to close it.

Billboards

Billboards are usually put along highway and main roads to capture the audiences who long on the road or drive along the streets and highways. The billboard advertisement will be for the whole year during the advertising campaign. The billboard will use a poster panel form which is silk screened and printed in sheets to the billboard. It is important to use appropriated size of image and font so drivers are able to see the billboard while they are driving without any distraction. The billboard will be set up on the Northern, Southern and Western Motorway and high traffic areas in the central city. Therefore, it will create the brand recognition and product identification by target audience, plus, increase the brand equity.

Magazines

Magazines are one of the best ways to advertise the branded Coffee shop like Costa Coffee, especially the fashionable Coffee Lovers. Normally, it contains fancy colours of pictures and photos to attract their target audience. Decided to advertise Costa Coffee in Fashion, Food & Beverage and Restaurant related magazines such as Cuisine, Vogue, and Women’s Weekly. The Women’s Weekly magazine is the main magazine media to advertise because it ranked in number one selling New Zealand Magazines (isubscribe, 2010). The advertisement will be printed in each month throughout the whole year in full page with colourful image and a logo of Costa Coffee and simple message will be add on.

SWOT ANALYSIS

Strengths

The main strength of the ‘Costa Coffee’ is the made in UK Company has a strong presence with a good reputation for creativity and coffee in UK. Therefore, the strong connection between New Zealand and UK may influence to increase the Costa Coffee consumption.

The second strength for the Costa Coffee is Italian Heritage. Most of the branded Coffee outlets are selling American style or Kiwi style blended coffee beverage. However, Costa Coffee is known as an Italian influenced culture founded on Italian expert knowledge of roasting unique coffee beans to make high quality handmade drinks. As a customer, it will be great reason to motivate them to experience a new style of coffee.

Lastly, the wide range of food (ie. Cake, sandwiches, muffins etc) for both adults and kids and unlimited free Wi-Fi internet connection can be also strong strength for Costa Coffee.

Weakness

The biggest weakness for the Costa Coffee is its market share in Auckland, New Zealand. Yet, Costa Coffee has no market share in the Central city of Auckland and no brand recognition has been made. Therefore, it will be challenge for Costa Coffee to create strong presence with a good reputation like in UK.

Opportunities

Expansion could be a key opportunity for Costa Coffee. For example, opening more outlets near the University campus, city council, immigration agency, banks within Central Auckland City.

Also attracting a wider population especially families with specific products for children. Costa Coffee’s Kid menu is the good example for this opportunity.

Treats

As a treat for Costa coffee, Auckland Central city could become saturated with different types of coffee shops. Therefore, this area is quite challenge for Costa Coffee to entering in and targeting the same market with existing coffee shops – eg. Starbucks, Columbus, Esquire etc.

New entrants are also treats to Costa Coffee. For example, increasing competitive threats from donut and bagel chains as they continuously expand their outlets and increase alternatives of coffee product offering.

BUDGET

The table below shows the budget allocation across the different media of the advertising plan. The overall budget allocated for this advertising plan would be no more than NZ $4,000, 000. As shown in the table, it shows Television is the major media spend most of the budget followed by the Newspapers. However, it is worth spending massive budget on Television advertisements because it does exposed to larger quantity of target market incredibly within short period of time. Thus, it can easily grasp the target audience’s attention by use of combination of visual images, motion, colours and sound effects. For Newspapers, it also plays an important role, because it is cheaper than Television but it also covers wide areas of target market and audience.

Communication Tools

Amount per year (NZ $)

Television

2,592,000

Newspapers

3,512,832

Internet Banner

235,200

Billboard

222,000

Magazine

161,000

Total (NZ $)

$ 3,390,116

The calculation above is the maximum amount of the advertising campaign for the whole year.

MEASUREMENT

Since Costa Coffee has been spending lots of money on its advertising campaign, it is very important to know whether the advertising was effective or not. The effectiveness of advertising campaign needs to be assessed in order to avoid costly mistakes (Belch & Belch, 1999). In this case, pre-test can be used before the campaign is implemented and post-test is done after implementing the advertising campaign. There are many ways or methods to do these measurements, such as questionnaires/survey, interview, observations and focus group project or more. Questionnaires, survey and interview are the basic and most common methods to be used by everyone because it is reasonably cheap and easy to gather the people’s opinion towards product/service.