City Brew

City Brew Coffee has become a local favorite across Montana, Wyoming and North Dakota, but struggled with scaling up as their popularity and market increased. Over the years we worked with them, they expanded to multiple locations, cities, and states, which posed challenges for keeping branding and culture consistent, plus rolling out new coffee drink and food trends in a timely fashion.

With coordinated strategic planning a year in advance, we wanted City Brew to see trends before they started fading. We pushed them to think broader than just the next big latte, and they’ve grown to enjoy packaged distribution in hotels and box stores, including Costco, and to become locals’ favorite coffee seller, whether they’re in their cars or trying to burn the midnight oil at a local shop. Our work for City Brew won two ADDY awards in 2014 for campaigns focused on the Christmas holiday and the company’s anniversary.

Our efforts with City Brew over a nine-year period included not only strategic planning, but also concrete deliverables including coffee bean packaging, an elaboration of point-of-purchase items for store consistency, store signage, and menu boards. We also developed a social media plan, a strategic customer experience plan, and a consistent photography campaign around each rollout.