Caffe Vita Solves for
Flavor, Consistency & Efficiency
with BKON partnership
Caffe Vita is a Seattle headquartered independent & locally owned roasting company. They currently operate 10 cafes throughout Seattle, Portland and New York, and have a strong foodservice wholesale business. The company underwent an ownership change in 2020 and have been revitalizing their story with new product innovations.
Challenge
Caffe Vitta was experiencing several challenges that prevented the growth of their cold brew. They desired a higher quality product that circumvented refrigeration requirements, was easy to ship directly to the consumer, and offered consistency across their channels from CPG to wholesale to their own retail stores.
How BKON Helped
program design
The BKON team listened to Caffe Vita’s goals and conceptualized a program that utilized output from a single brew production to support the multiple channel formats they desired. BKON’s supportive business modeling provided Caffe Vita a complete view of economic considerations to help shape and validate their product strategy.
PRODUCT Development
Caffe Vita shipped their bean of choice to BKON, where a recipe was developed using the RAIN™ brewing process to create their unique flavor profile. Samples were shipped to the Caffe Vita team so they could taste and experience first-hand the clean, fruity and classic flavor they desired.
Commercialization
Caffe Vita’s roasted coffee was brewed at BKON’s production facility. It was shipped in concentrate form to co-packer Good West where it was diluted and heat-treated for up to 6 seconds using the UHT method, then aseptically packaged. Despite being thermally processed, the optimal flavor of Caffe Vita’s cold brew was preserved due to the unique capabilities of RAIN technology.
Centralized brewing created a consistent product for Caffe Vita to utilize across their channel strategy. It was divided into two formats at Good West to support Caffe Vita’s dual goals to create a multi-serve 2-liter bag-in-box for retail and online sales and a 5 gallon bag-in-box keg replacement with BKON’s KegX for their own retail and wholesale open cup service.
GROWTH
Caffe Vita was able to immediately open up a new direct-to-consumer sales channel for their finished cold brew online.
In their own retail, the CPG boxes added another option for grab and go beyond their beans.
The foodservice channel is being managed amongst the uncertainty of COVID with a product that has a 6-month shelf life.
Having experienced positive results with their new cold brew program in 2020, Caffe Vita extended their product strategy in 2021 with a shelf-stable canned cold brew that utilizes the same BKON brewed recipe to support the grocery channel and expand their online direct to consumer options.
“At the time when everyone is making coffee at home, BKON’s shelf-stable cold brew has allowed us to bring our café experience to people’s homes. Since adding it to our website, we’ve received powerful feedback from our customers thanking us for bringing the great taste of our cold brew to homes across the country.”
KATE Van PETTEN
MARKETING DIRECTOR
“Transitioning to a shelf stable program has allowed us to move away from the cold supply chain by removing the need for large refrigeration space in our warehouse since the product can be stored at room temperature. It has also made managing our cold brew stock simpler. The extended shelf life and reduced waste allows us to purchase more at a time, reducing purchasing costs.”
Lorenzo de Amicis
National Services Manager
“Our Guatemalan cold brew coffee sourced from Finca Nuevas Vinas, offers flavors of milk chocolate, vanilla bean & tangerine. By partnering with BKON we were able to achieve the taste profile that best complimented this coffee as cold brew. With BKON’s help we are able to properly showcase what our Guatemalan has to offer as a cold beverage, each sip leaving you wanting more.”
SAM SPILLMAN
DIRECTOR OF COFFEE AND CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
The Results
Caffe Vita successfully launched a new multi-product, shelf stable cold brew program in less than 60 days.
Caffe Vita’s shelf stable cold brew program continues to grow in volume across both consumer product and wholesale foodservice channels, paving the way for additional SKU and format extensions, including their new canned cold brew.
Caffe Vita was able to eliminate their large capacity cold storage unit, creating more space for green coffee and supplies. The 5-gallon KegX units take up 17% less space than a plastic keg so they can now stock more liquid per cubic foot.
Through centralized brewing, Caffe Vita reduced the number of quality control steps necessary. They use to brew in-house at each of their locations and spent a lot of resources testing for quality at each cafe.
Their new online channel opportunity has grown with orders coming in from as far as Japan.