More importantly, CCD had an otherworldly pulse on what areas in cities were truly popular. By 2010, there were 1000+ stores all over India - 5 times that of Barista, that had entered India in 2000 with its first store in Delhi. While, of course, metropolitan cities would have seen the first spoils, fast-growing tier-2 cities like mine weren’t far away - Bhubaneswar saw its own in the early 2000s.
#BOOM ROASTED FREE#
Its biggest draw in a tea-loving nation was its free (but timebound for an hour) internet. In 1996, Siddhartha opened the first CCD outlet on Brigade Road in Bangalore. Sigh, kids these days, cribbing about their Jio Fiber connection snapping for just 30 minutes. It’s not like internet was a very widely-available commodity back in the 90s. He decided to move his consumer business of selling readymade coffee to something that might give him more margins - like selling an experience.
Interactions with German and Singaporean cultures made ex-financial services entrepreneur Siddhartha realize that there may be money to be made in selling coffee to people under the guise of providing them with free internet. CCD defined that for an entire generation of people who didn’t hail from a metro, and who didn’t have enough immediate family members who had likely seen the massive green-and-white logo abroad.Īnd this was by design. I had not seen this before, because I didn’t know what cafe culture was before this. Bright yellow lights, walls with word clouds, “ A lot can happen over coffee” having its own space, brown sofas, a counter with some of the most delectable cake and sandwiches I had ever eaten, a verandah for outside seating, and amicable staff. The earliest I can remember being exposed to cafe culture in my tier-2 hometown was a Cafe Coffee Day store. In order to start this story, we might want to roll back a decade or so, to go back to when coffee started becoming cool, owing to a Karnataka native named VG Siddhartha. That’s loyalty not just in terms of what the product has to offer, but also what the brand is doing over and above the product to ensure some lifetime patreons. This also raises the question of how spoilt for choice we have become, and whether as premium customers, loyalty to that one cup of coffee holds meaning for us.
#BOOM ROASTED PROFESSIONAL#
But between consumers who are extremely protective about their darling French press, and the professional who can only spend enough time to buy a frappucino, the spectrum of coffee among people who can pay (or don’t care about what good coffee costs) is huge. India has come a long way when it comes to consuming coffee - from “ yeah, I’m good with my Nescafe ” to “ nope, not touching anything except my morning Starbucks ”. (If my parents are reading this - please don’t pick up an MBA pamphlet.) The potential for one of us to make “content” around this is not far away - it’s already happening, minus the coffee. And while it’s certainly true for Western countries, you’d be surprised to see that behavior in Indian working professionals, too. Among creators in either genre - every day, without fail, they go to the same coffee shop, and get that same cup of coffee. īut this post isn’t about what management consulting or product management is - you can pick up an MBA pamphlet for that. It’s actually a little different from the '“product manager” genre of videos, because at least the poor consultants seem to be on the grind all day. It’s every bit meant to be sold as a glamorous career option in all the things one gets to do as a management consultant. There’s an entire genre of videos on YouTube that’s simply about a routine day in the life of a management consultant in Toronto/Tokyo/London/insert global city.Īny given video has a set structure: show the consultant waking up, using some face pack product that has likely sponsored them, prep for work, take a cycle, get coffee, reach work, speed-run work….you know the gist.
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