Looking to re-establish its “coffeehouse credentials,” coffee brand Nabob has revamped its existing coffees and added two new product lines, Bold and Whole Bean.
The revamp is being supported by an extensive print and out-of-home campaign that features messages like “Now serving Bold Blends” and “Beans meet grinder. Grinder meet Nabob.” The creative mimics the hand-written chalk signs found in coffeehouses, and features the tagline “New beans. New coffee. New Nabob.”
The coffee brand has also introduced new packaging across its entire product roster (13 SKUs in all) that sees small tins replaced by bags. That is an important step towards re-affirming Nabob’s reputation as a premium brand, said Holly Ramsden, senior brand manager, roast and ground coffee for Nabob parent Kraft Canada.
“We do see that consumers perceive higher-quality coffee to be found in a bag,” she said.
The accompanying campaign from Ogilvy Toronto (with media from MediaVest Canada) includes out-of-home in major markets and newspaper advertising featuring both standard run-of-press ads and a custom-content series profiling global coffee cultures appearing in The Globe and Mail.
Those marketing elements are being complemented by direct mail and sampling programs that will see the Nabob Coffee Truck visit events such as the International Home Show and The Babytime Show this month.
Nabob has a broad range of competitors in the premium and super-premium category including Van Houtte, Kicking Horse, Melitta and even some President’s Choice coffees.
The introduction of Nabob’s Bold coffee line is being driven by increased consumer adoption of darker, richer blends. “We wanted to ensure we had the right lineup up blends for [premium coffee] enthusiasts,” said Ramsden.
The new Bold Blends product line includes two new roasts, the Vancouver coffee-culture inspired Gastown Grind and Midnight Eclipse, and a repositioned Full City Dark roast.
According to the Coffee Association of Canada’s most recent “Canadian Coffee Drinking Study,” the proportion of Canadian adults drinking coffee in the past day rose to 65% in 2010.
The most recent Statistics Canada data showed that annual coffee consumption increased 3.6% to 90 litres per person in 2009, an increase of 14 litres from 1989.
