May
24
We have completed a recent survey on Peet’s Coffee & Tea (PEET) in which we asked two questions we thought relevant to the company’s performance in coming months.
We asked 106 Peet’s employees and representatives across the country. Peet’s has fewer than 150 stores in total so we ended up calling some stores more than once to ask our questions. First we asked employees if they thought coffee prices would rise in the near term. Second, we asked what the best selling drink was.
On the topic of coffee prices, 76 respondents said they did not expect coffee prices at Peet’s to rise. Several employees indicated that there were no internal memos indicating price increases and some employees pointed out that Peet’s has generally paid higher prices for fair trade coffee and is unlikely to be impacted by rises in mass produced coffee if that were to occur. It appears to us that the majority do not coffee prices increases for Peet’s in the near future.
Our second question on the best selling drink also yielded an obvious first choice. 40 respondents identified the Freddo line of specialty drinks (which happen to be the most expensive on the menu at up to $4.00 per). The Chocolate Caramel Freddo was mentioned most among the Freddo options and the hook with this drink is that the chocolate used is Sharffen Berger Chocolate, a gourmet out of Berkeley California (Home of Peet’s Coffee as well). Sharffen Berger has been a division of Hershey’s since 2005 but maintains its own branding and market positioning. The Freddo recommendations may reflect good corporate communication by all the Peet’s employees or the high priced specialty drinks may be flowing rapidly to customers which would seem good for Peet’s financial results. The second most popular response to our question about the top selling drink was Peet’s regular Anniversary Blend coffee or Arabian Mocha coffee.
Comments
Leave a Reply