Ikea opened its first Coffee Bar in its Utrecht branch. With this new concept, the home furnishing chain wants to further zoom in on the coffee and lunch moment with new visitors and a younger audience. In recent years, according to Ikea, there has been an increasing focus on a good cup of quality coffee.
The coffee bar at Ikea Utrecht, set up as an independent shop-in-shop in the middle of the existing restaurant, can accommodate 60 visitors. Coffees, cakes, muffins, brownies and fresh juices are available.
With the Coffee Bar, the home furnishing chain wants to further zoom in on the coffee and lunch moment with new visitors and a younger audience. Thus, the bar has dedicated workstations and for those in a hurry, there is take-away coffee.
The home furnishing chain is pressing ahead with the roll-out: the existing coffee corners in Barendrecht, Heerlen and Eindhoven will be remodelled based on the new concept in the course of this and next year. For the remaining branches, Ikea is investigating if and when they will implement the concept.
The new coffee bar will be staffed by Ikea Food employees trained by a barista. The price level in the new concept may be slightly higher than what regular Ikea visitors are used to, but remains below the prices of coffee bars in the Ikea area in Utrecht. Members of Ikea Family get their coffee for free in the restaurant, but have a wider choice in the new Coffee Bar.
Students and local businesses
Ikea hopes to attract new visitors and a younger audience with the new coffee bar. The concern is particularly targeting students, people who work in the area and people who now only come to Ikea to have coffee with friends.
Why Ikea chose its own coffee concept? At Ikea, we are always curious about new concepts with which we can reach and serve our existing and potentially new customers even better. So we are constantly testing new solutions, responds the home furnishing chain.
Particularly in the Utrecht branch, with its central location in the country right along the A12 motorway, part of a residential boulevard and adjacent to a residential area, the formula saw an opportunity to offer visitors something extra: a good cup of coffee, handmade by baristas in an environment with a different ambiance, including facilities to charge laptop, tablet and mobile at the work bar.
Attention to a good cup of coffee
In recent years, Ikea says there has been an increasing focus on a good cup of quality coffee, from espresso to speciality coffee, at any time of the day. Dutch consumers - unlike a few years ago - are willing to pay just a bit more for it, the concern observes. Great value is also attached to a socially responsible product. Thus, even the PÅTAR coffee is organic and UTZ-certified. Popular in the Coffee Bar are the cappuccino, followed by the lungo - the regular coffee - and the Latte Macchiato.
And because a cup of coffee is no longer just drunk in the morning or evening, it is served with something that suits the time of day: a tasty organic farmer's yoghurt with muesli in the morning, a savoury cheese roll around lunch or a good point of cake in the afternoon. In terms of snacks, a favourite is the pastel de nata, a puff pastry snack with cream filling, second is the Old Amsterdam swirl, a freshly baked cheese roll, followed by the Brasilienne cake, airy pastry with whipped cream and nut sprinkles.
To inner cities
The Coffee Bar is an example of how Ikea is looking for new concepts and solutions to meet customer needs. The retail chain also wants to give consumers a reason to visit Ikea more often soon with stand-alone cafés or restaurants in city centres.
