Whether you’re running a small-batch roastery, a hip coffee shop, or a subscription service, your coffee branding will determine whether customers reach for your product or scroll past it.
Creating a memorable coffee brand isn’t as simple as just slapping a pretty logo on a label. It requires strategic thinking where packaging, storytelling, visual identity, and consumer psychology all come together.
Here’s how to stand out in the competitive coffee industry with irresistible branding.
What Is Coffee Branding?
Coffee branding isn’t just your logo or packaging – although these are an important part of your brand strategy. But it goes much deeper than that.
At Bethany Works®, we think of branding as a purposeful fusion of your story, style, values, market differentiators, customer experience, and other elements that all work together and express what your brand stands for.
You can’t create truly effective coffee branding without understanding buyer psychology.
From the texture of your packaging to the typography on your labels, each decision should trigger specific emotional and cognitive responses from your target audience.
This is why many coffee brands work with a brand strategist before creating their packaging and other brand assets.
Why Coffee Branding Is Important
Businesses with well-defined brand strategies can expect revenue growth of 10-20%.
The coffee aisle presents a TON of options to consumers. Your packaging must command attention through distinctive colors, shapes, and messaging.
Think of how La Colombe’s illustrations communicate sophistication and craftsmanship right away, attracting its target audience.
For coffee shops, branding creates an atmosphere that keeps customers coming back. A coffee shop with clear branding stands out from generic competitors and gives customers a reason to choose you over the coffee shop across the street.
People don’t just buy coffee – they buy the feeling of belonging to a particular coffee culture. I say this with firsthand experience living in Portland – a place where people are VERY serious about their coffee culture! :))
Beyond driving immediate sales, brand consistency also builds recognition and trust over time. Customers start buying not just because you make fantastic coffee or your shop has great service but because they value being associated with your brand.
It’s also essential for your coffee branding to accurately communicate your product’s attributes. For example, dark and rich colors signal bold flavors, while light and airy designs suggest milder profiles.
Misalignment between packaging expectations and taste experience can damage your brand’s trust. A customer who buys what appears to be a bold morning blend only to discover a delicate floral profile likely won’t return for more!
How To Create Psychology-Backed Coffee Branding
Creating coffee branding that truly works means understanding the psychology behind why people choose one coffee over another. So, here are the 7 elements that will help you build the best coffee branding that connects with your customers and drives sales.
1. Define Your Coffee Company’s Unique Story and Values
Every memorable coffee brand starts with a compelling story. Why did you start your coffee company? Maybe you discovered a rare variety of coffee beans and got inspired. Or maybe you want to focus on sustainable coffee and improve farmers’ lives through direct trade.
Brand storytelling creates emotional connections with your target audience. People don’t just buy coffee; they buy into narratives that make them feel good about their purchase.
A good example of this is Stumptown Coffee Roasters (did I mention I live in Portland and may be partial to this brand?), a popular coffee brand that talks a lot about its direct relationships with farmers.
Identifying your values, unique origin story, and the purpose behind what you do and what it means to the world is the first step to building an instantly recognizable, unbreakable brand.
94% of consumers say that they recommend brands with which they have an emotional connection.
RESULTS THAT SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES
Download our case studies + client experiences to review the impact of our website design and brand strategy services have beyond the stunning deliverables you’ll find in our portfolio.
2. Identify Your Target Audience
Knowing exactly who you’re selling to shapes a huge part of your coffee branding. Different coffee drinkers have dramatically different priorities.
Are you targeting busy professionals who need reliable morning fuel? Or maybe young coffee enthusiasts who are looking for something more unique? Each group responds to different messaging, colors, and design elements.
Different target audience groups also have different values. For example, Deloitte research shows that millennials and Gen Z prioritize environmental sustainability, with about 60% of them willing to pay more for sustainable products and services.
At the same time, they’re also sensitive to ‘greenwashing’ – a phenomenon when brands make marketing claims about sustainability but don’t have the business practices and certification to back them up.
Start by creating detailed buyer personas that capture:
- Demographics (such as age, income, location)
- Coffee habits
- Pain points (what frustrates them about existing coffee options)
- Values (what matters to them beyond taste and price)
Don’t spend too much time on the demographics. While they’re helpful to know, the most effective brand storytelling and positioning is going to come from understanding your target audience’s psychographics – their values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyle choices.
3. Research Your Competition
The coffee market is crowded, so you need to figure out a way to uniquely position your coffee brand in front of your target audience. To do that, you need to understand what other options exist in the market.
- Research your competitor’s pricing, packaging, messaging, and customer experience. You can order their products online and look at their social media accounts to get a sense of what they stand for.
- Look for gaps their branding doesn’t address. Maybe your competitors all use similar earth tones and talk about quality, but none emphasize community building or innovating with flavors.
- Identify what you admire about successful competitors, but never simply copy them. Customers quickly spot inauthenticity, and copycat brands rarely inspire loyalty. Instead, figure out how you can build on your unique strengths.
In short, whatever makes you different should be central to your coffee branding.
4. Craft Your Brand Messaging and Voice
Your brand voice is how you talk to customers. It needs to match both your values and what your target audience expects. For example, your brand voice can be approachable, authoritative, playful, unpretentious, edgy, artistic, or passionate.
Whatever adjectives you choose to describe how your brand communicates, make sure that they guide all of your written content. You can create a brand messaging framework that includes things like:
- Your core brand promise (what customers can always expect)
- Key messages about quality, sourcing, and experience
- Common phrases and words to use (and avoid)
- Sample copy for different contexts (packaging, social media, website)
At Bethany Works®, brand messaging is always a part of the overall brand strategy that we craft for our clients. You can see examples in our Portfolio.
5. Design a Visual Brand Identity
This is perhaps the most fun part of creating an irresistible coffee brand and what most entrepreneurs think about when they first hear the word “branding.” Your visual identity translates your brand story into images, colors, and design elements.
Colors trigger specific emotional responses.
For example, earthy browns and greens signal natural, traditional coffee experiences. Bold reds and oranges suggest energy and intensity. Colors like blues and purples can differentiate your brand but might not traditionally connect with coffee.
Your typography choices matter, too. Your fonts can communicate sentiments like craft and reliability or feel more modern and accessible.
Your coffee brand should have a comprehensive style guide that documents:
- Logo variations and usage rules
- Color palette with specific codes
- Typography hierarchy
- Photography style
- Design elements and patterns
One of the most important questions to ask your brand designer is whether they use consumer psychology when creating your coffee branding or just go based on what “looks pretty.”
Aesthetics are important, but they won’t be effective if they don’t resonate with your target audience’s brains.
6. Create a Unique Packaging Design
Your packaging should tell your brand story at a glance. It should capture your target audience’s attention and quickly communicate the most important values and differentiators of your coffee brand.
For example, here’s the label design that Bethany Works® created for an e-commerce brand, SALT. Its minimalist design and the tagline “yin meets yang” express the label’s core belief in the importance of balance between comfort & style, work & play.
7. Apply Your Coffee Branding
Consistent branding makes your message come across more clearly and builds recognition with your target audience. This helps grow your business over time.
For coffee shops, you can apply your branding to:
- Interior design elements
- Staff uniforms and training
- Menu design and language
- Cups, sleeves, and napkins
- Local marketing materials
For packaged coffee brands, focus on:
- Website design and online experience
- Social media presence
- Partnerships and collaborations
If you have a team, it’s essential that they have access to documented brand guidelines so that it’s easy for everyone to maintain consistency.
Our Work
At Bethany Works®, we specialize in strategic brand and web design for fierce visionaries and tenacious creatives who are ready to elevate their brand. Here are a few samples of our past work, and you can find more in our Portfolio.
Rosemere Taven
Rosemere Tavern is a true tavern, offering only beer, wine, and good times – including pull-tabs and punchboard games.
They’re family-owned and operated, and their goal was to become known as the local hangout spot. A place where people came in not just to have a beer but to pull up a seat at the bar and dive into chats about the good old days.
Wild Hare Films
Wild Hare Films is a photography studio for elopements, intimate weddings, and steamy sessions in Washington State. They embrace the carefree and believe that acceptance allows human beings to make room for curiosity.
Before their rebrand with Bethany Works®, Wild Hare Films’ branding was inconsistent, with no clear creative direction or voice. They wanted their brand to feel wild, artistic, and classy at the same time, and our team “nailed it” – their words, not ours!
Looking for more examples of our work? You can also check out these e-commerce brand examples.
FAQs
How To Sell Your Own Coffee Brand?
The first thing you should do is truly build your coffee brand – go beyond just picking a few pretty colors and a generic logo from Canva for your coffee bags, and instead dig deep into creating unique positioning, messaging, and visual identity for your coffee business. Then, you can establish both online and physical distribution channels that match your target audience’s shopping habits.
For example, you can create a user-friendly website with direct sales capabilities or reach out to local cafés and farmers’ markets. With a thoughtful foundation, strong coffee branding will do the legwork for you.
What Are the Best Colors for Coffee Branding?
There’s no specific set of best colors for the best coffee branding. It depends on your specific positioning and target audience. That said, there are some popular colors in the coffee industry, such as earthy browns, deep reds, and forest greens. These colors visually communicate tradition, warmth, and natural quality.
For stronger blends, you can also use bright oranges and yellows to express energy. Black and white combinations can be used to suggest sophistication and premium quality for upscale coffee branding. Tap into consumer psychology to understand which colors best reflect what your brand stands for.
How Do I Market My New Coffee Brand?
It depends on what your coffee brand is and how you want to make sales. Regardless of whether you’re an e-commerce coffee brand or a local coffee shop, you should have a modern, user-friendly website that’s optimized for SEO so that it actually shows up in searches.
What your website is going to look like and what kind of functionality it’ll have heavily depend on your business. For example, if you sell coffee beans as a distributor, you’ll need strong e-commerce features. If you have a brick-and-mortar location or a food truck, you’ll need strong local SEO.
You can also leverage social media platforms like Instagram to share authority-building content and behind-the-scenes glimpses. Depending on the nature of your business, it can also be a good idea to partner with complementary local businesses for cross-promotion.
Stand Out with Psychology-Backed Coffee Branding
Coffee branding that’s rooted in psychology creates meaningful connections with your target audience, which naturally results in better sales and more impact.
Sure, you’re selling caffeine, but you’re also selling belonging, identity, and a certain experience that resonates with your audience both consciously and subconsciously.
Learn more about our design services to start crafting your irresistible coffee branding.
