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Thursday, May 20, 2010

"We're going to love this brand to death" H. Schultz

Oh my...I'm sure you all know that Starbucks owns the Seattle's Best Coffee brand.  It was a smart acquisition for *$ and many thought it would spell the end of a loved Seattle brand.  Well, the demise has been slow - but the plot seems pretty clear.


SBC has been disappearing from loved locations (downtown, Bellevue Square) and now has a "snappy" new logo to go with it's quieter presence in the marketplace.

Frankly, I could have come up with something better than that using my "excellent" Word Art program.  It looks a lot like a jacked up Target logo which makes me wonder will they be co-locating into Target stores?  No, they won't because Starbucks is already there.  Silly us.  Say good-bye to this historic Seattle based brand - it is officially dead.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

It looks like the SBC logo is crying.

Doug said...

I have to disagree the logo is great. Easy to identify with, and even though I agree it is crying, it highlights the lower price point (drip coffee) the SBC will now be known for. I also doubt you will see it used very much in the seattle area except at McDonalds, a deal that has been extended to not quite nationwide. Its aimed squarely at taking on Dunkin Dounuts as they now make more revunue in Coffee than they do in donuts. Mid West and eastern states is where SBC will start to gain a larger presence.

PNB Dave said...

I agree with Doug. I think the logo is appropriate for the new demographic and price-point Starb's is targeting with SBC. A recent Seattle Times article said the company expects the brand to be sold in 30,000 locations by fall, more than half of them Subway and Burger King fast-food restaurants and AMC Entertainment movie theaters.

Truth be told, if I had any ready cash at the moment I'd probably buy more Starbucks stock.