Illy Making Inroads into High End Hotels
While Starbucks is busy cranking out mass-market appealing coffee drinks, Illy is taking a decidedly upscale approach to expanding their brand. Illy has teamed up with several high end hotel brands to offer a Euro espresso experience in the hotel cafe, while also offering Illy Y1 units as in-room brewers.
In a WSJ article this morning, Illy detailed their accomplishments to date: 2,000 hotels worldwide, expecting to double that in the next five years. They recently opened up a cafe in the Miami JW Marriott, that also pairs with the poolside espresso service. To make sure that the cafe delivered its best, Illy sent its head barista from Italy to make sure the standards were up to par.
The illy brand is maybe uniquely qualified to do this venture on a global basis; Starbucks is well known but due to their everywhere approach, lacks the exclusive cache, Nespresso has the machine and capsule appeal to the right target audience, but not an authentic grind and extract heritage that an espresso bar needs. For illy, the careful mix of image, appeal and authenticity melds with product and quality of execution to make for the right fit and chemistry in upscale brands like JW Marriott.
At the Wall St. Journal - Read more on Illy in upscale hotels
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Posted by Scott Martin at November 22, 2010 11:49 AM
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