Brews & Shoes: A Unique Explanation For Why Your Sneaker Store Now Has A Caf¨¦

As a child, I tolerated shopping sprees before family weddings only because the shopkeeper would offer me a stool to sit on and a complimentary glass bottle of Coke. As the adults argued over material, designs, and prices, I would slowly sip my soda and fade into myself. It is safe to say that I have always hated the ordeal of shopping and prefer the ease of e-commerce apps.

But some weeks ago, I chanced upon a unique experience. After watching a play at the NCPA in Mumbai, my friend suggested we run to the ISUZU showroom nearby. He could check out a car he had been dreaming of and save up to buy it. I tagged along, prepared to be bored with endless chatter around car specifications and features, a subject I have no knowledge of or interest in. Instead, I was met with a Blue Tokai caf¨¦ inside the showroom. While my friend marvelled at the cars on display, I sat and sipped my coffee, just like I did as a child.

If you look around for such experiences, you will realise this concept is not new to the Indian shopping experience. Coffee brands and chains like Blue Tokai, Subko, Ritual, and Maverick & Farmer have opened up mini bars across a variety of retail outlets¡ªbookshops, galleries, bike and car showrooms, and even sneaker stores.

DawnTown Shoe Store

A 2019 article in the New York Times, Why Is There a Coffee Shop in So Many Stores? I wondered why boutiques were beginning to look a lot like caf¨¦s. A coffee bar seemed to be a part of every kind of retail experience, from plant and furniture shops to bike parts resellers and barbershops. Saturdays NYC, a surf shop and coffee bar, is sometimes credited with kickstarting the trend.

For some stores, adding a caf¨¦ was a way to make their shops seem friendlier and less forbidding. As one of the respondents in the article said, ¡°If you walk in somewhere and there¡¯s expensive furniture and there¡¯s no music playing, it turns into a gallery... But if it¡¯s people drinking coffee and there¡¯s music playing, you¡¯re like, ¡®Oh, I can lean into this a little bit, feel it, and want to buy it.¡¯¡± For others, it is a simple way to increase foot traffic that may translate into impulse purchases.

Caffeine Culture

Maybe it¡¯s a way to subliminally convert caf¨¦-goers into future customers; maybe it¡¯s an acknowledgement of the fact that we all need a pick-me-up while shopping, and the retail industry has wizened up to that. Shivam Shahi, co-founder of Blue Tokai Coffee Roasters, told me, ¡°Hospitality has always been the culture in India.¡± As more and more people begin drinking specialty coffee, the beverage has made its way into the shopping experience.

In places like India¡¯s burgeoning cities, dealing with skyrocketing commercial real estate prices, the collaboration model is also profitable for both businesses. After all, all you need is a trade licence from the local municipal authority, an FSSAI registration, and a fire licence, all of which are not hard to attain.

In India, Blue Tokai began focusing on clubbing a coffee shop with bookstores around 2017. But now, everything goes.

Ritual Daily Coffee

A Mumbai sneaker store, Dawntown in Bandra, comes attached with a caf¨¦ and a basketball court. The caf¨¦ is run by Ritual Daily Coffee, which already has a standalone caf¨¦ in nearby Pali Hill. You¡¯d think proximity would be a factor to consider before opening another caf¨¦, but Rahul Ramnani, Founder and Chef of Ritual Daily Coffee and Tokyo Matcha Bar, said, ¡°Ritual¡¯s sneaker caf¨¦ seeks to create an environment for like-minded people to interact in a progressive, casual, and out of the ordinary environment.¡± He said when Dawntown¡¯s founders approached Ritual to open a caf¨¦ on their premises, they collaborated to offer patrons an experience that ¡°brought together their shared love of brews and shoes.¡±

But the way Dawntown is designed, it is evident that its offerings go beyond shopping. In their outdoor area, you can play a game of basketball, grab coffee and grub from Ritual, and spend time there that is not limited to buying sneakers. According to Kushagra Patwari, CEO and founder of Dawntown, they wanted to uplift the shopping experience. ¡°People are buying a high-value item, and they usually spend more than an hour in the store; families and kids are coming in. We wanted to offer something extra to them,¡± he said.

Retail and Ristretto

But why specialty coffee? Why not a juice stand, for instance? Shahi argued that most consumers can¡¯t make a specialty brew at home, even if it¡¯s a regular part of their lifestyle. That is why Blue Tokai carefully chooses which brands to collaborate with before opening a cafe inside their stores. There are four main criteria to be met, Shahi said. ¡°The first is, naturally, commercials. Next, we identify whether the experience and the aesthetics match with coffee. It is also important to us what the brand offers and who their target audience is.¡±

Sure, who doesn¡¯t love a hot cappuccino while browsing a bookshop? But would you really seek out coffee while shopping for a home appliance? As specialty coffee is a slightly premium experience, coffee brands are careful to choose spaces where their audiences might be. It¡¯s all about who you are seen with. This is evident, particularly with Subko in Mumbai. The coffee chain has opened a Subko Mini attached to art galleries like Art + Charlie in Bandra and Method in Juhu. They are also inside the boutique hotel Bombay Abode in Colaba and at Bombay Shirt Company stores in Mumbai and Bangalore. And at the BMW bike showroom in Bangalore, you encounter a Maverick & Farmer coffee shop.

DawnTown Shoe Store

For Blue Tokai, belief in the in-store model was easy, as they had already seen success with their 2017 coffee shop-inside-bookstore experiment. Now, you will see a Blue Tokai caf¨¦ at Bahrisons in Kolkata and Chandigarh, inside VegNonVeg, the premium multi-brand sneaker store in Delhi, and the BMW showroom in Hyderabad. The brand is now looking to collaborate with salons, EV showrooms, and banks as well.

A day may come when, like in New York, we discover that a caf¨¦ we frequent is actually a spare parts shop. Ramnani sums it up well: ¡°It¡¯s a growing concept. As coffee and street culture are on the rise, it¡¯s only a matter of time till this becomes the norm.¡±