Emerging as a Dark Horse, Fore Coffee's Performance Soars, Achieving Positive Growth

Jakarta, Tangerangtalk.Online - Fore Coffee, a leading local coffee retail startup that aspires to provide a better coffee experience for Indonesian consumers, welcomes the year 2023 with a business strategy focused on profitability, despite 50% of its non-functional outlets being affected by the pandemic storm throughout 2020 to 2021.

With a background in the food and beverage service industry for over 23 years, Vico Lomar has steered Fore Coffee back to its original path, which is a business that offers quality food and beverages that cater to the taste of Indonesian consumers. The brand has also undergone a repositioning to become a trendy and affordable beverage for Indonesian families.

The fruitful results, as delicious as Fore Coffee's drinks, can be seen in the positive EBITDA achievement in Q3 2021, which is a testament to the management's expertise under the leadership of Vico Lomar in executing various strategic measures to achieve business goals. One of the key factors in achieving positive performance is a reduction in promotional expenses by 50% in 2021, 30% in 2022, and further 20%-30% in 2023.

"Throughout 2022, Fore Coffee has demonstrated its commitment to being a role model of pioneering spirit and customer-centric innovation, which is part of the brand's core values. In addition to creating and offering products that suit the taste of every Indonesian family, we also emphasize the convenience and affordability of our products by continuously introducing seasonal beverages while promoting our flagship products," emphasized Vico Lomar, CEO & Co-founder of Fore Coffee.

"Our flagship products are the most effective promotional tools. These products have successfully conveyed the message of the quality of Fore Coffee's offerings to the Indonesian people. That's why our focus is on intensive and sustainable product research and development, so that we can create new trends and constantly introduce new products that will become favorites among the community," added Vico.

Furthermore, Vico outlined three strategic steps that have been the key to Fore Coffee's success in expanding its business reach and achieving spectacular accomplishments and profitability. These steps include driving the quality of flagship products through innovative research and development, empowering high-quality human resources, and targeting the opening of new outlets.

The flagship products or signatures of Fore Coffee in 2022, such as Aren Latte, Pandan Latte, and Butterscotch Sea-Salt Latte, have propelled the brand to the TOP 5 brands with the highest top-of-mind awareness in Indonesia. One of the smart marketing breakthroughs was appointing Vidi Aldiano as the Chief Savor Advisor of Fore Coffee in 2022, introducing a range of new seasonal beverages curated by Vidi Aldiano's taste preferences. This campaign received a tremendous response in the market and created queues at many Fore Coffee outlets.

According to Matthew Ardian, CMO of Fore Coffee, in 2022, the company conducted extensive marketing strategy reviews. Together with the team, Fore Coffee stood out in the midst of coffee industry competition in Indonesia through various collaborations and iconic campaigns. One of the marketing strategies employed by Fore Coffee was a focus on brand positioning or awareness, as well as in-depth consumer mapping on a national scale. Fore Coffee also differentiated itself with a distinct brand approach compared to other coffee players. "Previously, Fore Coffee was known as a premium local coffee brand, that was the perception people had of our brand. In early 2022, we sharpened our position, not to be known as a premium player, but as a leading powerhouse coffee brand that offers essential products of the best quality and is favored by the people, as we understand that consumers deserve a better product," explained Matthew.

For Matthew, the primary role of marketing is to support research and development and operations. "In addition to understanding the aspirations and inspirations of Indonesian consumers, the role of marketing in Fore Coffee is to bridge these aspirations with a variety of innovative products desired by the community. Throughout 2022, Fore Coffee achieved many firsts, from the Fore Junior line of beverages for children, the Fore Deli line, to collaborations with premium lifestyle brands such as Grab, Laneige, Green Rebel, and Oma Elly. All of these launches were packaged with a digital-centric and contemporary marketing approach," said Matthew.

In 2023, Fore Coffee aims for organic and sustainable marketing, with a focus on acquiring new customers both offline and online as a contribution to refining the brand image, which the marketing team has been focused on since last year. "With consistent monthly campaigns, we have seen Fore Coffee consumers engaging in word-of-mouth marketing through user-generated content shared on social media networks. Ultimately, this results in a positive outcome because the healthiest consumer quality is organic," explained Matthew. This has yielded great results. According to research conducted with a third party, Fore Coffee experienced a 23% increase in customer satisfaction and Net Promoter Score (NPS), placing Fore Coffee as the brand with the highest NPS among others in Indonesia.

The plan to solidify the product line will not be realized without the excellent collaboration of the team behind the scenes at Fore Coffee, especially the operational team and the hundreds of Fore Coffee outlets and marketing team. With a network of 134 outlets in Jabodetabek, Java, Sumatra, and Kalimantan, Fore Coffee is optimistic about achieving its business target of adding around 75 outlets by expanding into mid-sized cities, bringing the total number of outlets to approximately 200 by the end of 2023.

"Our aspiration is for Fore Coffee to become a brand that is loved and trusted by Indonesian consumers. This goal may seem simple but requires extraordinary commitment from all elements of the company. With principles of openness, transparency, and relentless innovation for customer satisfaction, we believe this aspiration can be achieved," concluded Vico.