BK JOE Throws in the Towel

It was no surprise to us, but Burger King has thrown in the towel on its BK JOE line of coffee and will now be selling Starbucks' Seattle's Best.

It's a really smart move for both sides.

We tried licensing BK JOE years ago, but no one in the coffee world would touch the brand. Made from a coffee extract (called, appropriately enough, "sludge" in the business), BK JOE couldn't get the pulse of a coffee-holic racing. In the interim, McDonald's has grabbed up even more of the breakfast day part by selling a quality coffee (Green Mountain). Burger King's breakfast strategy was hostage to its lousy coffee, supplied by Sara Lee, who sold off its own retail brands years ago.

Starbucks is moving rapidly to expand its channels of distribution, pushing its retail licensed products and launching Via instant. Americans are behind the rest of the world when it comes to instant coffee. If you travel in Europe, for example, instant is an accepted way of getting your jolt of java in the morning. But the branding "experts" here are crapping all over Starbucks, insisting they're "diluting" the brand equity.

It seems only those on the sidelines understand brand equity, and those of us engaged in building businesses in new and exciting ways are "ruining" the brands. Just ask the restaurants who aren't licensing their brands to retail. Even as more and more of them go under.

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