Every so often we get an explosion in a certain space that dies away with 1-2 winners, investors get so scarred from this space and decide to abandon it for the remainder of their career. This is normal, people, even the smartest out there, often draw on their past experience when evaluating future opportunities. For instance in the late 2000s /early 2010s that was social, by 2014-2015 social was declared dead by the majority of investors. With Facebook dominating the space, Twitter stagnating at 200m DAU barely anyone saw the rise of a third social media network..snapchat…then a fourth…Tiktok…then a fifth Clubhouse. Coffee has a similar story, after the rise of blue bottle, philz…the demise of luckin in china…many investors declared the space “dead.” So many have been burnt trying to chase the success of these few winners with no luck that they just went back to doing their SaaS, negative churn companies…which is fine! There is so many fantastic SaaS companies.
We, however, have not been by the industry yet and are willing to bet on the next winner in the coffee space. A company that hasn’t even launched a product yet!! Couplet Coffee will win this space for a few reasons. First and most importantly is their distribution strategy, Gefen was one of the Gen Z mafia that created ššš, she knows how to launch a product in a way that is on par with the guys @ Robinhood in the very early days. The second is Couplet Coffee is social movement first, a coffee company second. Gefen’s life mission is shining a spot light on underrepresented minorities. All the merch for couplet coffee is created by underrepresented minorities using her platform to shine light on their work and this is the just the start. Our purchasing habits have changed dramatically over the past decade, I for one know that I am X100 more likely to buy a product from a company that have values that resonate with mine. Selfishly and partly because it makes me feel better about my spending…I mostly view it as an investment. Yes today I invested in artist on Couplet Coffee Merch store, and got a t-shirt in return. We need more Couplet Coffees in the world and I can’t wait to see what comes out of this investment