More Good Earth for Edmonton
CALGARY – Their unique coffee concept began with one location in Calgary’s Beltline in 1991. Today, Calgary-based Good Earth Coffeehouse and Bakery has 36 cafes, including six in Edmonton, and plans an aggressive expansion into the eastern Canadian market. The company is also opening six locations over six months in the West, including another three or four in Edmonton.
“We’re on a fairly good growth program right now. We’re basically infilling in markets where we’re already at,” said Michael Going, president and co-founder of Good Earth.
There are 22 cafes in Calgary, one in Airdrie, two in Red Deer, one in Lethbridge, one in Canmore and a second underway; in addition, there is a café in Regina and another under construction, one in Kelowna and one in Victoria with a second and third on the way. The company is looking to move into Saskatoon and Winnipeg.
“(We’re) really getting ready for a strategic push into those major, much-larger markets. We set a goal for ourselves to get up to 50 cafes, plus or minus, within Western Canada before we make the push into Central Canada,” added Going. “We do not have a set number of cafes targeted.
“We will enter those markets within 12 to 15 months by partnering with groups who can open and operate multiple cafes in a relatively short time period, the first 12 to 18 months. Then we will proceed with infilling locations within those markets … ”
The company was focused on selling great products from the start and now averages 10,000 customer transactions every day. “The core idea for us was to have a genuine coffee-house environment where there’s a sense of community, a sense of relaxation and enjoyment and sharing. Making sure the coffee was exceptional right from the start,” said Nan Eskenazi, co-founder of Good Earth.
“We had a really wholesome component knowing that as our business grew and as the marketplace changed that we would be needing to be distinctive from other coffee concepts. So the food component of our business has always been a powerful point of difference.
“I think the other really profound difference for us in establishing our business was that we established it on a set of values Michael and I personally hold in terms of environmental and social responsibility in the business model. …”
The company has leveraged its concept into real estate opportunities where landlords and institutions are looking for the same alignment in values. Places of education and hospitals are examples.
Despite an extremely competitive marketplace, including java giant Starbucks, Good Earth has been a local and western Canadian success story over the years. Recently it began a pilot project offering beer and wine to customers in three locations. The project has been successful and will be rolled out to a few other stores in the future.
“Good Earth is trying very hard not to be Starbucks,” said Lynne Ricker, area chair for marketing and senior instructor in retailing at the University of Calgary’s Haskayne School of Business. “So they’re differentiated and they go after a consumer who wants to support maybe what they perceive as a smaller, more intimate type of business. In the local market, certainly, you get the customer who wants to support a local business.
“As they expand, that tends to go away a little bit. The bigger you get the less local and small you feel but by then you’ve got a formula that works.”