how a mom of three opened a coffee business by building a community first.

Coffee?

That’s the first question you hear when you set foot in an Israeli house.

There’s also the instructions on the phone – heat up the water, we’re on our way… to let you know your guests are coming, and good conversations are about to begin.

Coffee for me is a social experience which is always followed by cake or cookies. Every Israeli house always has cake or cookies on hands for that daily (sometimes twice or three times a day) event when the door opens and in comes great company to entertain.

So when I heard Maruxa (“Muh-roo-shah”) talking about her love for coffee and what it represented for her, I knew exactly what she was talking about.

And when she described herself as a Coffee Snob I let out a sigh of relief knowing I was not alone.

See, in Israel the coffee is rich. Sometimes sweet (depending on how much sugar one takes) but most definitely rich and bold. You may know it as Turkish coffee. It comes in small glasses and just as Hummus, it is part of our culture and our staple.

So when Maruxa began to describe her Perky Perky coffee I knew I had to go get me some.

Not only because I was curious beyond belief as to what this coffee snob think is good coffee, but because of the background story and what that coffee means to her.

Here, let her tell you:

Want to dig deeper and speak with Maruxa face to face?

Then add your name and email below and I’ll let you know when she joins me on I’m That Geek show.

brilliant marketer

There are a few really cool things that Maruxa did not only to start her business but also to grow a strong community and let her customers feel connected to the brand.

First, she defined a mission that revolves around inviting women back into their power and every one of us ladies out there, especially the ones with kids, can relate to this. We all remember the days when we felt awesome, beautiful and vibrant. And then we grew up.. the kids came, the bills came, the responsibilities and the mountains of endless laundry came and we kinda forgot what it was like..before.

Then, she made sure that mission was represented everywhere – in the packaging, on the website, in the way she marketed and in the way her clients felt about being part of her brand.

What do I mean?

she cultivated a strong community of women in all walks of life that know they have gifts, talents, skills and areas of genius that make the world a freaking amazing place for themselves and others they love.

These women were involved in the creation of the brand and the business:

They help choose the type of beans through a blind taste test
They help come up with the coffee names
They help choose the logo, and the packaging..

And because they were involved and invested they felt ownership and belonging.

When the doors opened, they bought the product and shared it with their friends. They talked about it, they posted about it and they became true brand ambassadors.

product experience

When my order of Perky Perky arrived at my door, the first thing I noticed as I opened the envelope it came in was that delicious coffee smell that immediately sends my mind back to my coffee conversations at home.

I took a moment to inhale it in and get lost in nostalgia and childhood memories.

The coffee package felt like it was made from an organic material (that, I won’t lie, made me feel like I’m doing something good for the planet by buying it and not another brand) and when I flipped it around to read the back of the package I couldn’t help but smile to myself and give props to Maruxa for replacing the boring instructions with this:

Click to Enlarge

Then… I opened the coffee package to find another gift hiding inside: the rising up collection, reminding me that – I am worth it, and letting me know this is 1 card out of 4..

[click on the image to see the back of the card]

The #Hashtag
Every brilliant marketing has to have its own hashtag to identify itself, and Maruxa, true to her mission… rather than revolving her hashtag around herself and her company, she again focused on the community with the hashtag #perkyface and a private community in Facebook where her clients share their perky morning faces.

Here’s my #perkyface: