5AM Monday December 4th, 2000 – Costco Wholesale Day 1
We got there early, and set up an amazing coffee stand on an end-cap adjacent to the coffee aisle. We had never actually done this before. We knew we wanted to make a great first impression, so we made a great road show. Costco allowed us to have a full end-cap quad; which is the 4 pallet spaces on the end of the aisle. This is roughly 8 feet wide, by 6 ½ feet deep. We placed our product against the rafters behind us, and stacked it real high. Our saying was ‘high and tight’, as Costco likes its end-caps built up high, and looking sharp at all times. We had roughly a foot between us and the table, which could not extend into the aisle at all. We stored all our cups, cream, sugar, etc…under the table. We placed our brewed coffee on the table along with all the condiments and signs and even a small TV, which had a 5-minute looped video tape showing our roaster in action. We hung a banner above us with the catchy question, “What is Micro-Roasted coffee?”.
We sold 158 two pound bags of coffee our first day, which was a Monday, and built from that number leading up to the weekend where we sold 238 units on Sunday for a total of 1,234 units in our first week! That’s over $11,000 in one week – in one store! We had no idea it would be so successful. Patricia Curtis at Costco’s regional HQ in Los Angeles believed in us. She is like an angel. She gave us the opportunity of a life-time. Costco Wholesale, one of the world’s biggest and best retailers (mass merchandiser, warehouse club, etc), was now an intermediary where thousands and thousands of individual consumers could buy our coffee. She requested we do additional road shows in Westlake Village and Burbank locations and asked us to begin an ongoing road show program where we would introduce our products to thousands of new customers throughout southern California.
Today: we are in-line in 25 Costco warehouses north of the I-10 fwy in SoCal.
Thank you COSTCO MEMBERS for TEN YEARS OF LOVE
Mitch McMullen