Cinnabon upgrades its coffee program in a bid for more frequency

Can coffee help Cinnabon sell more cinnamon rolls? We’re about to find out.

The Atlanta-based chain on Wednesday said that it will start selling Seattle’s Best Coffee in a bid to upgrade its beverage program and get customers to come in more often.

Urvi Patel, chief brand officer for Cinnabon, called the rollout “a strategic evolution for Cinnabon” by “bringing our beverage platform up to the same quality standard as our iconic rolls.”

Beverage program upgrade

By pairing the chain’s cinnamon rolls with Seattle’s Best Coffee, “we’re delivering a more complete experience for our guests while creating new opportunities for franchisees to drive frequency, increase beverage attachment and strengthen overall performance,” Patel said.

Cinnabon is owned by the Atlanta-based brand operator GoTo Foods, which already has a relationship with Seattle’s Best Coffee in international markets.

Beverages have become a crucial battlefield in the restaurant business as growing chains take more share and existing brands expand their capabilities, such as McDonald’s and Taco Bell.

Frequency and growth

Yet it may be more crucial for a concept like Cinnabon that is largely an indulgence. Customers are far more likely to get coffee multiple times per week than they are to get a large cinnamon roll.

The company believes that an expanded beverage program will pull customers in more often, driving incremental growth through higher customer frequency. Cinnabon also believes that a better-known brand such as Seattle’s Best will pull in those customers more often than something it could do on its own.

The Seattle’s Best program also uses Cinnabon’s existing drip coffee equipment so franchisees do not need to make a substantial investment to start selling the product.

The partnership is the latest example of Cinnabon expanding its beverage lineup. The chain earlier this year launched a limited time line of Swirled Sodas, or dirty sodas.

Cinnabon operates nearly 2,400 locations globally, all of which are franchised. The chain has more than 1,300 locations in the U.S. Global system sales rose 3.6% to more than $500 million, according to Technomic Top 500 data.