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IN AN INCREASINGLY FAST-PACED
world where consumers’ attention
spans and boredom thresholds
seem to shorten by the day, product
innovation has become ever more
important. If you can blend that with
slick marketing and a bit of fun, you
may have a game-changer.
South African entrepreneur Dayne
Levinrad’s product innovation combines
two of most people’s favourite
pleasures – coffee and chocolate. His
‘Coffee in a Cone’ concept – coffee in a
chocolate-coated ice-cream cone – has
taken both consumers’ taste buds and
the social media world by storm.
It’s said that #coffeeinacone has
become the most Instagrammed coffee
in the world. What he’s also succeeded
at, however, is turning cyber attention
into real-world revenue, with people
queuing outside The Grind Coffee
Company, his shop in upmarket Melrose
Arch, Johannesburg. There’s also a
dedicated WhatsApp line for customers
wanting to place takeaway and delivery
orders via the mobile messaging service.
Levinrad’s store is located inside
premier cycling shop Concept Cyclery,
whose owner approached him to set
up shop there, given his knowledge of
fine coffees and the love that the city’s protect his invention locally and
cycling community has for the beverage.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
Levinrad left South Africa for Australia
after high school and trained as a
coffee barista. Being an entrepreneur
at heart, he spent his four years there
looking at how to tap into people’s
obsessive love for coffee in new, fun
ways. His sojourn overseas also led him
to Brazil and Los Angeles in the US,
where he consulted on different ways
to look at coffee products.
“What was top of mind was how to
generate foot traffic using social media
and combining both to build a new
product,” Levinrad tells the IMM Journal
of Strategic Marketing. “Many people
create a website and then promote
their product. I wanted a product that
other people would promote online.”
The product itself had its genesis in
Levinrad’s desire to create a unique
edible coffee concept. The trick, of
course, was to find something that had
never been done before. His mother
has been in the food game for many
years, so he turned to her for help with
the research and development.
“In addition to something that you can
eat and drink, I wanted the product to be
self-contained and sustainable, with no
waste,” he explains. “It took a lot of time
working in my mum’s kitchen to get the
cones right as they had to withstand the
heat of the coffee without leaking. It was
not a simple process. There were many
spoiled white T-shirts, but we developed
the entire concept ourselves.”
? images with the hashtag were posted on
He’s turned cyber
recognition into
real-world income
Once the correct compound had
been developed for the cones, Levinrad
immediately applied for patent and
trademark registrations that would
internationally. Given the level of
personal investment in the product
development, it made sense for him
to take this step. It helped that he
was able to give away a portion of the
equity to a private investor in return
for financial support.
“Protecting your intellectual property
is an arduous process, but it helps
to justify your investment in design,
production and marketing,” he says.
“Because of the novelty of our product
it’s open to being copied by others.
October 2016 – January 2017 strategicmarketing 27
Ensuring that we are protected by the
law provides peace of mind and means
that reputable food and beverage
businesses will not attempt knock-offs.”
Levinrad continues: “It also means
that when we licence Coffee in a
Cone to other companies, they can
be assured that the product does not
infringe on any other organisation’s
patent. That’s important because we
are now being approached by national
franchises and international distribution
companies who like the idea.”
SOCIAL MEDIA
PHENOMENON
Once the product was viable, Levinrad
created the #coffeeinacone hashtag,
then encouraged people to come into
the store, take a selfie and share it on
Instagram. That quickly compounded
the number of people who saw it online.
Within six months, more than one million
the picture-sharing social media site.
Coffee in a Cone owes much of its
marketing success to savvy use of
social media. Levinrad’s marketing
strategy caught the attention of Aviv
Weil of Creative Shop Facebook,
Africa, a programme for assisting small
businesses. Weil was drawn to the coffee
idea and the attention it was getting on
social media. He then helped Levinrad to
grow his social media ecosystem by more
fully incorporating Facebook, Instagram,
WhatsApp and Messenger platforms.
By creating a conversation that people
wanted to share, Levinrad has been
able to develop a phenomenon that
has been featured by the likes of news
channel CNN, Insider Food (a food-
focused Facebook page with more than
3-million ‘likes’), US-based newspaper
The Huffington Post, South Africa’s Top
Billing lifestyle TV show, and many other
local and international news sites.
“Trends are determined by an
algorithm that looks through all posts >>