Dutch coffee subscription brand Wakuli opens first retail outlet

Wakuli received funding from Dutch investment bank ABN Amro to pursue new growth opportunities in Europe | Photo credit: Wakuli

Wakuli has launched its first bricks-and-mortar retail outlet in Amsterdam, serving both hot beverages and its packaged coffee range. 
 

Founded in 2019 as a doorstep-delivery specialty coffee brand, Wakuli plans to expand its business to several European cities in the coming years.

The Amsterdam-based business says adding a value-focused specialty café component to its subscription delivery model, currently available in the Netherlands and Belgium, as key to achieving its goals of making specialty coffee more accessible, affordable and for the benefit of coffee farmers. 

“Specialty coffee is now an exclusive market for a group of connoisseurs. It is of no use to coffee farmers if this remains a niche, so we want to open this world and make specialty coffee super accessible,” said Lukas Grosfeld, Founder, Wakuli. 
 

“We buy and roast ourselves and are therefore on average more than 20% cheaper than chains such as Starbucks,” he added. 

In June 2022 Wakuli received funding from Dutch investment bank ABN Amro to pursue new growth opportunities in Europe for its ethical, direct trade sourcing and roasting business.  

Wakuli said it will continue to scale its subscription delivery model, which has more than 40,000 customers.  

World Coffee Portal’s Project Café Benelux 2022 report found that 73% of industry leaders in the region believe that consumer appetite for specialty coffee had increased over the last 12 months. Additionally, 48% of consumers surveyed stated that purchasing ethically certified coffee is important to them. 

The Benelux coffee shop segment, comprising Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, has a total market size of nearly 1,300. World Coffee Portal predicts the Benelux branded coffee shop market will exceed 1,540 outlets in 2027.