So...the day starts at the butt crack of dawn 3:45AM. The typical life of a small business owner. Trying to get billing done, invoice, study my craft and prep for a prospective new client meeting before 9AM.

I shower and cruise to Starbucks, but the address in my GPS led me to a warehouse where Starbucks apparently used to be. I happend to catch a glance of a Caribou Coffee out of the corner of my eye and head there as my back up. (What is sad is this use to be my first choice before they went public).

I plow through a few emails and decide to take a break to grab an oatmeal. I place my order for oatmeal and I get a "what type?"  I reply, "What do you mean what type?" The Barista looks at me with a blank stare...Good question, I know we have a lot of choices.  Aaargh!

While this young woman was very kind to cure my illiteracy and read my twelve choices off the menu, I was sadly reminded why my once favorite place is now last on my list behind Starbucks, Dunn Brothers and a local hole in the wall.  

So here is the lesson for small business owners in the context of my blog, Epoch.

Don't Follow, Lead. If you do follow, blow the competition out of the water!

Caribou has 500 stores and Starbucks has 9,000! Caribou Coffee is so much smaller and nimbler, it should have been the company to offer coffee in a packet you can take on the road. Or, being an outdoorsy coffee shop, their food selections should resemble those items that take you back to where the Caribou hang. For example, I would offer a breakfast sandwich called a Crystal Creek Sunrise Scramble, inspired by some customers trip they had camping at Crystal Creek in the Tetons. If you are going to follow, make sure you are clearly better than the competition. Note, more is not better. If I was running Caribou Coffee I would have hired someone to create an out of this world gourmet oatmeal, instead of the undercooked crap from a packet I'm eating right now. This would be more consistent with their attempt at "fresh baked" pastries in the store.  

One more non-coffee example: iPods were not the first to market, but they clearly were superior to any media player on the market when they hit.

Build a Community. Human beings buy stuff, not demographics.

I use to feel like the folks at Caribou Coffee were my buds. When I went into the Caribou this morning at 5:30AM, there was no one but me there. I did not get a greeting from the two people that saw me walk in.  

I will go one step further and say that if you go to the corporate Website, there are no invitations to follow them on Twitter, Facebook or the like.  Once again, this suff is free, and social media is the easiest way to stay dialed in on the market and your brand. 

I would totally leverage inbound marketing to keep a pulse and inspire my community to help shape my offerings.

Be Authentic and Avoid the Mushy Middle. Mediocre is a Horrible Aspiration!

Starbucks always has been a kind corporate, sleek refined more upscalish coffee shop. Whereas Caribou is a rough and tumble back country type of experience. However, you would never know this other than the little bits and pieces of Caribou and rustic stuff in their decor. Being a kayaker, backcountry camper Caribou used to be the place where I could go to escape with my buds. Now they are a toned down chain trying to appeal to the masses and not doing very well, based on their financial performance.

To summarize, authenticity, the ability to innovate on a dime and create an intimate community is the biggest game changer small business owners and CEOs have.  I'm certain if Caribou would embrace these truths they would post stronger financial earnings and they would again become my first choice.