Cothas Easy Brew Coffee

Design: Prajwal Kashyap
Location: India
Project Type: Student Project
School: MIT Institute of Design, Pune
Tutor: Samrudha Dixit
Packaging Contents: Packaged Coffee Bags, Stirrer
Packaging Substrate / Materials: Paperboard, Filter Paper, Polypropylene
Printing Process: Flexography, Pad Printing

Considering the current times, everyone’s either super productive, or super lazy. Everyone wants fresh coffee, but nobody’s got the time to brew it from scratch. That’s why Cothas Easy Brew was created. Cothas Coffee is a famous manufacturer of filter coffee powder and coffee related products in South India. It’s considered a household name among coffee enthusiasts and is a brand nearly as old as time itself (since 1949). However, it’s been fairly limited to the South Indian market. This is because filter coffee preparation is not a process everyone’s got the time or equipment for. That’s the gap that Easy Brew aims to bridge.

After conducting extensive research on the psychology of the consumer and their gripes on what makes the preparation of coffee difficult, a map of customer psyche and their journey with their respective coffee products of choice could be drawn. This helped pinpoint pressing issues that deterred customers from buying certain brands, or even Cothas Coffee itself. The information gained from this research was then channeled into creating an effective means of preparation and storage of coffee in a hassle free way.

Most people usually cannot live without coffee. “Don’t talk to me before my morning coffee.” They say, rudely, when someone asks them why they’re parking their car in the middle of the road, obstructing both lanes of traffic. The questioning pedestrian clearly has no idea how critical coffee is to this individual, and how volatile those who lack its consumption are. Keeping this in mind, it’s best to not put a foot out of line in the midst of an avid coffee enjoyer. And the worst way thing to give a consumer is badly packaged coffee that’s tedious to unpack and prepare.

That’s why Cothas Easy Brew removes the tediousness from the equation by adding individually packaged coffee bags (much like tea bags) to the mix. There’s even a stirrer in the box. Simply attach the coffee bag to the stirrer with the provided ties, and stir it into a cup of boiling hot water. Freshly brewed black coffee, prepared within minutes. It’s as simple as that. Available in the two signature Cothas blends- ‘Specialty’ and ‘Premium’, both carefully blended in two different ratios of coffee powder and chicory, for varying amounts of strength.

The above ‘ease of life’ implementations, packaged with graphics that are as good as your own mother stroking your hair and saying “Don’t worry. You’ll get your coffee soon.” means there’s nowhere else a human being needs to look for their caffeinated concoction.

What’s Unique?
This project simply removes the hurdles faced by consumers on their quest for freshly brewed filter coffee. The included stirrer has many optimizations to make it as efficient in making coffee as possible. The coffee bags, that are compact and packed to the brim with authentic coffee powder, fit right into the provided slot in the stirrer and can easily be fastened by the ties already attached to the stirrer. And since the coffee powder is sorted into coffee bags, there’s no room to get the quantity wrong. If the consumer prefers stronger coffee, they can simply use multiple coffee bags. The whole package is also sustainable as everything, apart from the stirrer, is biodegradable. The stirrer, made of polypropylene, is designed to be reusable, and to withstand the heat from boiling water. Overall, this project aims to reduce the number of angry people in the world by making the process of brewing coffee as easy as counting from one to three.