With 2025 coming to a close — and 2026 only a few short weeks away! — we’ve been reflecting (and marveling) at just how big this year has been for coffee shop marketing.
A strong search presence became a “must-have” instead of a “nice-to-have”…
Seasonal coffee flavors dominated social media and broke in-store foot traffic records…
And Google Business Profiles emerged as a meaningful, low- to no-cost marketing strategy.
But, despite the impressive marketing developments the coffee shop industry had in 2025, recent trends have us thinking that 2026 will be a bigger, better, and even more exciting year.
So, without further ado…
Here are five coffee shop marketing trends we predict will skyrocket in 2026.
Trend 1 — AI-driven Marketing
Throughout 2025, the coffee shop industry has become much more AI-savvy than before — especially with AI solutions for coffee shop marketing.
According to BCC Research from this year, ~20% of food and beverage marketers have already integrated AI into their day-to-day operations.
AI-driven marketing in particular has become an increasingly popular tool for coffee shop owners and operators because of its ability to optimize your efforts, handling just about every part of the marketing process for you.
Look at Weaver’s Coffee & Tea, for example.
This year, the San Francisco-based coffee shop has leaned more heavily on AI tools to support almost all of their marketing efforts.
Weaver’s has found AI to be an incredible tool for “[enhancing] the Weaer’s experience” across every customer touchpoint. The brand’s AI coffee assistant, HAL 8122™, has been helping the brand with all things marketing, from personalized communications and targeted advertising to content creation and social media.
“As a woman founder in the heart of the San Francisco Bay Area, I’ve always believed that technology should enhance craftsmanship—not replace it,” says Weaver’s co-founder, Renée Brown. “Today, [AI] is revolutionizing [the coffee] industry, and we’re proud to lead this transformation with purpose, creativity, and care.”
And, with new AI marketing tools emerging on what seems like a daily basis — like Surfer SEO and Claude, for example — Craver predicts AI-driven coffee shop marketing will only continue to grow in 2026.
Trend 2 — Hyper-personalized Loyalty Programs
In January 2025, Attentive’s State of Personalized Marketing Report revealed that 90% of customers “want more personalized communications” than they’re currently getting.
So, when coffee shop marketers started recognizing this growing penchant for personalization, they responded by developing hyper-personalized loyalty programs. This offering has skyrocketed in popularity among coffee shop owners and operators of all sizes this year — including popular brands like Blue Bottle Coffee.
In September 2025, California-born Blue Bottle Coffee announced the launch of their first-ever loyalty program, “[designed] to make every coffee ritual more rewarding and shareable.”
Those who join Blue Bottle Coffee’s loyalty program earn 1 point per dollar spent, alongside other perks like 150-point redemption tiers, surprise “Just Because” rewards and discounts, and personalized offers that are unique to each member’s history and preferences.
“We believe generosity is a powerful expression of hospitality,” said Simone Hodges, Chief Brand & Experience Officer at Blue Bottle Coffee. “With our new membership program, we’re giving our guests more ways to share the coffee they love, whether gifting a drink to a friend or being surprised with a reward for no reason at all.”
And, while official membership numbers haven’t yet been shared, Blue Bottle Coffee fans are vocal on social media about how great the program is.
With Blue Bottle’s personalization success — and the growing number of tech options available to smaller businesses — Craver predicts even more coffee shop loyalty programs will emerge in 2026, offering consumers better, more personalized rewards than ever before.
Trend 3 — Gamification
Gamification marketing — a tactic that turns regular marketing into an engaging game — has become a go-to strategy for coffee shops in 2025.
Typically part of a coffee shop’s hyper-personalized loyalty program, gamification marketing offers a way for your customers to have fun and get rewarded for it.
As it turns out, the Loyalty Program Trends Report by Open Loyalty says gamification is the most important loyalty trend for consumers in 2025, with brands planning to increase their gamification efforts over the next few years.
And, this year, Dunkin’ Donuts showed us all what that “gamified enjoyment” could look like in action (and what it “looked like” was a smashing success).
Source: Dunkin
When Dunkin’ shared their 2025 holiday menu, they also announced a complementary set of seasonal challenges and incentives for members. Visiting on December 26th, for example, earned Dunkin’ Rewards members 3x the points on donuts, while ordering one of the new seasonal lattes earned members the “Latte All the Way” holiday badge.
“When we set out to improve DD Perks, we asked our members what they wanted to see in a new program,” said Scott Murphy, head of the beverage-snack category and Dunkin’ Donuts President. “They told us three things: flexibility, variety, and recognition. And we did just that.”
Brands like Dunkin’ Donuts have used this year to show the industry that gamification marketing can — and does — work, and Craver predicts 2026 will have a lot more “fun-and-engaging” coffee shop marketing because of it.
Trend 4 — Subscriptions & Memberships
We’ve talked about the reinvented coffee shop subscription model in the past — one that delivers its subscribers benefits instead of beans.
Fast forward to today, and coffee shops are still going strong on the subscription and membership train… and for good reason. The coffee subscription market was last valued at 934 million USD (with an impressive 11.1% growth rate predicted for the next decade).
Plus, there’s “real life” proof of concept, too — like Blank Street Coffee.
Back in 2023, Blank Street launched their monthly subscription-slash-membership service, Blank Street Regulars. By January 2024 — only four short months after launching — the program had already reached ~5,000 Regulars (with over 4,000 people on a waitlist).
Source: Blank Street
Now, in 2025, the waitlist is still holding strong… but that’s not stopping their company from growing in other ways at the same time.
May 2025 saw $20M investments. September 2025 saw a new brand identity. And October 2025 saw reports of tripled company-wide profit.
And, if that weren’t impressive enough, the Regulars program has been successful, top.
“People on the program would normally come to us—without the program—maybe two or three times a week,” said Vinay Menda, one of Blank Street’s co-founders. “But with the program, they’re coming six times a week. It’s really making this a daily ritual. We’re excited to scale it.”
With the coffee subscription market’s projected growth and the proven success of Blank Street’s subscription in 2025, Craver predicts 2026 will only bring more coffee shop subscription and/or membership models.
Trend 5 — Experiential & Event-based Marketing
In 2025, consumers made it very clear they want more experiential marketing from the coffee shops they frequent.
InMarket’s Q1 2025 Coffee & Snack Shops Fidelity Index says “[connecting] value with notable events”— AKA experiential marketing — is a great way to stand out in a competitive coffee landscape, as “well-timed promotions” and experiences can “boost relevance, capture attention, and deliver value” for your customers.
And, one of this year’s best examples of boosting relevance with experiential marketing?
Tim Hortons’ Smile Cookies.
The smile-faced cookie campaign has been wildly successful since its launch in 1996 because the brand has mastered the art of turning a simple chocolate chip cookie into an experience.
Source: Tim Hortons
The Cookies’ twice-yearly launch has become nothing short of a cultural event, with social media posts poking fun at lop-sided smiles and Reddit threads appreciating the best smiles they’ve seen. Plus, the money-raising aspect of Smile Cookies means consumers can feel good about participating, too.
In December 2025, Caroline Barham – President of Tim Hortons Foundation Camps – described Smile Cookies as one of the reasons they “can continue to empower underserved youth” through camp experiences… and who doesn’t want to make a difference just by eating a Cookie?
In 2026, Craver predicts more coffee shops will test out experiential marketing, taking simple drinks and snacks and transforming them into memorable, meaningful experiences, events, and cultural phenomena.
Start Exploring Coffee Shop Marketing with Craver
Considering the growth of coffee shop marketing this year — and the fact a new year is just around the corner — now is a great time to start thinking about your own coffee shop’s marketing efforts.
But where can you start?
With Craver’s “Beginner’s Guide to Marketing for Restaurants & Coffee Shops,” that’s where!
Developed in collaboration with Deena McKinley — the Managing Partner and Founder of Maverick Marketing Solutions, LLC — this Guide will take you through everything you need to start marketing your coffee shop, including:
- The basics of local coffee shop marketing
- What your coffee shop needs before getting started
- How to develop a marketing plan for your coffee shop
- Common pitfalls and mistakes your coffee shop should avoid
- Coffee shop marketing ideas that are easy/inexpensive to start with
- 3 things your coffee shop can easily start doing today
- How to look ahead/evaluate your coffee shop marketing’s success
After all, it’s a lot easier to hop on next year’s coffee shop marketing trends with an already strong marketing foundation in place.
