In recent years, the increasing popularity of iced coffee has begun to show its impact in the fast food industry. In an attempt to take advantage of this growing trend Dairy Queen has introduced its own line of iced coffee drinks to keep up with its new competitors in the industry such as Starbucks and its introduction of its new nitro boosted iced coffee. Through this campus research audience analysis has been collected for the Dairy Queen organization in order to pinpoint potential customers for its new beverages.
The average college students seem to be avid coffee drinkers. A strong correlation was found during research between the presence of coffee drinkers in the homes of the students interviewed and their own coffee consumption. The majority of interviewees who preferred to drink warm beverages to get their caffeine fix preferred to have breakfast at a coffee shop as opposed to a fast food restaurant. This trend was broken by interviewee Kyle, who prefers cold beverages to get their caffeine fix said they preferred to eat breakfast at a fast food restaurant “any day of the week.” Some of the students who claimed to prefer warm drinks to get their caffeine fix admitted to a love of cold coffee drinks as well, stating they enjoyed the “cold sugary coffee drinks” every once and a while. Students who live off campus and use a car to commute to the university were all coffee drinkers, while those who live on campus were not. The coffee drinking students were not brand loyal regarding food and beverages while the latter was. Also, the amount of daily sleep of those students who do drink coffee is significantly less than those who don’t. Despite this, all students claimed they needed caffeine in their system a minimum of four days a week to stay awake.
Based on analysis of the research conducted for the Dairy Queen organization, coffee drinking seems to be a common trend for college students. These students are frequently on the run and do not seem to be brand loyal when it comes to food and beverages, as long as they are able to get the appropriate intake of caffeine. Due to the convenience of fast food restaurants, the implementation of iced coffee into the Dairy Queen menu points to being a hopeful decision in regards to attracting the average busy college student.
Productions by University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire students 