Retailers Target Consumers Through Lattes, Cereal

MACOMB, MICH., may be the last town on earth without a Starbucks, but it does have an upscale coffee bar. The cafe, which opened this spring, is typical of the genre. There's the comfy sofa, the bistro tables and the Frank Lloyd Wright decor. There's free Wi-Fi so you can check your e-mail, and there's the usual selection of milky lattes and potent espressos. There's also an excellent chance of finding a dead body in the next room. That's because this cafe is located inside the Lee-Ellena Funeral Home, where you can grieve Aunt Sally and enjoy a frothy cappuccino at the same time. Without it co-owner Sarah Lee-Ellena frets that "people will go to the Marriott and have their services there."

We should have seen this coming. Like cranky newborn babies, Americans can't survive long between feedings, and businesses of all stripes have launched snack bars and coffee kiosks in an effort to snare what's known in consulting parlance as "share of stomach." Should the urge strike you can order a custom omelet at Bed Bath & Beyond or grab a wild-boar sandwich while making an ammo run at Cabela's. If you wake up thinking, "Hey, I should head down to the record store for a bowl of cereal," you can stop by the Virgin Megastore for Lucky Charms. And then there's the never-ending parade of coffee. Just when you're ready to explode from one too many espressos, you're confronted with a coffee counter at the dentist's office and the drugstore and the car wash.

It doesn't take an anthropologist to explain what's up: Americans are busy and would eat breakfast at the DMV if it were convenient. That's why big-box stores with cafes see the average shopper make an additional 2.5 visits a year and why retail-based eateries are posting nearly double the traffic gains of the overall restaurant industry. Deutsche Bank retail analyst David Weiner says they also boost profits: Borders (BGP) and Barnes & Noble (BKS) earn an estimated 40 percent gross margins on cafe sales, compared with just 20 percent on books. But beyond java profits, businesses are after your undying devotion. The way to a consumer's heart is through the stomach, or so the theory goes, and retailers increasingly believe that to create an emotional bond, customers must literally eat the brand.

This explains the Sticky Date Pudding served at Ralph Lauren's Rugby Café. A few spoonfuls of lumpy nostalgia and, suddenly, you're Mr. WASPypants and he's Uncle Ralph, and why not buy the new polo shirt in all 14 colors? At architecture firm FRCH Design Worldwide, experts design restaurants based on a retail client's "core brand attributes." In the case of pricey-doll purveyor American Girl Place, that meant creating a cafe based on phrases like "meaningful" and "finding your inner star." The result: a pink-lit heaven where little girls chat on cell phones and share $23 prix-fixe salad lunches with their hungry dolls.

These eateries are a welcome relief when you're toting six shopping bags and still need to buy Christmas gifts for all the cousins. The problem, of course, is that most businesses do just one thing well, which means the in-store-cafe experience often falls short. The green shamrock cookies selling a week past St. Patrick's Day at Virgin Megastore inspire little faith in their meat sandwiches, and you can't help feeling like a cretin eating the $9 dessert at a fancy decor shop like ABC Carpet & Home when it's obvious that cake is the only thing you can afford in the store. It's surreal enough that Internet bank ING Direct's cafe is wildly popular with midtown Manhattan office workers; do they have to rub it in by hawking paper shredders alongside the chocolate-chip muffins?

Still, you can forgive just about any shortfall if the coffee's good, which brings us back to the Lee-Ellena Funeral Home. How's the joe? According to the proprietor, it's a work in progress: "I haven't figured out how to work the machine."