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Coffee N U and OOVAA offer coffee and gaming on the house, slates expansion to B & C cities
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Saturday, 10 October, 2009, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Nandita Vijay, Bangalore
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Coffee N U and OOVAA, a coffee shop of international standards, is now gearing up to expand its presence in the country. Plans are to open up 50 outlets in the current financial year with 25 company owned and 25 franchisee outlets. An exclusive feature of the outlet is OOVAA which is a top of the line Personal Computer (PC) Gaming Zone developed specifically to target gamers.
Oovaa provides a platform for gamers where they can have fun testing their skills against worthy competitors. The gaming zone is set up in technical collaboration with AMD for PCs with the best Graphic cards. There are 32" sleek LCD Monitors. At OOVAA, membership schemes are upgraded as the hours of play increase.
"We are the only company to offer gaming zone and coffee shop under one roof. The first outlet was opened in January 2009 at Nagpur followed by Bangalore in April and Pune in August. Hyderabad is expected in October followed by two more company owned and five franchisee outlets already finalised at different parts of country. The work at Hyderabad is already in progress and then the second outlets at Nagpur and Bangalore are also in the pipeline. We have already signed 5 franchisees at other cities and would be announced soon," Shashank Jha, director, Coffee N U and OOVAA, told F&B News in an e-mail interaction.
The outlet, which is owned and promoted by Valiant Automations, Nagpur, is a hi-end speciality coffee shop targeting the urban population of 14-40 years.
The standard format at Nagpur comprises music lounge corner & a library apart from free wi-fi for the customers. The Bangalore outlet is the lounge format with comfortable low height seating. The Pune outlet is a fusion of standard and lounge format. Each outlet with both the brands requires an investment of Rs 55 lakh.
"We are expanding pan-India and our major targets are B and C class cities. We expect this by the end of the current financial year. When people come for long hours of play, they will require something to eat and drink. Coffee and the concept of a cafe fitted perfectly well and thus Coffee N U started after a long research and development of one year," he added.
There are over 43 varieties of coffee drinks, 7 types of teas and around 15 iced coolers. At the lounge and pub format, it offers around 15 flavours -- zero tobacco, zero nicotine herbal hookahs at the cafes. Also available are burgers, sandwiches, rolls and pizzas. There is a special blend of coffee which has been awarded as Golden Blend at Atlanta in April 2009. It is also launching a series of health coffee drinks and diet teas. Pricing is between Rs 29 and Rs109. Gaming is Rs 75 an hour.
"We have different formats to offer looking at the locations and the target clientele. Further, we are announcing many innovative things from the next month like "Connect with Coffee, Know Your Brew". Every Sunday two hours will be dedicated to the general people at all the cafes to bring them closer to coffee, explain about the art and science of coffee and general coffee knowledge," said Jha.
Among the visible trends is that big international cafe chains are looking to enter India. There is a growing interest among entrepreneurs to open up coffee outlets. There is only a small percentage of coffee drinking population which indicates the potential to explore more opportunities. The upcoming Indian International Coffee Festival in October is a good attempt towards this. The biggest challenge was the lack of marketing budget to promote outlets, said Jha.
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