The coffee category is one of advertising’s most theatrical arenas. Hollywood celebrities lounging in monochrome boutiques, hushed voiceovers about provenance and craft, flagship stores designed to feel more like temples than shops. CoffeeB, the Swiss capsule-free coffee system from Migros, has decided it wants none of it. With its new campaign — “Bester Kaffee, einfach ohne all das Drumherum” (“Great coffee, simply without all the fuss”) — the brand takes direct aim at the performance surrounding premium coffee and positions itself as the honest, low-waste alternative.
The Product Is the Message
CoffeeB launched in September 2022 as a Migros innovation with a simple but striking premise: a portioned coffee system that produces no capsule waste. Instead of aluminium or plastic pods, the system uses coffee balls — small spheres of pressed coffee grounds wrapped in a water-soluble, compostable coating. The machine brews directly through the ball, which then dissolves. The result is espresso-quality coffee without the bin full of empties.
Three years after launch, with over 600,000 machines and 180 million coffee balls sold, CoffeeB is expanding into Italy and the United Arab Emirates — and partnering with Keurig Dr Pepper for the US market. With the product proven, the brand is now ready to make its broader cultural argument: we offer everything the category promises, minus the theatre that surrounds it.
Satire as Strategy
The campaign’s centrepiece is a television and online film directed by Norwegian filmmaker Harald Zwart. The spot follows an ordinary man being guided through what is presented as the exquisite world of CoffeeB by an affected saleswoman. The man is visibly uncomfortable — surrounded by overblown luxury theatre while trying to order a coffee. The joke lands because the pomposity on display is instantly recognisable: it is how rival premium coffee brands actually present themselves.
The creative team — copywriter Peter Brönnimann and art director Stefanie Huber — made a deliberate choice to work against the grain of the category. Rather than proving CoffeeB’s credentials through aspirational imagery, they expose the absurdity of how credentials are typically signalled. The film borrows the visual grammar of high-end coffee advertising and subverts it, all while keeping CoffeeB in frame as the product that refuses to play along. The campaign runs across TV, online video, outdoor and point of sale.
What Advertisers Can Learn from CoffeeB
The CoffeeB campaign shows that category disruption does not have to be loud or confrontational. By holding up a mirror to category norms and letting the audience draw its own conclusions, the brand makes its point without lecturing. The sustainability angle — no capsule waste — never feels preachy because it is embedded in the humour rather than stated as a virtue. The comedy does the work that a manifesto never could.
There is also a timing lesson here. CoffeeB waited three years before shifting from product explanation to brand personality, allowing the technology to prove itself in market before asking consumers to connect with it emotionally. The new campaign is possible precisely because the product has already built credibility. For any challenger brand with a genuine functional advantage, this is the sequence worth studying: earn trust first, then find your voice.
