STiR coffee and tea magazine

STiR coffee and tea 11 Nescafé Courts Gen Z Amid Shifting Consumer Behavior Coffee is no longer tied to a single setting. It thrives in private, online, mobile, and local spaces, each demanding different formats, stories, and experiences. As global consumer behav- iors shift, the world's largest coffee brand, Nescafé, is rapidly adapting in order to occupy these new spaces. Gen Z consumers are driving this change, reshaping coffee into a personalized, mobile experience often discovered online before it's ever purchased. Nescafé is responding with im- proved online shelf visibility, ensuring its products can be found, traced, and trusted in this digital-first space. In this environment, credibility is currency. Nestlé has increased its marketing investment from 8.1% to 8.6% of sales in the first half of 2025, according to its half-year results report. The company is focusing on funding influencer-driven campaigns and more authentic storytelling across digital platforms to close this trust gap. Nescafé's expansion of its ready-to-drink (RTD) line into India, the Middle East, North Africa, and Brazil is squarely aimed at these habits. Michael Briner, global category lead for RTD at Nestlé's coffee brands strategic business unit, ex- plained in a press release: "We want to meet the needs of young consumers who prioritize convenience, variety, and on-the-go options that align with their fast-paced and dynamic lifestyles." Nestlé's H1 report notes that many of its 65 new coffee product launches were region-specific and highlighted increas- ing consumer taste preference testing. The coffee space is no longer uniform worldwide — it is hyperlocal, segmented by flavor, culture, and consumption context. Nescafé's strategy of expanding RTD, launching dozens of new stock keeping units (SKUs), and boosting digital presence is an attempt to claim these fragmented places. The future of coffee will not be won in cafés alone; it will be won space by space, wherever and however the next generation chooses to drink it. by Emilio Bonnet Nescafé repositions itself as the brand for the next generation as Gen Z comes into its spending power. Photo credit: Drift Shutterbug Cimbria Introduces AI-Powered Precision Sorting Cimbria's brand-new AI-powered software, BRAIN, introduces a highly advanced control system to its top-range optical sorters. BRAIN instantly recognizes the elements to sort without needing operators to configure settings by hand. Through autonomous machine learning, BRAIN instantly sets the whole list of parameters, eliminating manual adjustments and guesswork. A complex algorithm of the BRAIN software enables the SEA.IQ PLUS and SEA.XL optical sorters to identify elements even more precisely and distinguish color, shape, size, and defects quickly and easily, saving precious time and manual workload. BRAIN's artificial intelligence streamlines manual sorting operations by automatically adjusting settings for optimal results every time, making it easy to create complex recipes for the best optical sorting. "At Cimbria, we are very proud of being the very first in our industry to introduce the extensive benefits and possibilities of artificial intelligence," explains Michela Pelliconi, Cim- bria's head of sales optical sorting. "With BRAIN, we have taken the first step into the endless opportunities of AI with the main focus on improving efficiency and quality for our customers." Artificial intelligence now allows businesses to experience easy and straightforward handling of optical sorters from Cimbria while operating at a highly advanced level. The combination of human operation and machine learning increases the precision sorting of raw materials for impressive results. By combining artificial intelligence (AI) with Cimbria's vision sorting technology, BRAIN takes selection accuracy to new heights, allowing previously unachiev- able sorting results. Photo credit: Cimbria Coffee Report

• Cover