The Immigrant’s Son Espresso

This is my story about The Immigrant’s Son coffee roasters. It was the first time in my career I experienced the remarkable power of customers emotionally connecting to a business so clearly and saw incredible results unfold in real time.

Back in 2005, Andrew Meo, a good friend of mine asked me for help. He was going to start a coffee roasting business in Wellington, New Zealand and wanted a hand with brand and marketing. 

At that time Wellington was home to some of the best coffee roasting businesses in the world. L’affare, Coffee Supreme, Atomic, Allpress, Havana, and Ozone all went on to become well established, even global coffee brands. Wellington truly was the world’s most saturated and competitive coffee roasting market, and Andrew wanted to start a new one.

I couldn’t see the logic, but I knew Andrew had serious chops in the hospitality business. He owned one of New Zealand’s best restaurants, Pravda, and had worked for L’affare.

I admit telling him it was a crazy idea to start yet another coffee business in Wellington, but Andrew was adamant. He wanted to do things differently – and better. The first question I asked was, what name did he have in mind? His response: “Octane…Fuel… something like that.”

Like many other sectors, coffee is ubiquitous to most consumers. Like wine, beer, or chocolate, it can be higher quality but still indistinguishable in taste from another brand. Therefore, it is incredibly important a coffee business finds a way to set itself apart from its competition. Brand is one way of doing that. 

Octane and Fuel were pretty standard coffee names, so I asked Andrew to think differently, to ask himself why he truly wanted to build this business. He reluctantly agreed and left, promising to come back with something different.

A few days later he handed me a small black Filofax. On one single page was a handwritten company name and story, which he read to me:

The Immigrants Son Espresso. 

In 1951 my father Antonino Meo immigrated from Italy to New Zealand. He arrived with a suitcase, a passion for good food and good coffee – things that were not easily found in New Zealand at that time.

My earliest childhood memories are of the aroma of coffee in the mornings. “Coffee boiled is coffee spoiled,” he would say.

I am Andrew Meo, Antonino’s son. Today I source the world’s best beans, carefully roast them and deliver to you the finest beans an immigrant’s son can make.

Andrew Meo

It was a beautiful story full of love for his dad and admiration for his courage to travel halfway around the world hoping to make a better life for his family. The story immediately touched me, as I was also an immigrant’s son and knew the courage and determination needed to arrive in a strange land.

We agreed that the story and the name were so powerful it was all he needed to launch the business. I added a small line drawing illustration of a man walking hand in hand with a small boy and that was it - The Immigrant’s Son Espresso brand was complete.  

Andrew found premises for The Immigrant’s Son Espresso roastery. It was on a major bus route and buses would stop outside the roastery whilst waiting for traffic lights to go green. 

This seemed like an opportunity to promote the business. We wrapped the building with The Immigrant’s Son Espresso branding – inclusive of the story. 

I checked in on him a couple of days later and he seemed to be a little perplexed by something. What he told me next was remarkable. 

Passersby - bus passengers and car drivers - were stopping and walking into his roastery, often with a tear in their eye. They told him they had just read The Immigrant’s Son Espresso story on the window and just had to meet him and tell him they were an immigrant’s son or daughter themselves. They bought some coffee, thanked him for sharing his story with them and went on their way. 

Andrew had no marketing budget, but word of mouth became so strong there was no need for it. Despite being in an intensely competitive environment The Immigrant’s Son Espresso grew fast.    

The holy grail for a coffee brand in New Zealand is to be sold by a national store network. The best store network and the most difficult one to crack was Moore Wilsons, NZ’s equivalent of Whole Foods in the US.

The national buyer of Moore Wilsons turned out to be an immigrant’s daughter. She loved the coffee and the emotional connection that customers had with the brand. Moore Wilsons took The Immigrant’s Son Espresso brand on nationwide.

Within 6 months The Immigrant’s Son Espresso had grown from nothing to one of the country’s most successful coffee businesses.

Hardwired Human Behavioural Science. Why did The Immigrant’s Son Espresso work?

The Immigrant’s Son Espresso brand and story wasn’t carefully crafted by Andrew Meo to utilise human behavioural science. It simply came from his heart. But the story made a deep and emotional connection with immigrant’s sons and daughters, as well as many others – and the business flourished. 

The Immigrant’s Son Espresso brand and story exemplifies the power of emotional connection to business. 

One man’s story about his love of his father, told in a heartfelt and emotional way required courage and vulnerability to tell. We are drawn to people reveal their authentic selves.

It was about love. As humans we are hardwired to love and be loved. 

It was a story about purpose, not product or profit. The business was a son’s homage to his courageous immigrant father, revealing true intent which builds immediate trust and integrity.

It was also a story about passion. The passion a son had to roast the very best coffee fit for the memory of his father. Therefore, it’s likely to be damn good coffee, and it was.