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Roast & Ritual

Brewing M&S’s new specialty coffee brand

Our challenge: create an M&S specialty coffee brand with artisanal credentials, serious stand-out and timeless appeal.

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Marks & Spencer approached us with a new specialty coffee house blend to launch in Café and Foodhall. Our challenge was to dial up M&S’s coffee credentials and turn it into a destination for specialty coffee – all without overshadowing M&S’s established premium ‘Collection’ line.

Challenge accepted.

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Our approach: Artisanal for everyone

1. Researching what really matters to coffee lovers

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We explored how the M&S tone could flex for ‘speciality coffee for all’ – while honouring M&S’s core identity. Then we packaged everything into comprehensive guidelines covering logo-usage, design and packaging, along with voice and messaging.

2. Creating an accessible identity with artisanal vibes and trusted quality

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Roast & Ritual now had its reason for being: to wake Britain up to better cups, by democratising speciality coffee for all. To maximise stand-out, we created a clean modern logo and distinctive colour palette.

3. Telling a consistent story

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We explored how the M&S tone could flex for ‘speciality coffee for all’ – while honouring M&S’s core identity. Then we packaged everything into comprehensive guidelines covering logo-usage, design and packaging, along with voice and messaging.

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The solution: accessible quality with artisanal innovation.
Name: Roast & Ritual – a stand-alone name that can exist within the M&S master brand. Modern and artisanal, yet warm and approachable.

Logo design: a clean and modern logo with the quietly confident strapline: For real coffee lovers. Paired with a “Crafted by M&S Food” lock-up to bring it into the brand family.

Visual identity: a duck egg colour palette – and a swirling pattern inspired by latte art – gave the brand a gentle but distinctive artisanal look.

Packaging: we designed the packaging to highlight the quality of the coffee, dialling up M&S’s coffee credentials – this included both cups and reusable cups.

Photography: the photography style was all about telling a story of deliciousness, versatility and accessibility – whether it’s coffee sipped in an M&S Café or at home.

Tone of voice: the verbal identity and messaging are confident and down-to-earth, with carefully placed moments of wit. This all played out across a suite of launch POS for café in both print and digital, supporting the Roast & Ritual launch merchandise.
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The results: an inclusive specialty coffee brand for anyone who wants an artisanal blend.

More people in M&S Café

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Roast & Ritual boosted customer engagement across M&S Cafés. People liked the elevated quality and trusted familiarity of this new house blend.

Reaching new audiences
 

By offering Roast & Ritual in more formats – beans, ground, and pods –  we captured the attention of new audiences and got people excited about enjoying speciality coffee at home.

Coffee lovers loved it
 

The brand resonated with key audiences: they appreciated both the modern, trend-driven feel and the trusted M&S quality.

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“Whippet helped us create something very special with Roast & Ritual. They took our vision for a specialty coffee brand and turned it into something truly standout—artisanal yet approachable, and perfectly aligned with the M&S identity. The results speak for themselves—it's a hit with our customers and a real boost to our coffee offering.”​

Sophie Miller, Brand & Marketing Manager, M&S Food

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