Starbucks Canada has released their biggest multi-media brand campaign in the company’s almost 35 year history in Canada, under the campaign line: It’s never just coffee.
Filmed in Canada at a Starbucks store in Toronto by Canadian director, Mark Zibert, the four signature ads, Extra Mile, Peace Offering, Therapy Sesh and Working From Home, reflect what Canadians have said what Starbucks means to them – the unique connection between their baristas and customers; their unmatched coffee that brings people together, and the coffeehouse experience that only Starbucks can provide.
“Starbucks has always been about so much more than the beans themselves, says Deborah Neff, Vice President, Product & Marketing at Starbucks Canada, “Our brand is rooted in the value of community – that third space – where people can come to meet friends, make friends, or just share a smile with the barista they see every day. That’s the DNA of this brand, and what made it so successful for so long. This campaign is a return to those roots and a reminder of the importance of community to our brand, and to our lives.”
The campaign launches on the heels of new and returning coffeehouse amenities at Starbucks. These include writing personal notes on customer cups; serving drinks in ceramic mugs for customers who chose to stay in the café; free refills for those enjoying their drink “for here”, and condiment bars returning. It also complements the latest ads from Starbucks in the U.S. and Canada, ‘Hello Again’, a declaration of a return to their roots with a celebration of coffee and connection.
“When I met the Starbucks team back in November, I told them that I’ve never been more familiar with a brand than I am with theirs,” says Angus Tucker, CCO of Leo Toronto who created the campaign. “I went to the Starbucks near my work at least twice a day and probably spent about $25,000 there over two decades. I knew the manager Kent, and all the baristas who worked that location by name. They sang me happy birthday one day when I walked in. They were friends. And when you talked to their customers, and the baristas, my relationship was not unusual. It’s that kind of place.”
The campaign uses the familiar “choice boxes” on the side of the iconic Starbucks cups to speak to what each moment represents. “It’s wonderful when you work with a brand that has so much visual heritage to it,” says Tucker, “There’s so much to work with.”
The timing of the campaign is interesting as it coincides with the launch of a new campaign for Starbucks in the US called “Hello again” which was described in releases as a reintroduction of the brand to US customers.
“There’s no one Starbucks moment, there are hundreds,” continues Tucker. “So we wrote a bunch of these little mini-stories that felt honest and true to anyone’s experience with Starbucks. Whether that’s two friends catching up, a young girl getting her first hot chocolate or a couple who’ve just had a little fight with each other. The discipline we gave ourselves was that the stories had to be told in 15s. Partly to allow us to shoot as many as possible. But partly so that they felt ‘observed’ rather than written. Anything that felt contrived we threw out.”
A social initiative on Linkedin will launch at the same time of the campaign called Open to Chat. It’s a twist on the “Open to Work” ring that you typically see on Linkedin but instead says that you are ‘Open to Chat’ with young people looking to learn about different careers and establish their networks. Anyone who’s having an “Open to Chat” coffee at a Starbucks will get a free coffee for both themselves and their mentee.
“It’s never just coffee” campaign launched on April 21, 2025, and spans multiple channels in Canada, including TV, high-impact placements through OOH, and a variety of digital tactics including social and online video.
