Independent coffee house sets up shop next to barista giant in Northampton shopping centre

The coffee house, which has sites in Kettering, Peterborough and Wellingborough, currently sell over 250,000 cups of coffee a year and admit that the brand loves the challenge of competition.Area Manager, Richard Wagg told the Chronicle & Echo that this is Bewiched's third site trading next to a Costa Coffee.He said: “We love the challenge of competition, there is no doubt that this is a more difficult path to tread, but anyone who frequents our Kettering or Peterborough sites will testify that we trade very strongly versus our branded neighbours.“People often ask what makes us different? Well we are different in many ways and we strive to be better. Our approach to how we prepare our coffee's, the level of expertise we train into our teams, is a far higher expectation than that set in other national coffee houses.“The extraction of the coffee and temperature of the milk are key to an outstanding product, by empowering our team with that knowledge and then giving them the best equipment on the market, means we can deliver this consistently.”The coffee shop that offers a ‘sheer breadth’ of drinks pride themselves on their ice cream milkshakes and hot chocolates.Managing director, Matt Fountain said: 'We know we will have a tough year and a half in the Grosvenor, there is a proportion of the population - around 25 percent - who are really keen to try something new and they will be among our first customers.“If previous projects next to the major brands are anything to go by, we will see those early adopters but they will not fill our shop regularly, so we will have an empty store at times and Costa will be full. The psychology of walking into an empty coffee shop and past one that is full next door, is fascinating - and frustrating to watch - the public won't trust an unknown brand unless they look busy.'We are in independent local business, both myself and Richard grew up in Scaldwell and we have been very keen to secure a site in Northampton. We are experts in what we do and currently sell over 250,000 a year coffee's across all of our sites.”Handmade food and cake can also be bought on site, which Bewiched says is ‘ever changing.’