Introduction
The book, “The Oxford companion to American food and drink”, by Smith1 argues that coffee is one of the most preferred beverages all over the world. Coffee is brewed and usually exhibits a dark color and also has acidic flavor due to the brewing process.
The preparation of coffee is done from roasted seeds obtained from coffee plants. Individuals drink coffee for various personal reasons. Some drink coffee because they believe it gives them extra energy, especially those who like to stay awake for long during the night. Some people actually are fascinated by the taste and smell of coffee.
They just feel good when they can smell the nice aroma and feel the taste on their tongues as they drink coffee. Besides, for non-alcoholic drinkers, taking coffee is one of the best ways to spend time with friends in social joints. In fact, with increase in the number of coffee cafes like Tim Hortons, meeting for coffee has turned into a social event where friends meet to share good moments together.
Many people also drink coffee just as a form of habit. Tim Hortons is one of the most common coffee joints in Canada. It serves various customers with varied taste for coffee. It also offers other kinds of drinks the customers can choose from besides coffee. The surveyor issued questionnaires to respondents to find out how customers at the Tim Hortons purchase the company’s beverages and other products.
Methods/Procedures
The survey focused on Tim Hortons and its coffee customers. Ten participants were randomly sampled to participate in the survey. They were each issued with a structured questionnaire containing matrix questions to answer. The questionnaires contained ten similar questions for every respondent. They were required to answer the questions independently without consulting one another. This was to ensure validity and reliability.
The first question asked the respondents the size of coffee they preferred. The responses varied a great deal. Amongst the ten participants, five stated that they preferred medium size; this represented 50% of the respondents. Then three people indicated they preferred small sizes and two indicated that they preferred big sizes. These represented 30% and 20% of the respondents respectively.
The respondents were also asked how frequent they bought stuff from Tim Hortons. Three of the respondents indicated that they bought coffee from Tim Hortons always, four indicated that they bought coffee most of the times, one indicated sometimes while two indicated rarely.
These statistics represented 30%, 40%, 10% and 20% respectively. A question was also asked on whether respondents ate at Tim Hortons every day. In this case, six of the respondents indicated that they ate there most of the time; three indicated some times while the remaining one indicated always. This implies that the respondent ate at Tim Hortons every day. In terms of percentages, these represented 60%, 30% and 10% respectively.
The respondents were also asked to indicate the frequency with which they took both lunch and breakfast at Tim Hortons. These two questions generated similar answers. Five respondents indicated that they always took both breakfast and lunch at Tim Hortons. Four of them indicated that they only sometimes took both lunch and breakfast.
This implies that some other times they may either eat from their houses or go to other restaurants. One respondent showed rarely for both lunch and breakfast. The implication of this could be that the respondent was never stationed at a work place but could be traveling during the day’s businesses.
There was a question regarding ordering of stuffs whenever the participants visited Tim Hortons. The question asked them how frequent they ordered other products apart from coffee.
Eight of the respondents showed that they rarely ordered other products besides coffee, one indicated sometimes while the remaining one showed he always ordered different things on various occasions. Since many people like taking coffee for various reasons, the respondents were asked whether or not they believed coffee was important for energy concentration. All of the respondents answered on the affirmative.
They all indicated that in deed coffee was a source of extra energy, especially during winter periods. When asked on whether they thought Tim Hortons was the best, seven of them agreed, one indicated somehow while the remaining one was not sure on the issue. Those answered it is the best showed that they had mostly relied on the coffee and other products from Tim Hortons for a long time. This could be because they liked the quality of products at Tim Hortons.
On whether they kept special amount of money for Tim Hortons, the respondents again had varied answers. Three indicated always, two indicated sometimes, two showed rarely while the remaining three never kept special money for Tim Hortons. Those who always kept special money might be very loyal to the company’s products. The reason could also be that they were always satisfied with the services they received whenever they visited Tim Hortons.
Coffee is one of the most preferred drinks at the Tim Hortons. However there are also other types of drinks offered at the meeting joint. With regards to this, the respondents were asked to respond on whether they bought other drinks different from coffee.
All the ten respondents indicated that at time or another they bought other drinks. However, three of the respondents indicated that they always bought drinks different from coffee; four indicated they did this sometimes while the rest of the three showed that they rarely bought other drinks apart from coffee.
Conclusion
Tim Hortons is one of the companies offering coffee and other beverages to the population of Canada. The survey sought to find out the experience of customers with coffee brewed by Tim Hortons. The respondents were presented with structured questionnaires on which were matrix questions to answer. Ten respondents were selected to participate in the survey. They were asked to fill the questionnaires independently without consulting one another. This was to ensure reliability and validity of the survey.
The analysis of the data obtained during the survey indicated various outcomes from the respondents. The findings showed that the frequency with which customers bought coffee from Tim Hortons varies greatly from one customer to the other. Moreover, it also came out that customers do not only buy coffee from Tim Hortons, but sometimes buy drinks different from coffee; they also bought other things apart from drinks.
This implies that customers for Tim Hortons are not only attracted by the coffee itself, but also by other products in general. The survey also found out that other customer would buy other drinks unrelated to coffee despite the fact that they still preferred coffee most of the times. Again, a good number of respondents believed that Tim Hortons was the best place for them to buy coffee and other related products.
References
Smith AF. The Oxford companion to American food and drink. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2007.