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The airways are full of commercials for the new Via instant coffee from Starbucks. The coffee giant is challenging people to see if they can taste the difference between its traditional in-store, fresh roasted coffee and the new instant stuff.

As a self admitted coffee snob, I’ve resisted Via thus far, but I’ve been curiously watching Starbucks. Earlier this year, the company decided to rebrand itself in hopes of reviving slumping sales. It was a back to basics campaign supposedly focusing on what the company does best: serve quality coffee.

The campaign started out with unveiling a new everyday roast in stores called Pike Place. Many of the reviews called it a mild brew that tried to match cheaper rivals instead of sticking with something bolder which distinguished them in the first place.

Next was the introduction of fruit smoothies. Then tea drinks.

Now it’s Via. Nothing says quality like instant coffee, right? While Starbucks says it’s creating a new standard for instant, I can’t shake the image of my grandpa stirring up some Folger’s instant and handing it to my dad who looked like he was ready to spit it out the first sip he took.

I think we can look at what Starbucks has done over the last year and learn something about marketing. Is Starbucks really enhancing its image as a quality coffee company when it introduces a weak house blend, fruit smoothies, tea lattes and instant coffee?

In many ways, I feel like churches do a similar thing when they’re trying to reach out to their communities. They want to be everything to everyone instead of focusing on their strengths. If a church has a strong children’s ministry, why not focus on reaching young families? Likewise, if a church has a good adult ministry, why try to say you have a strong children’s ministry if you don’t? If God is blessing a church with certain strengths, why not embrace it?

If Starbucks focused on coffee, it would still get business from people who are looking for tea drinks. Likewise if a church has a particular target, say young families, they’ll still get people outside of that group to come to church. If the message is good, people will come.

I guess the point is, it’s important to be authentic to who you are instead of trying to appeal to everyone.

What do you think?