CHICAGO— Following its acquisition of Copco last fall, Lifetime Brands is expanding the brand’s line of tea kettles and adding coffee products into the mix. The company will also expand Copco’s hydration business and expand it into the lunch bags segment. Lifetime will launch all of the new products at the International Home + Housewares Show, here.
“With Copco we are going to be doing two big things. We are adding new tea kettles and also adding coffee products too, converting the brand into a whole coffee/tea story. We will be bringing back some of Copco’s founder, Sam Farber’s tea kettles that were classic iconic kettles such as the Harmony and Deco, in enamel on steel and stainless steel. We will also add some of our own new designs, including Belle. This will be a major expansion of the tea kettle business for Copco,” said Bob Varakian, group president, Lifetime Brands.
Varakian noted that some of the coffee accessories the company will introduce under Copco will include double-walled porcelain and double-walled glass French presses. These will be weaved into the Belle coordinated line of French presses, tea kettles and accessories. There will also be glass and cork, stainless steel and cork French presses as well.
“When Farber started Copco, the company was focused on design at affordable prices on everyday objects, which revolutionized the industry. It increased the importance of design and made it more important. We will honor that original focus and go back to that. We will also be following the original marketing plan, which we think is sound. Coffee/tea is always one of three trends that major retailers are focused on and we feel that Copco has the market share in this category and now we are going to take that and quadruple the product development efforts,” said Varakian.
He also noted that there will be a major launch of tea kettles in the $29 and $39 range, as well as lower-priced options.
The other part of the Copco brand has been in the portable beverageware segment with coffee and hydration, which Varakian said the company is now managing through the Built division. Here, Varakian explained that Lifetime will offer customers mainly Tritan plastic travel bottles, while Built’s bottles will be double walled stainless steel.
Lifetime also plans to transform Copco so as to provide its customers with a one lunch solution that will also include hydration and coffee bottles, neoprene lunch bags and bento boxes.
For the Copco line of lunch bags and bento boxes, Lifetime will launch all new patterns and colors that will coordinate with the bottles, to attract the consumer.
“This will be a major launch for Copco as well, one that we feel taps into the current consumer trends of being more aware of food and nutrition and dieting. Many consumers feel safer that they are bringing their own food, it saves time and money,” he said.
Varakian said that Lifetime Brands is excited to bring these launches of new Copco products to those consumers that both know the brand and those that are younger and may not.
“People that know the brand will reinforce what they know about the brand and then the people that don’t, we will introduce it to them by way of some great new designs,” he said.
