From pistachio to matcha, rhubarb custard and honeycomb, World Coffee Portal caught up with Antonia Schmidt, Chief of Staff at Blank Street, to get a behind-the-scenes look at how the US coffee chain develops its beverage menu – and find out what it takes for a drink to make the cut
“Anything that can be made will be made.” That’s the ethos driving the experimentation culture at Blank Street, where the product development team prototypes drinks daily, many of which never make it to the menu. For Antonia Schmidt, Chief of Staff and de facto innovation quarterback, that’s exactly the point.
“Failure is the best part,” she says. “When developing menus, every scrapped drink idea gets us closer to what’s great. That’s how we sharpen taste, instincts, everything.”
At first glance, Blank Street’s seasonal menus might seem polished and effortless. But behind every launch is a maze of iteration, cross-functional debate, flavour science and operational pragmatism.
For every Strawberry Shortcake Matcha or Daydream Latte that reaches the cup, there are dozens of concepts that don’t.
“Every menu starts with a tension,” explains Schmidt. “We’re trying to strike the balance between what’s bold enough to surprise our customers, but grounded enough to succeed in one of our cafés.”
Long horizons with startup speeds
Despite Blank Street’s startup agility, Schmidt notes that product development now begins nearly a year in advance. “It surprises some people when I say we’re already working on Summer 2026. But that’s the timeline you need if you want to do something great, not just good,” she says.
“It took our product team months of work and three different pistachio extractions to make that drink sing”
“There are a thousand moving parts, from ideation and R&D to getting the ingredients to all of our stores globally, training our amazing baristas on the recipes, setting up photography that captures the mood around the drink. It’s this perfect storm of planning and creativity, all driven by incredible teamwork.”
Still, she adds, “We’re nimble enough to pivot. If something feels right, we’ve proven we can move mountains to make it work.” That was the case with Salted Pistachio Matcha, which launched this July.
“On paper, it looks deceptively simple,” she says. “But it took our product team months of work and three different pistachio extractions – into milk, into a cream and into a high-quality syrup – to make that drink sing.”
The sketchbook vs. the lab
“We often fall in love with concepts in the sketchbook,” Schmidt laughs, “but drinks don’t launch unless they sing.” A flavour combination might sound great on paper, but until the beverage team builds, blends, and balances it in the test kitchen, it remains just that: a sketch.
“Every drink, whether it launches or not, teaches us something”
“Innovation at Blank Street is a team sport. The sketchbook is the spark, but operational execution, consistency at scale, and business fundamentals all have to align. Otherwise, it stays in the vault.”
Sometimes, drinks fail because the flavors just don’t want to pair well. Other times, the flavours work, but the market just isn’t ready for something that niche.
“There are drinks we developed in the past that were probably ahead of their time, and maybe we will go back to the archives to revisit them for future menus,” says Schmidt. “Every drink, whether it launches or not, teaches us something. We capture that feedback, both internal and guest-facing, so we’re building a kind of flavour memory base over time.”
“There are drinks we developed in the past that were probably ahead of their time, and maybe we will go back to the archives to revisit them for future menus,” says Antonia Schmidt, Chief of Staff, Blank Street Coffee | Photo credits: Blank Street Coffee
The drinks that almost were
What’s the one that got away? “There’s a list,” Schmidt says. “Some drinks are just a little too early, or too out there, for the moment we’re in. But we keep them in the vault, because their time might still come.”
“But that’s the job. You can’t always chase universal approval. You chase intrigue. And sometimes, it’s the quiet sleeper hit that ends up defining your menu. Missing out on the sleepers is what keeps our team up at night, who live and breathe this.”
Matcha and coffee: vehicles to explore flavour
While Blank Street has become known for its matcha innovation – from Strawberry Shortcake to Banana Bread – Schmidt clarifies: “We’re not just a matcha or coffee brand. We’re a flavour and innovation company.”
Even though matcha is having its moment, Schmidt says coffee is treated with just as much curiosity and respect. “The two bases ask for completely different treatment across flavour, colour and texture,” she explains. “Sometimes a flavour works across both, but sometimes the bitterness or acidity throws it off. It’s not always a clean swap.”
That kind of nuance is what keeps the team constantly experimenting; not just with coffee and matcha, but with where flavour innovation might go next. “We’re always thinking about future bases: what else could we build drinks around? There’s a lot of white space, and we’re hungry to create killer products.”
Hero products always have anti-heroes
With each new seasonal menu, Blank Street introduces what Schmidt calls “heroes” and “anti-heroes.” The hero drinks are designed to win broad love. The anti-heroes? “They’re a little edgier,” she says. “They’re not meant to dominate sales. They’re meant to offer something interesting for our guests to try, and to signal what’s next. They’re also a chance for our product team to flex their creativity and explore new frontiers. Our product team is really high-calibre – on an average day, you’ll see them bringing in sous-vide thyme mixes or layered orange infusions. After all, it is true mixology.”
With new innovations and flavours ‘dropping’ more than four times a year, one might imagine a massive team behind the scenes, but it’s a small, tight-knit group. Jai Lott, Jared Wierman, Allie Shamus, and Hashim Parvez bring backgrounds in hospitality, specialty coffee, and boutique cocktail programs, all with a shared culinary curiosity, each adding a unique lens to the creative process.
This duality, creating space for both commercial success and creative play, is a hallmark of the Blank Street innovation strategy. “Some drinks are good for business because they really take off and perform super well. Others are good for business because they push our brand forward, and invite our guests to have a novel experience.”
Delight at scale: the real innovation frontier
While flavour innovation gets the spotlight, Schmidt sees the deeper magic happening in the back of house. “We’re not just innovating with syrups and garnishes. We’re rethinking sourcing, operations, and even bar design.”
As the company grows, Blank Street is increasingly moving away from traditional coffee catalogue ingredients toward bespoke, fresh, and often in-house creations. “You’ll see fewer off-the-shelf flavours,” she notes. “More in-house, extraction of whole ingredients, more real.”
“It’s one thing to make delicious, high-quality drinks for one or two cafés, but we’re focused on achieving that same level of quality across 100+ shops. Our proudest innovations are the ones where we hit great flavour balance and our guests love it, knowing we pushed quality as far as possible at our scale.”
The final sip
For Schmidt and the team, the measure of a great drink isn’t just sales or social virality, it’s harmony. “The best drinks,” she says, “are where flavour, logistics, and emotion all align. And our guests fall in love with it. You taste it and think: that’s Blank Street.”
And what keeps Blank Street chasing the next one? “There’s always another drink. Always another sketch. And always another customer ready for a little magic.”
