When cycling content creator Mark Heij (@harkmeij) and his girlfriend rolled up to the window of Oatly’s Amsterdam pop-up—dubbed the first-ever coffee bike-thru—they weren’t sure what to expect.
What they found impressed them so much that Heij and his girlfriend went through the line twice. Initially, he had an iced coffee while his girlfriend ordered the Strawberry Sakura Genmaicha Matcha, one of the (somewhat wordy, ultra-specific) signature drinks that was featured on the bike-thru’s rotating menu. During the second round, they ordered the Salted Gochujang Barista Cacao and a cappuccino.
At one point in the video Heij posted on Instagram, he turns towards a woman behind them in line on a city bike, who makes hand motions encouraging them to hurry up—ostensibly so she can order, too. Behind her, a long line of cyclist patrons extends from the chrome-colored structure.
“It’s a perfect match,” Heij says of the connection between coffee and cycling.
For a few weeks in May and June of this year, the Oatly Bike-Thru, an idea “birthed” by Oatly brand lead Julia Kemp, made a splash on social media and in the press for “reinventing” the drive-thru concept. Although drive-thrus first came to prominence in the car-centric U.S., Oatly trialed its plant-based pop-up in a bike-centric European locale instead.
The team chose Amsterdam due to its reputation as a cycling capital, says Martin Ringqvist, Oatly’s executive creative director, EMEA. “The city has been championing sustainable mobility for decades, and cycling isn’t a trend there—it’s simply how people move,” he says.
Even during its brief tenure, the bike-thru showed fans that a new type of coffee concept is possible: one that prioritizes novelty and speed alongside social connection and sustainability.
Get In and Get Oat
On Instagram, the oat milk giant launched the pop-up with a pun, framing it as “a fast-drink restaurant where you pedal in, place your order, and get oat.” It also invited pedestrians to stop by on foot.
Although Oatly didn’t share how many people visited the Bike-Thru, Ringqvist says he considers it a successful creative experiment. “We saw the full spectrum of Amsterdam: road cyclists in full kit, parents on cargo bikes, daily locals, and people who came from across town [just because],” he says.
The fast-food drive-thru concept has dominated convenience culture for nearly 100 years, and coffee is particularly well-suited to the model. Although the last few years have seen major growth in at-home coffee consumption, about 59% of all U.S. coffee purchases occurred at drive-thrus in 2025, up from 55% just one year earlier, according to the National Coffee Association.
Chains like Starbucks and Dunkin have long featured drive-thrus alongside walk-in stores, a model they have recently begun exporting to Europe. Meanwhile, newer brands like 7 Brew Coffee have pioneered a highly competitive drive-thru-only business plan. 7 Brew now operates more than 750 locations across 38 U.S. states, and was the fastest-growing coffee chain in 2024, with year-on-year sales up 163%.
Its success underscores growing consumer demand for speed and customization, for both coffee and non-coffee cafe beverages.
From Neighborhood Vibe to Global Recognition
Not all fast coffee service looks the same, however. From pushcarts to mobile coffee bikes, coffee has historically moved on wheels—particularly among independent operators in cities like New Orleans, Mexico City, and Seattle. These smaller-scale businesses offer the personal touch and local fit that global drive-thru chains often can’t.
Smiling Barista, an independent bike cart company based in Antwerp, Belgium, exemplifies this approach. “In a city like Antwerp, a huge share of commutes happen by bike, so instead of asking someone to stop, park, and walk into a cafe, you let them ride straight up, grab their drink, and keep going,” writes founder Didi Sas in an email, echoing Ringqvist’s take on the Amsterdam pop-up. (Although Smiling Barista has done contract promotional work with Oatly, it was not involved in the Bike-Thru.)
“That’s the whole appeal: no detour, no dismount, and still a real specialty drink instead of something out of a machine,” he says.
That convenience focus doesn’t make the model impersonal, however. Sas says that many customers wave hello in passing. The combination of novelty, speed, and social contact that bike carts offer seems to resonate with Antwerp locals. Between its 2019 founding and 2026, Smiling Barista has grown from one to four coffee bikes.
While Oatly’s Bike-Thru was open for just a few weeks, it quickly gained visibility outside the Netherlands, with online commenters requesting Oatly host a pop-up in places as varied as Canada, Italy, and South Korea.
“We need this in Baltimore!” one Instagram user writes.
“This would make me get a bike,” comments another.
Despite the feedback, there’s no plan to expand the concept—yet. “Will there be another Bike-Thru? We’re not sure yet,” says Ringqvist. “We’re hearing from cities that want to put cycling at the heart of their agenda and experience it for themselves.”
The Coffee Bike Cart as a New Third Space
It’s clear that good branding goes a long way, from devotees of the fast-food chain Raising Cane’s choosing to sleep outside new locations to scores of Oatly fans, like Heij, feeling inspired to spread the word on Instagram.
“The video I made did really good, and made a lot of people come to the bike-thru,” says Heij, who says that Oatly invited him to the launch but did not sponsor or pay him for his post. “I would like to see it permanent, but I can imagine that the novelty of it will fade.”
Only time will tell. But Oatly believes that, between the bikes and the plant-based drinks, the concept can prove enduring with consumers. “It showed us there’s a real appetite for experiences where sustainability and great taste aren’t competing ideas—they’re the whole point,” Ringqvist says.
Sas agrees—for him, sustainability is visceral. “I wanted something that drew attention and was unique,” he says. “And the bike just fits what we want to show. No engine, no emissions—we pedal to pull a shot.”
Oatly’s Bike-Thru kiosk is continuing to get attention, too. After the pop-up ended, Oatly repurposed the kiosk as a DJ booth for the summer at RadioRadio, a club and event space roughly 19 minutes by bike from its original location. It’s “now serving Oatly Signature Drinks to a dancing crowd instead of a cycling one,” says Ringqvist. “We’d rather keep an idea moving than make something for one moment and throw it away.”
One could argue that modern drive-thrus tend to be impersonal—and are set to get even more so, now that AI is entering the chat—especially in comparison with walk-in, physical cafes.
But people are still coming out for coffee, and a hybrid model like the bike-thru concept appears to offer a middle ground. Says Ringqvist: “We turned part of the daily commute into something people actually looked forward to.”
