The Hire
Death Wish Coffee Co. has named Sasha Auguste as Chief Marketing Officer, adding a CPG veteran with omnichannel retail credentials to its executive bench as the brand pursues broader distribution and category leadership. Auguste steps in to oversee marketing strategy, brand positioning, and digital initiatives at a company that already commands the #1 Fair Trade and #1 Organic roasted coffee positions in the U.S., according to SPINS MULO scan data from December 2025.
Auguste arrives from YumEarth, where she led a strategic repositioning of the better-for-you confectionery brand, sharpening its differentiation and growing market share within the natural candy segment. She also built an innovation pipeline that moved YumEarth into adjacent segments and executed an omnichannel strategy that drove measurable volume gains across direct-to-consumer, Amazon, and key retail partners. Prior to that role, she led brand repositioning and launched the DTC business at Kidfresh.
Retail & Category Context
Death Wish Coffee is currently carried in more than 25,000 stores nationwide, spanning grocery, natural/specialty, and mass channels. The brand's core lineup — Dark Roast, Medium Roast, Espresso Roast, Light Roast, and Valhalla Java — is entirely Fair Trade certified and made with organic coffee, a positioning that has driven outsized velocity in natural and conventional grocery planograms as shoppers continue to trade into premium and certified coffee sets. The organic and Fair Trade coffee segment has seen sustained shelf-space expansion at major grocers, with retailers increasingly leaning into certification credentials as a point of differentiation from private label and national commodity brands.
Auguste's brief includes integrated marketing, innovation support, and consumer engagement — a mandate that signals Death Wish is eyeing further TDP gains alongside new SKU development. Steve Gardiner, CEO of Death Wish Coffee, noted that her experience across both large and emerging CPG brands positions her to compete at scale. "Sasha is a proven leader, and her experience at big and small brands will help us up our game even further," Gardiner said.
What's Next
For retailers and category managers, the appointment underscores Death Wish Coffee's ambition to move beyond its cult-brand status and compete aggressively for prime shelf real estate and end-cap placement in the coffee aisle. Auguste's background in DTC and Amazon channel strategy also suggests the brand will continue to invest in the full demand-generation funnel — using digital and direct channels to build awareness that ultimately drives in-store scan velocity. As the specialty coffee segment faces pressure from both private label premiumization and better-funded national brands, the ability to convert brand loyalty into repeatable retail turns will be the real measure of this hire's impact.
For more on the premium coffee category, see our coverage of emerging trends in grocery beverages and natural and specialty channel brand strategy.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
