A catalog with too few choices can miss needs; one with too many can waste buyers' time distinguishing between options. There's no optimal number of products for every brand. The real problem is creating enough meaningful difference while still helping buyers understand which options they're choosing between.

Variety needs to serve a meaningful difference

A catalog has value when each group of choices solves a need buyers genuinely recognize. If you add many product codes with nearly identical characteristics, the number increases but useful information doesn't increase correspondingly.

Research on choice overload by Chernev and colleagues, based on 99 observations with 7,202 participants, found the effect of the number of choices depends on the complexity of the choice set, task difficulty, how unclear preferences are, and the buyer's goals. So you can't simply conclude that more choices are always bad.

This is especially relevant for coffee, since newcomers often don't yet know what they like, while long-time drinkers can process more differences. The same catalog can be easy to choose from for one group but difficult for another.

Organization matters just as much as quantity

Kahn and Wansink showed that a catalog's structure affects perceived variety. Six lab and field studies found that how a product set is organized and balanced can change perceived variety, which in turn affects consumption amount.

For a coffee catalog, this suggests it isn't necessary to cut products just to simplify the choice page. You can keep many choices but layer them by criteria buyers understand, such as brewing method, taste, package size, or occasion of use, if product information genuinely supports those criteria.

When buyers see the entire catalog at once, the difference between product codes can blur together. When the catalog is split into meaningful groups, buyers process each part instead of having to compare everything against everything.

Don't turn one criterion into the only mold

A good organization doesn't necessarily need to use just one criterion. A drinker may want to choose by brewing method, but after choosing the method still needs to choose by taste. A gift buyer may prioritize package size first, then look at flavor. A newcomer may need a simpler choice than an experienced one.

So a catalog can use a layered structure: the first layer narrows the range, the next layer distinguishes the remaining choices. This is a way of keeping variety while not forcing buyers to process the whole catalog right from the start.

There's no reason to give a fixed number of layers or an optimal number of codes for An Khuong without behavioral data. The meta-analysis on choice overload only allows building principles, not deriving a specific product threshold for a particular brand.

A good catalog needs to let buyers know the difference

A catalog can have a great many products and still be easy to choose from if the difference between them is clear. Conversely, just a few products can still be confusing if the names are similar but don't explain the difference.

You can test this with a simple exercise: give the catalog to a buyer and ask them to explain why product A differs from product B. If the answer is mostly "different packaging" or "different name," the catalog hasn't communicated enough information. If they can talk about brewing method, taste, package size, or a specific characteristic, the structure has supported the decision better.

This is also where product content matters. The catalog can't do the explaining job on its own if each product lacks the necessary information.

Balance the catalog with data instead of intuition

There's no universal formula for determining how many products is just right. Instead, a brand can track indicators like the rate of viewing without choosing, products commonly compared together, products bought repeatedly, and products rarely chosen.

If a group of products is frequently overlooked because buyers don't understand the difference, the problem may lie in organization or information rather than the products themselves. If two products keep substituting for each other without opening additional demand, the risk of role duplication should be examined.

The ultimate result of a good catalog isn't a product count. It's the ability to help buyers recognize the options worth considering, understand the difference, and make a decision without having to process an unnecessary amount of information.

References

• Chernev, A., Böckenholt, U. & Goodman, J. (2015). Choice overload: A conceptual review and meta-analysis. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 25, 333–358. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcps.2014.08.002
• Kahn, B. E. & Wansink, B. (2004). The influence of assortment structure on perceived variety and consumption quantities. Journal of Consumer Research, 30, 519–533. https://doi.org/10.1086/380286
• An Analysis of Assortment Choice in Grocery Retailing (2015). Journal of Retailing, 91(1), 19–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretai.2014.10.004
• Samoggia, A. & Riedel, B. (2018). Consumers' perceptions of coffee health benefits and motives for coffee consumption and purchasing. Appetite, 129, 70–81. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2018.07.002