Серп и кофе
A complete Telegram mini-app for a Moscow coffee chain with a Soviet soul — events, seven locations, and a marketplace that launched with no paid promotion.
They asked for an event calendar.
What they actually had was a secret.
"Советская Культура" — handpainted by a member of the team. It's been on the wall since day one.
The Challenge
We came in to build an event calendar.
Then they mentioned the secret menu.
The brief was clear: a way for regulars to discover events across five cafés and two farmers markets, without leaving Telegram. We were a week into planning when the client mentioned, almost as an aside, that they had a secret menu — dishes and specials known only to people who already knew to ask. That one detail changed the shape of everything we built.
Brand & Identity
A Soviet symbol, redrawn around a coffee cup.
The name alone sets the tone — "Sickle and Coffee." The brand lives in that tension: constructivist forms and warm neighbourhood feeling, propaganda poster geometry and Celentano on the turntable. The identity work started with the sickle. We spent a week turning it into something you'd want on a tote bag.
What We Built
Event feed
A city-wide and per-venue calendar with RSVP, Telegram-native push reminders, and shareable event cards. Every event across all seven venues — in one place, inside Telegram.
Seven venue pages
Each of the five cafés and two farmers markets gets its own page — atmosphere photos, seasonal menu highlights, hours, and a map pin that opens natively in Telegram. No two pages look identical.
The secret menu
A members-only section accessible by invite or a code given at the counter. The thing they already had — now with a proper home, discoverable only by those who belong.
Marketplace
Specialty single-origin beans, branded merch, and gift cards. Payments via Telegram Stars and card. Launched with zero paid promotion. Profitable in month one.
The Product
Result
All seven venues on the platform before the first month was up. Fifty registrations in the first week.
No paid promotion. No announcement campaign. The community was already there — regulars who'd been asking for exactly this. The secret menu became the most-shared feature in month one, passed around in chats the way a good restaurant recommendation always has been.