Don’t forget!
9am tomorrow morning at the Mosaic Cafe in Carrolton hosted by AAH! Coffee, and sponsored by Pallo (www.coffeetool.com).
it’s mostly cupping centered, and it will feature coffees from various roasters in Texas.
Don’t miss the customer interaction lecture given by Aaron Heil(AAH! Coffee), and stick around for the Culture of Excellence presentation headed up by Eldon Hooley(Javataza).
Enter the friendly competition(s) if they occur.
Expect it to run for most of the day.
I will not be in attendance. Tomorrow is my birthday, and I intend to spend it leisurly with my significant other. I hope everyone has a blast!
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July 19th, 2008
9:00am
Mosaic Cafe
2435 Kinwest
Irving, TX, 75063
Map and Directions
Hosted By:
and
Click Here for more info.
- Cupping for quality and roasting analysis
- Connecting with the consumer market (customers)
- Creating a Culture of Excellence
- Espresso techniques and free time
- Latte Art Throw Down
- Networking
Sponsors
___________________________________________________________
Sponsorships Available! (Contact Us)
This project is a work in progress
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My SO (not Single Origin) and I dropped into our local gem of a shop: Sugar Brown’s Coffee to grab a cup, play some cards, enjoy the live music and atmosphere, and to just have a good time.
Being past students of mine, they are always excited to tell me of news going on. There is much to tell about their journey, but this is not about their shop, so much as of their latest step forward.
They acquired a third espresso grinder.
Most shops are content with a Decaf grinder and a Non-Decaf grinder for their espresso bar. That’s all you really need, they say, and they are right. You don’t need more than that to run a successful retail store.
Let’s back up a bit, and remember why we got into this whole coffee business to begin with.
It’s About The Coffee
I can’t speak for everyone, but there are many people who started into the coffee business because they love coffee. Sure, there is profit to be made, and yes, we love our customers. But before those factors were a reality, the coffee was there, and we learned to love it.
If, as retailers, our roll is to represent the coffee in such a way as to “let it speak for itself”, and if our love for coffee included the excitement of the exploration of flavors and new taste experiences, shouldn’t we offer these experiences to our customers?
Enter the case for the Third Grinder.
Having a third espresso grinder opens up possibilities for short-run single origin espresso offerings, and room for a limited time guest espresso from one of your favorite roasters.
Keeping things like these on a regular schedule can give your regular customers something to look forward to. Just like in the blog world, regular scheduled updates does more for harboring visits than anything else. (that, and high quality content.. or high quality products, in this case)
Is it expensive? It can be. But so is your espresso machine, and so are your other two grinders. Would you say you get your money’s worth out of your decaf grinder? I bet most would answer “no” or “barely” if they were to crunch the numbers of average decaf sales matched to the purchase price of their decaf grinder when it was new. So why do it? It’s a service to your customers.
The third grinder is a service to not only your customers, but to the coffee itself, and those who grow it. It increases awareness of the diversity and journey of coffee into your customers’ cups. This increased awareness focuses demand, which, in turn, helps to promote the quality driven people in this fine industry, from baristas, to roasters, to green coffee buyers, to processing mill workers, to those who grow and harvest the coffee. The end result is a higher standard across the board.
All this from buying a third grinder? Not exactly, but it is another way to help work towards these goals.
I understand that there are folks out there who consider single origin espresso to be a non-worthwhile endeavor. While I disagree, this is a discussion for another post.
Kudos to Sugar Brown’s Coffee for another step in the right direction. Kudos to others who have done the same. And Kudos to those of you who now have plans to implement such a program into your retail plan.
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He trained James Hoffmann for last year’s WBC. He trained Kyle Glanville for the USBC, which he went on to win. He won the Irish Triple Crown of the Irish Latte Art championships, the Irish Cup-Tasting championships, and the Irish Barista Championships. And now, in his first ever appearance in a World Barista Championship, he was crowned the World Barista Champion. This man is unstoppable.
It seems all eyes will be on Square Mile Coffee, the company owned and run by James Hoffman, 2007 WBC, Annette Moldvaer, 2007 World Cup-Tasting Champion, and Stephen Morrissey, 2008 WBC.
They may be in need of more trophy space.
The final order of the WBC is as follows:
1st Stephen Morrissey, Ireland 738.5 pts
2nd David Makin, Australia 733 pts
3rd Liesbeth Sleijster, Netherlands 694.5 pts
4th Daniel Remheden, Sweden 693 pts
5th Michael Yung, Canada 702 pts
6th Soren Stiller Markussen, Denmark 671 pts
Congratulations to all competitors, and congratulations to the World Barista Champion, Mr. Stephen Morrissey
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So, I’m a bit (a lot?) late on announcing this. The truth is, I didn’t remember to announce it here at all, so please forgive!
The giant success of the USBC live feed lead to this fantastic service to specialty coffee industry fans.
I do hope you’ll take full advantage of it. This has never once been available in any earlier WBC, and I hope you’ll encourage its continuation as more competitions come and go.
http://www.worldbaristachampionship.com/
Click there, or click the image at the top. Enjoy!
June 19-22
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This is a great new probject from a gentleman named Mads-Ole Bak who lives in Denmark. The concept is to have all information about all national competitions all over the country consolidated into just one easy to find and navigate location. Brilliant!
He had this to say:
The purpose of the site is to make a thorough coverage of all the competitions that will be going on during the SCAE Wonderful Coffee exhibition in Copenhagen this summer.
We will have access to the competitions and SCAE have agreed to cooperate with us during the event, so we (hopefully) can make a very interesting site for everyone who would like to follow the competitions but are not able to be in Copenhagen.
In addition to the World championships, we would also like to collect a lot of information about all the national competitions. It has proven pretty difficult to find out who won the national championship. So we hope that some of you would like to help us if you know anything about national competitions that we should bring on WBConEspressoBar.
Please feel free to visit the site, register in our forum and post any information you might have in the “National Chapters” forum
We hope that you will find our site interesting and that we will be able to bring you a lot of good stuff during the competitions in June.
For some reason, national coffee associations have a hard time making competition information as easy to find as it could be.
It’s high time something like this came along.
Check it out, and sign up to join by visiting: WBConEspressoBar
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This is something that I feel most of us can identify with.
A statement by the originator of modern academics:
With regard to excellence, it is not enough to know, but we must try to have and use it. – Aristotle
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Grounds for enthusiasm – link
Houston Business Journal – by Susan Powell Special to Houston Business Journal
By dedicating himself to not only brewing a fabulous cup of coffee, but also sharing his passion for premium coffee with the world, Mike McKim has turned an avocation into a full-time occupation.
At his company’s headquarters in a small nondescript strip mall at 2810 Louetta Road in Spring, about a mile west of Interstate 45, it’s clear that McKim, CEO of Cuvée Coffee Roasting Co., is building a business aimed at other professionals.
The full-service operation imports the world’s finest beans, then roasts them to exacting standards.
A big congratulations to Mike and Cuveé!
We’ve seen Brown and Gallo in the press before, and this isn’t the first time I’ve seen Cuveé in print.
Who’s next?
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Joe Mama’s
Coffee House
is now closed. It was open for three months serving up great coffee (and food) to citizens of Amarillo, but alas.. it was not to last.
I’ve been told that a smaller retailer may open in the future for a smaller build-out attempt at a successful retailer.
Best wishes to Ray & Co. at Joe Mama’s.
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Sarah Benedict is a Barista at Starbucks Coffee. She is a member of the Lubbock Coffee Club, and has a passion for great coffee.
Sarah submitted this article:
Re-Training the Siren:
An Insider’s View of What to Expect
$.99 lattes were available yesterday from 5:30pm to 9pm at Dunkin Donuts stores because Starbucks baristas were given the evening off. All 7,100 Starbucks locations shut down to have individual store meetings and a heart to heart with Howard Schultz. “Priorities are out of whack,” said Shultz via a pre-recorded video. Our focus has been so set on profit generating, that we have lost sight of the perfect espresso and absolute customer service. Each meeting started off with a coffee tasting, as is Starbucks tradition, and then focused on shifting the new focus to three always important things:
First, customer service is our main concern, as it has always been. However, we will do whatever the customer asks us to do, no questions asked, and everything in our power to deliver the best customer service.
Secondly, milk steaming standardization was implemented. We discussed correctly aerating milk, and the importance of perfect foam. Re-steaming milk is unacceptable and attaining the proper temperature is essential. While this seems elementary, the beverage recipes over the years have been personalized by store managers and even baristas to the point that every barista had a different idea of the ideal temperature range for steaming milk.
Lastly, Starbucks is reconfiguring the flavor profile of the espresso. Because Starbucks stores use super automatic machines, the barista has little or no control over the quality of the espresso. Our machines have been recalibrated to pull a longer shot that now must last between 15-19 seconds from first visual. In fact, we no longer use the single shot option, and pull only double shots. When pulling the shots, we are to pull them only into shot glasses, so that we can inspect the quality of the espresso. Every hour we are to time the shots and to taste them as often as possible.
At the end of the night, each barista made a written promise to their store manager, their store partners (coworkers), and customers. We promised to deliver the absolute best customer service; to never deliver anything less than the best. We promised to let every customer know that we value their feedback and input. We value the opportunity to remake any beverage so that every customer has the most rewarding experience and feels appreciated. We promised to hold each other accountable for upholding every single standard and work with each other to meet every expectation set for us by our customers, our partners, our managers, and Mr. Schultz.
We hope that you notice a difference each time you come in. We want it to be more welcoming, more fun, more flavorful, and more of what you want. Demand the best, request ‘fore here’ mugs, ask us questions because we are ready.
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