Thoughts on a new Espresso Cart

While eating lunch I had some time to think about our conversation. I think you face a few challenges which you might be able to turn into advantages.

With an espresso cart in the lobby of an office building you have a restricted audience. You’ll need to turn as many of your neighbors into customers as possible. You’ll need to find ways to engage them, to make them partners in your business. How do you do this? I have a few ideas….

Learn as much as you can about coffee and the coffee business. You had many good questions on the phone. Continue with that. The more you know about coffee the more you’ll be a resource for your customers. Encourage this same thing in anyone you hire on to help you run the espresso cart. Find employees who are interested in coffee for coffee’s sake. Find employees who like to share their knowledge and experience with others.

Taste coffee from as many sources as possible. Ask roasting companies about their practices. Please yourself first – find the coffees that you like – and don’t worry so much at the start about pleasing your customers. If you like the coffee, and you know something about how it was produced and roasted, then you’ll know why you like the coffee and you’ll be able to explain it to your customers.

You’ll want to be able to catch people as they are rushing to get to work. Be as efficient as possible during the morning rush. Let your customers run a tab, let them pay once a week or every other week or whatever makes you comfortable. This will build loyalty and you won’t be fumbling with money during the morning rush. Think about the traffic pattern and streamline as much as possible. Have a table downstream, a few feat away from the espresso stand, for anyone that needs sugar and napkins. Let people phone in their orders as they approach the building and have everything ready for when they arrive.

Later in the day set up a few small tables and stools so that the people can gather and meet with each other. If the environment is suitable set up medium sized tables off to the side or in a corner for business meetings.

Later on, once you’re established with the espresso stand, consider catering for nearby businesses. With a good drip brewer you can brew coffee into airpots which keep coffee fresh and deliver it to nearby businesses for their business meetings. Collect the airpots the next day during your next day delivery so that they are always rotating in and out. Establish a regular account with these businesses and bill them once a month. Find out how to make things as easy as possible for the Office Manager. This person can be your friend if you make their job easier. Take orders for espresso drinks via phone and deliver to any businesses that are within walking distance.

You had many good questions about blends. I’d be happy to talk with you more about that, but don’t allow the many many options out there to overwhelm you. I’ll give you a quick overview of one of our most successful blends. We talked a bit about the Peru and the Sumatra on the phone. The Peru is a bright, sweet coffee, good as a medium roast. The Sumatra is rich and earthy, good as a dark roast. Mix them together and you have a great blend. The two compliment and balance each other in a specific way. But you need to be familiar with the Peru alone and the Sumatra alone before you begin to blend them, otherwise the process is random and pointless.

In my opinion you can run single varietal coffees through an espresso machine. You don’t always need a fancy espresso blend. And herein is another way to engage your customers. Have one stable coffee, something that you’ve found that you like, and always offer it. You need something that your customers can rely upon. But then
also offer a second coffee, something different each week. Make it fun and interesting for your customers. “This week we are featuring coffee from Ethiopia, next week from Honduras.” It will be like sampling wine and over time your customers will tell you what they like. It will be an exploration for everyone. Don’t think that you need to find the one perfect coffee. I don’t think that such a thing exists. The world is a big place and it has a lot to offer. Vanilla alone or chocolate alone get boring after awhile.

You’ll need to tune your espresso machine for each coffee. Some coffees will taste good at six grams per shot, others at eight. Get to know your equipment. Only way to do it is by trial and error. Again, go with what pleases you.

Yes, nitrogen flushes and vacuum packaging help keep coffee fresh, but the most important thing is the freshness of the roast. Green coffee has a long shelf life, up to two years. But as soon as coffee is roasted the clock starts ticking. I’d stay under two weeks for roasted coffee. Ten days actually. This can be something that sets you apart. Make sure your customers know how fresh your coffee is.

As I said on the phone, all of our coffees are Fair Trade and Organic. You’ll see this referred to as FTO in the coffee business. FTO prices are typically above conventional prices. We only offer the best coffees that we can find, which means that they can be expensive, but I am regularly watching coffee prices, and our FTO prices are usually better than our competitor’s.

I’m not sure I explained Fair Trade very well on the phone. Our blog has a few videos that talk about Fair Trade; you might find them interesting….

Well, that’s a lot for one email, so I’ll just leave it here for now. I’ll send you some information in the mail. You’ll get it sometime in the middle of the week.

Have a good weekend.

Rick