Fresh Cup Magazine | How-To Handbook | July 2019

Contents H o w-To Handbook 14

EDITION

THIRD

Fresh Cup Magazine | July 2019 | Vol. 28 No. 7

getting started

Leasing Space?

Tips for Café Owners

BY DALE WILLERTON, THE LEASE COACH

Point-of-Sale Systems How to Be Inclusive with Your Payment Methods

BY CAITLIN PETERKIN

Take Stock Inventory Management for Cafés

BY LUCY VALENA

Page 36

Page 16

Page 26

The Fresh Cup Equipment Guide

Creating Accessibility in Cafés

Smallware Essentials

BY MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH

BY VILISSA THOMPSON, LMSW

Page 40

Page 20

Page 30

BY FRESH CUP STAFF

42 staffing Measuring Success How to Use SMART Goals to Improve Your Business

BY RJ JOSEPH

Page 44

Using Service Training to Empower Baristas

BY RJ JOSEPH

Page 50

You Are Welcome Here How to Create a Safe & Inclusive Café Space

BY FRESH CUP STAFF

Page 54

56 menu & beverage program Menu Planning 101

BY FRESH CUP STAFF

Creating Your Specialty Tea Program

Food Allergen Safety in the Café

Page 58

BY MANISH SHAH

BY CAITLIN PETERKIN

Page 64

Page 68

Designing a Coffee Program

Cupping Coffee

Beyond the Bean

BY CAITLIN PETERKIN

BY CAITLIN PETERKIN

BY MICHAEL BUTTERWORTH

Page 66

Page 70

Page 62

Cupping Tea

BY BILL WADDINGTON

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72 sustainablity Can Your Café Go Zero Waste?

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Page 74

Whole Latte Choices A Pull-Out Poster Comparing the Footprints of Different Milks

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Sustainability Starts Here

BY FRESH CUP STAFF

Page 78

Page 75

80 marketing & branding Marketing Your Café

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Page 82

Social Media Management

Email Marketing

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Page 85

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Page 84

Designing a Website

@

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Page 83

How to Write a Press Release

BY JORDAN JOHNSON

Page 86

88 wrapping up Expanding Your Café

List of Resources

How-To In Review

BY CAITLIN PETERKIN

BY FRESH CUP STAFF

BY FRESH CUP STAFF

Page 90

Page 94

Page 95

EDITOR’S LETTER Page 10 | CONTRIBUTORS Page 12 | ADVERTISER INDEX Page 96

Cover illustration by Cynthia Meadors

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 9

EDITOR's LETTER

I

n the grand scheme of things, three years isn’t such a long time.

But in our world, so much has changed since 2016, the year we last published our How-To Handbook.

Trends have come and gone, cafés have opened and closed, and our industry is coming face-to-face with its own impermanence thanks to low prices and climate change. But one thing has held true over the years: People drink coffee and tea. No matter what some financial advisers suggest to the contrary, more consumers than ever are patroning coffee shops and tea houses all over the world, every day.

Three years have made us realize how vital it is to update our How-To Handbook, our as-comprehensive-as-possible guide to opening and operating a café. We’ve assessed the gaps in our last edition, built upon the trends that have remained steady (sustainable takeaway packaging, alternative plantbased milks, and the behemoth that is Instagram), and created an issue so chock-full of information that it may even be intimidating. We’ve put a lot of time, hard work, and resources into this issue to make it as thorough as possible, not only for the café owners of today, but, hopefully for café owners another three (or five, or ten) years down the road.

In the third edition of our How-To Handbook, we revisit basics like selecting the best equipment for your shop, creating your specialty coffee and tea programs, and highlighting smallwares essential to a café. We also approach café design, service training for baristas, and point-of-sale implementation with an inclusivity lens. And on the technological front, we discuss the importance of developing and marketing your brand, and the best platforms to leverage it.

Still, we know this guide isn’t completely exhaustive. Some articles may not even be relevant to you or your business. We wanted to give you, whether you’re just starting out or revisiting how things can be done, a holistic sense of what really goes into operating a café in this day and age—and then run with it. Take the tools that we’ve provided and apply them how you best see fit. And should you have any suggestions for our next How-To Handbook, please be in touch.

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE FRESH CUP PUBLISHING Publisher and President JAN WEIGEL jan@freshcup.com EDITORIAL Editor CAITLIN PETERKIN editor@freshcup.com Associate Editor JORDAN JOHNSON freshed@freshcup.com ART Art Director CYNTHIA MEADORS cynthia@freshcup.com ADVERTISING Sales JAN WEIGEL sales@freshcup.com Ad Coordinator DIANE HOWARD adtraffic@freshcup.com ACCOUNTING Accounting Manager DIANE HOWARD diane@freshcup.com FRESH CUP FOUNDER WARD BARBEE 1938-2006 EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD DAVID GRISWOLD Sustainable Harvest Coffee Importers

CHUCK JONES Jones Coffee Roasters

PHILLIP DI BELLA Di Bella Group

BRUCE MILLETTO Bellissimo Coffee Advisors

ANUPA MUELLER Eco-Prima

BRAD PRICE Phillips Syrups & Sauces

BRUCE RICHARDSON Elmwood Inn Fine Teas

MANISH SHAH Maya Tea Co.

LARRY WINKLER Torani

SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION Fresh Cup Magazine is distributed worldwide each month by post. Fresh Cup Magazine is available by subscription: price— one year US $48, two years US $68, one year Canada $55, all other countries $85 per year. Single issues—$5-$10 each, plus shipping. (Checks must be drawn on a US-affiliated bank.)

PLEASE ALLOW 6–8 WEEKS FOR DELIVERY OF FIRST ISSUE.

Copyright ©2019 by Fresh Cup Publishing Company Inc. Contents may not be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. ISSN: 1094-8228 SUBSCRIPTION QUESTIONS? EMAIL: freshcup@pfsmag.com CALL: 888-881-5861 PO Box 92735, Long Beach, CA 90809-9639 FRESH CUP OFFICES 2627 NE MLK Jr. Blvd., Suite 203, Portland, OR 97212 PHONE: 503/236-2587 | FAX: 503/236-3165 FRESH CUP PROUDLY SPONSORS NONPROFITS

CAITLIN PETERKIN, EDITOR

editor@freshcup.com FRESH C UP.COM 10 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

Thanks to our contributors

contributors

Based in Istanbul, Turkey, coffee educator, consultant, and writer Michael Butterworth is a licensed Q grader and a two-time United States Barista Championship competitor. For the How-To Handbook, he provides tips on how to select the best equipment for your café (p. 20), as well as implementing your coffee program (p. 62).

Vilissa Thompson, LMSW, is a macro-minded social worker from South Carolina.

Ramp Your Voice! is her organization where she discusses the issues that matters to her as a Black disabled woman, including intersectionality, racism, politics, and why she unapologetically makes good trouble. Read her piece on creating accessibility in your café on p. 30.

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RJ Joseph is a coffee roaster, journalist, and blogger based out of Oakland, California. Her work in all areas of her life focuses on trying to create better systems for all types of people. For this issue, she highlights the importance of setting goals for your business (p. 44) and service training for your baristas (p. 50). When she’s not pulling shots, you can find her cooking, listening to records, and enjoying long city hikes.

Lucy R. Valena is CEO of Raveler, a Boston-based tech company focused on inventory, batch management, asset tracking, and content curation for the specialty food industry. She is the former owner of coffeehouse and gallery Voltage Coffee & Art, and proudly heads the arts initiative Bait/Switch. She lends her inventory management expertise on p. 36.

Hailing from sunny Tucson, Arizona, Manish Shah is the founder of the Maya Tea Company and the voice of the Steeping Around podcast. With over 20 years of experience in helping cafés improve their tea game, he contributes to Fresh Cup magazine on the topics of tea, menu development, market trends, and, in this issue, how to create your specialty tea program (p. 64).

Bill Waddington founded TeaSource 22 years ago. He is dedicated to finding the best teas in the world and making them available in the U.S. A specialty tea educator, he has conducted hundreds of classes and tastings from Las Vegas to Hamburg to Beijing. TeaSource has the honor of being selected as the Best Tea Company by the World Tea Expo in 2015. Turn to p. 67 for tips on cupping tea.

Dale Willerton is The Lease Coach. Willerton started his commercial real estate career as a shopping mall manager and leasing rep before switching to the tenant’s side in 1993. He is a frequent speaker at coffee trade shows and author of Negotiating Commercial Leases & Renewals FOR DUMMIES. On p. 16, he provides tips for café owners when it comes time to finding a space to lease.

A special thanks to the folks at Relevant Coffee.

Thank you to (from left) Brian Clemens, Rileigh Aguilar, Mitch Montgomery, and the whole staff at Relevant Coffee in Vancouver, Washington, for letting us take over their newly opened space for a day in order to take the photos you see in this issue.

VISIT THE CAFÉ: 1703 Main St., Suite A, Vancouver, Wash. | Open Daily, 6:00 a.m.-4:30 p.m. | relevantcoffee.com FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 13

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hether you’re looking to open your first coffee shop or negotiating a lease renewal, here are some tips to making the most of your tenancy.

Tip #1: The agent is there to make the sale, not to hold your hand.

Landlords pay agents big commissions if they can convince you to sign a lease. First-time tenants often regret putting so much faith in the agent to help them.

Don’t let one agent show you space all over town. Even if you have your own agent negotiating against the landlord’s listing agent, remember both agents are splitting a commission coming out of the landlord’s pocket. The listing agent doesn’t want to split his or her commission with your agent. You’re better off directly calling the listing agent for each property.

Tip #2: Start the leasing process well in advance.

For renewal deals, we reach out to landlords at least 12 months in advance. For start-up coffee shop tenants, if you’re not careful, the deal-making process, design, and buildout of your space will take much longer than you expected, resulting in you paying rent before you open your doors. The tenant shouldn’t be paying rent before they open—and the lease needs to say so.

Tip #3: Negotiate on multiple sites simultaneously.

Although an agent might want you to focus in on only one location, that is not the best strategy. By making simultaneous offers to lease on several sites—even if you love only one location—we can create competition among landlords and get the tenant better terms.

Tip #4: Be the batter, not the pitcher.

E? C A P S G N I S A LE R O F S P TI S R E N W O E F A C ton, ale Willer

By D oach C e s a e L The

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The agent will want you to send the landlord a Letter of Intent (LOI) because the agent can control the paperwork and state that he or she is being paid a commission. But streetwise negotiators know it is better to receive a lease proposal than it is to initiate one. We want the landlord to earn or re-earn your tenancy. You don’t want to pursue the landlord, you want the landlord to pursue you—after all, you may become his or her long-term customer paying rent for many years.

Tip #5: Get the lease proposal right.

If a material point is not included in the Offer to Lease (OTL) or Letter of Intent (LOI), you might not be

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Leasing SPACE? TIPS for cafe Owners able to get it added later in the Formal Lease Agreement. Knowing how much information and detail to include in the Offer to Lease is important. Just because the LOI says the tenant is not bound by signing it doesn’t mean you can renegotiate after you wise up.

Tip #6: Pay attention to your Permitted Use clause.

Don’t assume you can sell anything and everything you want. A full menu of both beverages and foods must be spelled out or you may be on the receiving end of a cease and desist letter from the property manager. Also consider if you need exclusivity on certain primary uses (like coffee itself).

Tip #7: Meet the landlord or property manager before you sign a lease.

I believe you should never sign a long-term lease without first trying to meet the landlord or their property manager. Many agents will try to keep the tenant and landlord apart; once the agent collects the commission, you may never see them again. You need to initiate a relationship with the landlord or their property manager.

Tip #8: Don’t lawyer up unnecessarily.

Whenever I speak at a coffee trade show seminar, attendees ask me, “Don’t I need an attorney to make sure the lease is legal?” No, you don’t—the legality of the lease is never in question. What do most attorneys know about market rents, tenant allowances, signage, etc.? You definitely need some help, but don’t automatically default to an attorney.

Tip #9: Negotiate to win.

The truth is, most tenants are intimidated by the whole leasing process. How can you expect to negotiate assertively with a real estate broker who has 10 years of experience? Many tenants are out of their league and are simply trying to negotiate not to lose—and that doesn’t make for a good lease deal.

Tip #10: Do your homework.

Negotiating Commercial Leases & Renewals FOR DUMMIES is a 330-page book I wrote for tenants, from my combined 30 years of commercial real estate experience first working for landlords and then in 1993 becoming a professional lease consultant and negotiator for tenants. Most hard and expensive leasing lessons can be completely avoided by doing some research and seeking out the right professional to guide you through the process. FC

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THE FRESH CUP EQUIPMENT GUIDE By

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rth

erwo t t u B l e a h Mic

M

any people dream of opening a coffee shop until they see the equipment costs. With such a wide array of brands and devices, it can be confusing—and expensive—to outfit a café. Before you write a check or sign a contract, it’s wise to sit down with a spreadsheet and plan out your equipment budget. While each shop has diverse needs and different budgets, certain principles are universal.

Espresso Machine The biggest, and most expensive, equipment decision a coffee shop will make is which espresso machine to buy.

I recommend approaching the decision in a similar manner as you might buy a car, and not just because the two machines have comparable price points. You probably wouldn’t buy a car without test driving it. In the same way, before you buy an espresso machine, try to get some hands-on time with the model. Ask baristas who have regularly used that brand their opinion. Even better, ask an espresso technician what the routine maintenance is like.

The espresso machines that get the most attention tend to be high-end, customized, and with lots of interesting features like pressure profiling. I think of these machines like sports cars—they’re beautiful and powerful, but tend to be expensive and less practical. They might make a striking showpiece for a flagship store, but boot-strapped, independent cafés are probably better off spending their equipment budget elsewhere.

Most coffee shops are best suited buying a mid-level workhorse espresso machine, probably one with volumetrics or a brew-by-weight feature. It’s one thing to pull a perfect shot of espresso in a lab setting; it’s another altogether to pull 500 shots that follow a consistent recipe.

There are many espresso machine manufacturers, each with their supporters and detractors, but amongst quality-focused machines certain features are almost universal. A must-have feature for quality-focused coffee shops

is a PID to ensure stable water temperature. For high-volume cafés, it’s also wise to get a two-boiler machine, which essentially means the steam wand has its own designated water boiler. With two boilers, no matter how many takeaway lattes you’re making, your water pressure and temperature are going to remain constant.

It’s worth considering the aesthetics and design of the machine itself.

Customers tend to congregate around the espresso machine as they wait for their drinks. Your choice in espresso machine in many ways sets the vibe for the entire shop.

Grinders Many coffee shops splurge on their espresso machine, only to get an entry-level or off-brand grinder. But if there’s one area to go all out, it’s on your grinder budget. Simply put, the quality of your grinder determines the flavor potential of your brew. A cheap grinder, even if it’s a burr grinder, will produce more uneven grounds. Uneven grounds mean an uneven extraction, increasing bitter and sour flavors in the cup. If your espresso machine takes up 30–40% of your equipment budget, expect your grinders to take up 15–20%.

Espresso grinders essentially come in two categories: conical burrs and flat burrs. Conical burrs tend to be better suited for more traditional espresso flavor profiles. They produce more fines, which constricts the flow rate. Generally speaking, conical burr grinders are better for denser, heavier-bodied espresso.

Recent years have seen flat burr grinders emerge in popularity. The more uniform particle size distribution allows baristas to push for higher extractions—a move necessitated by lighter roast profiles. Flat burr grinders are typically favored by baristas seeking longer extractions at lower concentrations— usually around 9–11% total dissolved solids.

Whether you choose conical or flat burrs, look for a grinder that can handle a high-volume good temperature control.

Espresso grinders tend to heat up with

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The fresh cup equipment guide use, which can have a big impact on your espresso. A commercial espresso grinder should be able to grind an 18-gram dose in eight seconds or less. Slower grinders might work for decaf or a seasonal espresso, but your house grinder needs to be fast and consistent.

For your filter grinder, flat burrs are universally preferred. As a general rule, the larger the burr set, the better the particle size distribution (providing the burrs are properly aligned). Filter grinders come in either “stepped” or “stepless” grind size adjustment. Either work fine for batch brew, but many baristas prefer the greater control of stepless grind adjustment for manual brew methods. Some stepped grinders have an additional micro-adjust lever to offer similar levels of precision.

Batch Brewers Batch brewers aren’t sexy, but they’re important. In a North American context, batch brew filter coffee likely will make up 40% or more of your sales. A properly programed batch brewer can brew coffee as well as any pour-over, provided the brewer has certain features. At this point, it’s common for batch brewers to have adjustable temperature, a programable pre-wet percentage, and control over the total number of pulses and brew time. All of these features are essential to being able to brew the best filter coffee possible.

An increasing number of equipment manufactures now offer automated single-cup brewers (an attempt to streamline pour-over production). These machines make the most sense in contexts where labor costs are really high or demand for filter coffee is too low to regularly brew large batches.

Perhaps the most important feature for batch and single-cup brewers is the water distribution from the spray head. After brewing, check to see if the bed of grounds is level, or if it’s uneven, with peaks and valleys.

The best batch brewers leave a perfectly level brew bed.

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Water Filtration Not properly filtering your water is something akin to buying a luxury car and never changing the oil. Beyond the negative effects on your coffee’s flavor, water that is too hard or too acidic is going to wreak havoc on your equipment.

The right filtration system for your café depends largely on your municipal water supply. For places where water is hard, such as most of the Midwest, reverse osmosis is the only feasible way of lowering the total hardness, without adding undesirable salinity.

Your espresso machine provider can likely provide you with a titration kit, where you can measure the chemical composition of your water, and treat it accordingly.

Stay Streamlined Perhaps the most important strategy for coming in under budget is eliminating any non-essential equipment. Do you plan on making smoothies and blended drinks an important part of your menu? If so, invest in a couple of industrial blenders. But don’t make the mistake of picking up a piece of equipment just to have it. A siphon brewer and halogen range can be a great centerpiece in a manual brew-focused café, but it’s an expensive accessory to be left in a corner.

It’s possible to find a lot of coffee equipment secondhand, but make sure a knowledgeable technician inspects it first. Before buying a used espresso machine, it’s smart to have the boiler descaled and other routine maintenance done.

Good coffee needs good equipment, and a discerning shop owner will get the most out of their equipment budget. FC

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By Caitlinkin Peter

POINT-OF-SALE SYSTEMS How to Be Inclusive with Your Payment Methods 26 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

he hospitality industry in the 21st century has witnessed a host of technological innovations that have drastically impacted production and efficiency. From automated espresso machines and soda dispensers to self-checkout stands and mobile payment apps, these developments aim to improve customer satisfaction while decreasing transaction times.

Recently, there has been a rise in businesses going cashless; restaurants, cafés, and grocery stores across the country are opting to not accept physical currency, but rather only card and mobile payment apps like Apple Pay or Venmo. In 2016, Bluestone Lane Coffee famously adopted a cashless policy, citing increased checkout speed and enhanced store operations.

“In a café, you really can see one of the compelling cases for cashlessness,” says Bill Maurer, director of the Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion at the University of California, Irvine. “It moves people through the line quickly, and if that’s what your business is about—getting people’s order and getting them served, moving them down the line to get to the next customer to increase your quota and your volume—then cashlessness is proved appealing.”

The latest data from Pew Research Center shows that three in 10 Americans make no purchases using cash during a typical week. And with point-of-sale systems like Square, Clover, and Toast, business owners can easily manage their customer database, track and analyze customers’ purchasing habits, and incentivize customers with loyalty programs and birthday rewards. As consumer behavior continues to skew towards plastic and digital means of payment, combined with streamlined POS systems, it’s easy to see the appeal of a cashless business.

However, while there are no federal laws requiring stores to accept cash, many municipalities, including San Francisco, Philadelphia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts, have passed legislation prohibiting businesses to go cashless.

“Some states are worried about [going cashless] because you start to set up the conditions for discriminating against people based on income, based on whether or not they have a bank account,” says Maurer.

According to a 2017 survey by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, 8.4 million U.S. households are unbanked, meaning they do not have a checking or savings account, with unbanked rates for black and Hispanic households substantially above the national average. Additionally, approximately two-thirds of unbanked households predominantly paid bills using cash in 2017.

There are many reasons why people may be unbanked, including not having identification, a

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point-of-sale systems permanent address, or simply enough money to keep in an account, as is the case with more than half of unbanked households, the FDIC reported. Businesses that don’t accept cash are therefore excluding parts of their community, ranging from low-income, black, and Hispanic households to recent immigrants, refugees, and the elderly.

“If you’re cashless, you’re basically saying there’s a whole bunch of the community that you’re not going to welcome,” says Maurer, “and that’s really an issue.”

Anonymization Cashlessness can also affect tipping behavior in the café because it removes the physical tip jar from the counter. Although Maurer mentions there is some evidence that suggests automated tipping options may yield higher tips, it can anonymize the café experience.

“It changes the experience from one of visibly demonstrating your thanks for good service by putting that money in the jar to making it kind of anonymous,” he says. “It sort of flattens the social relationships you have between the person at the till or the barista and the customer, which then might impart an overall feeling of depersonalization.”

For an industry that thrives on interpersonal relationships, an anonymized experience can detrimentally affect customer satisfaction and prevent them from returning.

On the flip side, certain POS systems allow for insight into spending habits and other data that can help tailor customer service to each individual who patrons your business. However, it’s important to pay close attention to the contract with your potential payment provider and understand where consumer information may be stored and how it may be used, such as being sold to a third party.

“A lot of businesses will go cashless to set up with a payment provider who’s offering them all kinds of cool

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services, but then will realize, ‘Oh, wait a minute, that payment provider now has access to all of my customers’ data,’” says Maurer.

By giving up ownership of this data, there is not only a risk of customer dissatisfaction with their personal information being released, but of identity theft and other threats associated with security breaches.

Implementing Your Payment System When implementing or updating your POS system, café owners must figure out how best to balance the ease of transaction with creating a welcoming space where one can linger.

Maurer recommends businesses always offer customers a choice when it comes to methods of payment, rather than solely accepting cash, card, or a system like Apple Pay. “It can’t be one size fits all,” he says. “Allowing your customers a choice in payment goes along with the idea of not sending any customer away based on their means of payment.”

If you’re an established café considering switching to a cashless payment system, think about those customers you may leave behind. If you’re opening a new shop, consider the message it will send to potential customers if you immediately start out excluding part of your community.

“You want the coffee shop to be a place where communities can gather and linger, and social relationships can form and grow,” says Maurer. FC

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By Vilissa Thompson, LMSW

CREATING ACCESSIBILITY IN CAFES A

s we look to celebrate the 29th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) this month, it still amazes me at how many businesses are not compliant regarding the accessibility of their establishments.

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creating accessibility IN CAFEs As a wheelchair user who frequents cafés on trips and in hotels, I find that there are accessibility stumbling blocks to ensure that my experience as a patron is enjoyable and will earn my repeated business. The disabled dollar should never be underestimated or underappreciated; we have the right to feel included and welcomed in your businesses not only by the staff, but by accessible design and navigation as well.

The first obstacle can be getting into the café itself: steps with no ramp present, steep ramps that may be harmful to roll/walk on, and non-automatic doors that may be too heavy for some to open safely. All of these issues can turn us away without many café owners realizing it. In 2019, it should not be the architecture of the building you are in that prevents us from entering and experiencing your business.

One thing I notice is the use of stools and tables in cafés, which also pose obstacles. Standard tables should be provided abundantly for anyone to use; customers should not feel awkward when they see nothing but stools and high tables in an area. Not everyone can utilize them for a number of reasons, and business owners should evaluate the ratio of standard seating options versus stools and high tables.

Another accessible issue is the one we face when we enter your establishment: high counters for order taking and paying for goods. Not being able to comfortably reach the counter to face an employee, give one’s order, and pay, or retrieve goods when your name or number is called, is frustrating. These simple interactions can cause undue stress on disabled patrons, and is an easily missed issue that can be fixed.

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creating accessibility IN CAFEs

Not only can the front of the counter be an issue, but behind the counter as well: hard-to-read menus on the wall. Some menus are hard to read if they’re written in light colors, lightly written on the board, or not organized well with cluttered information. Also, very few establishments have menus available in print form for those who may have difficulty viewing; or, if there are printed menus provided, the menus may not be available in braille or large print. All of these can prevent patrons from knowing what to order and the cost of items, and from being engaged in the buying process altogether.

Navigating cafés can present a problem if seating and tables are close together, posing a risk for those who use assistive devices to not move around comfortably or safely. From personal experience, nothing grinds my gears more than having to move chairs out of the way or tap people to scoot their seats because the path is too narrow to squeeze by. No one wants to disturb the café experience of others or feel like they are in a maze in the search of a good table.

Let’s not forget restroom facilities, as some establishments may not have adequate stalls for disabled people to utilize (or have staff-only facilities with no public restroom available). Having grab bars does not mean that your stall

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is automatically accessible. Small stalls where wheelchair users cannot move about freely creates a great dilemma for those who need them. It can mean that someone cannot close the door, cannot fit in the stall with their wheelchair, or that those who have a PCA (personal care assistant) do not have enough room for what is needed to do to relieve oneself. Being able to go to the restroom should not be a barrier, but, too often, disabled people find that businesses skimp on this need.

In continuing the discussion of the restroom, soap dispensers that are out of reach prevent disabled people from being able to wash their hands. Making soap dispensers easier to reach is seemingly an easy fix, but is a problem that goes under the radar.

As you are reading this, consider how you can improve your businesses to be more inclusive and accessible. Businesses shy away from accessibility because of the assumed costs, while ignoring the fact that they will lose out on more by excluding the largest minority group in the country and world. The disabled dollar and consumerism matters; prioritize it now or lose our business later— the choice is yours. FC

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TAKE STOCK Inventory Management for Cafés

By Lucy Valena

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O

pening a shop is complicated to say the least, and tracking inventory may seem like a trivial detail not worthy of your attention. This could not be further from the truth. Designing your storage areas and inventory systems with the following principles in mind will save you a lot of money in the long term, and precious brain space every day.

Be Organized Cleaning and organizing storage areas will make a bigger impact than you think. A tidy and well-maintained back of house suggests a level of balance and control that can feel very comforting in the hectic daily grind of café life. Take a note from tidying expert Marie Kondo and remove clutter as much as possible. The rubric for choosing what goes and what stays has absolutely nothing to do with “sparking joy.” Instead, remove everything from the back of house that is not used in daily operations.

supplies). This will make finding things an intuitive process in the heat of the moment and make counting easier.

Rotate Practicing FIFO (First In, First Out) will ensure that your stock is always rotated and will help minimize loss. This is especially important with coffee, dairy, and other products where freshness is key to quality.

If your storage areas are organized, this should not be difficult or time-consuming. When fresh product comes in, simply move the older stock to the front and put the fresh

It is best to store “like with like.” Store paper goods separately from food, and store cleaning products in a separate area if possible. Within these areas, group subcategories together as well (i.e. hot cups, cold cups, lids, condiment bar

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TAKE STOCK stock behind it. Take a moment to look at sell-by dates and roast dates to make sure everything is still good and fresh. If something has gone off, get rid of it right away to avoid inventory miscounts (and serving bad product)!

Set Pars A “par” is the total amount of a given inventory item that you need to have in stock in order to fulfill the expected sales volume between deliveries, plus a little more just in case. Constantly adjusting pars is an important practice for coffee shops, because it can be a very seasonal business.

You always want to have enough stock so you don’t run out of things, but you also don’t want to have too much stock you don’t need. Even though things like paper goods don’t go bad, per se, overstocking your inventory will tie up cash that you may need later in the month.

Have a Good System Be consistent and count inventory at the same time every week. It will feel like less of a headache and more like a routine if you do it consistently, and it will make it easier to trust the patterns that emerge.

Whether you use a dedicated app, a spreadsheet, a notebook, or a clipboard, keep your system as simple and easy to use as possible. Inventory is the backbone of your business, but maintaining it shouldn’t take up too much of your time once you have a good system in place. FC

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BAR 27

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3. Frothing pitchers 4. Grinder brush 5. Grouphead brush 6. Kettle

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8. Scale

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10. Tamper 11. Teapot 12. Thermometers 13. To-go cups (hot & cold) 14. Tongs 17

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19. Filters

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shelves 22. Bowls 23. Cups & saucers 24. Demitasse cups & spoons 25. Gibraltar cups 26. Glasses 27. Mugs

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28. Plates condiment station 29. Pitchers 30. Sleeves 31. Stir sticks/spoons

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32. Straws 33. Squeeze bottle 34. Sugar packet caddy 35. Sugar pourer 1

36. To-go lids (hot & cold) 6

miscellaneous 37. Anti-fatigue mats 38. Aprons

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39. Towels 4

ILLUSTRATION BY JORDAN JOHNSON @DRAWNHUNGRY

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MEASURING SUCCESS How to Use SMART Goals to Improve Your Business

By RJ Joseph 44 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

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s your business setting the right kind of goals to achieve success? Research shows that organizations and people who set goals for themselves are not only more successful, they’re also better at recognizing their successes.

However, not all goals are created equal; setting the right types of goals has been shown to increase organizational success by a significant margin.

In fact, according to goal management solutions provider WorkBoard, 69% of high-performing companies rank communicating business goals companywide as the effective way to build a high-performing team; meanwhile, the same report shows that workers lose 30% of their capacity and performance potential by not focusing on goals. In the world of coffee shops, these principles still apply, and can be helpful in achieving success and growth.

Why Are Goals Important?

Setting goals is crucial to success for many reasons, especially in a business or organizational context. One reason is that when you properly define your priorities, your focus will automatically start crystallizing in the direction of your goal. More importantly, defining your goals out loud or on paper and communicating them to your staff is the only way that they can actually know what your goals are—then, once you communicate goals to your staff, you’ll all be working in the same direction.

This is helpful not only so that the organization can send its collective energy in one direction (instead of in conflicting ones), but also so that if employees or management don’t align with your goals, they can assess whether it makes sense for them to work with your company.

Communicating goals to your staff also encourages accountability; when you’ve stated what your goals are and everyone has committed to them, it makes it easier to address situations where either you aren’t meeting them, or your staff sees something in the organization that’s acting in opposi-

tion to them. Proper goal setting is a practice that organizations and people improve at over time, and the gains over a long period can hardly be overstated—but, setting the right types of goals is essential.

“The benefits of setting strategic goals are numerous,” says Nathanael May, customer marketing manager at Pacific Foods. “We have companywide goals that are pretty broad, but then every single person in leadership and the department they lead has their own goals that feed into the company goals. It makes you feel like a part of something bigger—I know exactly what my role is, and what impact I’m having on the company’s success. Then I’m held accountable to meeting my personal goals….I have a role to play, and I’m reviewed on how and if I accomplished the tasks in that role.”

He notes that setting goals applies equally to coffee shops.

“What is the goal of the coffee shop?” he asks. “To stay in business, to be profitable, to provide goods and services to a community?”

Once you define those larger objectives, you can write them down and work your way toward the more granular goals that really help workers define success.

What Are the Right Types of Goals?

In the business world, the gold standard for goals is known as SMART goals: goals that are specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and timebased. This helpful acronym is an excellent way to focus your goal setting around the way your business operates in real life. The key here is that you aren’t necessarily creating new aims for your business; you’re just thinking about what you already want to achieve, then focusing it into a concrete goal you can strategize around.

The first step is to think about what you want your business to achieve this quarter; you can work within a longer time frame, but a quarter has proven to be an effective time frame for

ensuring accountability, so it may be a good starting point.

Some examples for a café might be: • Increasing sales • Outlining a more specific training program • Getting a new payroll or scheduling system • Increasing average ticket prices Choose whatever makes sense for your business—feel free to start small and work your way up to bigger goals over time.

“I think effective goals should be a stretch but still realistic and attainable,” says Marcus Young, campus director and senior consultant at Boot Coffee. “I also think these stretch goals should be balanced by attainable and non-financial goals.”

For example, he always sets a revenue growth goal for the campus, but he also sets goals that include diversifying their student base, adding new curriculum modules, and improving the quality of curriculums.

When setting these goals, he says, it’s important to keep the spirit of the company in mind in addition to focusing on performance, not just your financial bottom line.

“Most important,” he says, “you have to include a variety of stakeholders in your goal setting. Baristas, production staff, and administrative staff should all have input on goals for their departments specifically but also broader company goals. This creates a team with broad buy-in to company initiatives, and often these frontline or more junior staff have a fresh approach or unique outlook on company operations.”

Specific To make sure your goal is specific, tailor broad or general goals around specific numbers to make sure they’re actually achievable. So, if you want to increase sales in general, you can make this specific by adding a number to it.

Example 1: This quarter, we will

increase sales by 10%.

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measuring success If your goal constitutes a longterm to-do, like getting a new payroll system, you can make it specific by saying specifically what you want to achieve.

Example 2: This quarter, we will

select and implement a new payroll software system.

Measurable In order to know if you’re succeeding or not, you need to define goals that you can measure. With the above Example 2, your success will be obvious.

To execute Example 1, you’ll need to have some way to measure how much you’ve sold in the past and how much you’re selling now. If you don’t yet have a record of past sales numbers, your first goal should probably be measuring them and establishing a baseline.

There are many helpful ways to measure various success factors in your café, including: • Data from your point-of-salesystem (including sales, repeat business, average ticket price, etc.)

• Use of reward programs • Yelp or Google reviews • Employee turnover • Surveys of employees and/or customers

Actionable If your goals are going to be able to come to life, they need to have actionable starting points—steps you can take to make them happen. So, if you want to increase sales by a certain percentage, you’ll need a strategic starting point to make this goal make sense.

Example 3: This quarter, we will

increase sales by 10% by implementing a new rewards program to reward repeat business.

Or, Example 4: This quarter, we will

increase sales by 10% by promoting $1 espresso days on our social media, getting people in the door so they can see how great our staff is.

46 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

If your goal is to outline a more specific training program, your actionable goal would look like: Example 5: This quarter, we will

outline a new, streamlined training program by creating a training manual for all of our management staff.

See the difference? These goals have clear starting points and steps.

Realistic Another crucial factor is making sure your goals are realistic. Many people advocate for a “shoot for the stars” mentality with the thought that if you aim higher, you’ll achieve higher, but in actuality, if you always set pie-inthe-sky goals, you’ll never truly know if you’re meeting them or not. As Young

notes, it’s okay to set high goals, but make sure they’re realistic so that you can give yourself the positive reinforcement of actually meeting them.

For instance, if you realistically think you can increase sales by 10%, that’s the right number to set your goal around. If you realistically think that within the quarter you can select but likely not implement a new payroll software system, then that’s the right goal for you. Make the targets real to yourself so that you and your staff can feel encouraged when you hit them.

Time-Based How long should this goal take to execute? Many people like quarterly goal setting, but if you have a smaller goal that will take less time, define

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measuring success it around the time frame that makes most sense for you. Or, if it’s not logistically feasible to assess progress every quarter, you can try every six months or even once a year, as long as you create a system for people to remain focused over that time period.

While deciding your time frame for your overall objectives, decide when and how often you’re going to assess progress before you’re supposed to reach your goal. It’s important to see how you’re doing before you get to the end of your designated time period, so define when and how you’re going to check in on your goals.

Ready, Set, Goal Now you’re ready to set some goals. I’d recommend anywhere from one to five goals per person per quarter, depending on how many people you have tackling them.

48 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

Here is a formula for your goal: This [time period] we will [increase/decrease/establish/ implement] [sales/payroll system/etc.] in order to [what you want to achieve] [by X number if applicable].

There it is—is it specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and time-based?

Tweak it as needed. Once you do, it’s ready to communicate outward.

How to Communicate It One of the most important aspects of organizational goal setting is communicating it to everyone in your company not involved in the goal-setting process so that everyone is working towards the same things. How can you best do this?

It depends on your specific business model and company culture, but some helpful ways to inform

your staff and periodically reinforce your goals might be: • An initial email • An all-staff meeting where you discuss and give an opportunity for questions • A board or poster in the break room • Regular meetings or progress report emails In some cases, it may not seem like your goals are relevant to the staff at large, but they’ll likely still benefit from the transparency of knowing what you’re aiming for. If nothing else, all team members should understand their role in the company achieving its goals, even if it’s simple and seems obvious.

“When goals are shared with the whole organization, I don’t see other people and wonder what they’re contributing, or whether they’re on board with our shared vision,” says May. “I know that everyone has defined goals, and I know that those goals were de-

signed to produce a larger effect when we all work in concert with each other.”

“It kept me from feeling like I was just caught in the weeds with the minutiae of my daily tasks,” says Young. “At Boot Coffee we have a dispersed team of associates working at our campus in San Rafael, working in other locals around the U.S., and working abroad in our international consulting business. With well-articulated goals, even dispersed teams feel connected and are quickly able to collaborate towards attaining goals despite distances and varying projects and responsibilities.”

Did It Help?

At the end of the designated time period, assess not only how close you got to achieving your goal, but also how helpful your goal was in improving your organization. Like pulling the perfect shot, defining a helpful goal is a dial-in process. Learn from mistakes and try again, revising as you learn more about your business and

what kinds of goals and communication methods motivate your staff.

The more you engage your staff throughout this process, the more effective it will be.

“Staff are more engaged and entrepreneurial when they are involved in setting goals,” says Young. “Giving this type of ownership leads to a more engaged staff and more creative results.”

Eyes on the Prize Knowing what you want to see and measuring things has been shown again and again to have a positive effect on growth. As you define what about your business excites you, you can hopefully feel inspired to want to push your business to be a better version of itself. While tools like SMART goal setting can feel odd when you’re not used to them, they can help you to get to know your business better and grow it in the directions you’re most passionate about. FC

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using service training to empower baristas

By RJ Joseph 50 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

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aristas often undergo hours, weeks, or even months of training before they’re allowed to serve coffee drinks, but how often do companies allocate the same level of training to the service side of the barista profession? Even when companies offer service training, many fall into tropes that reinforce the burden of flawless service on baristas, without offering them tools to make that level of service possible.

When done correctly, service training can make the barista job infinitely easier, allowing baristas to craft positive customer experiences at a far greater frequency and scale while empowering them to address conflict at the counter if and when necessary.

Why Baristas Need Service Training “Hospitality can and should be as much of an art and challenge as making drinks,” says Eric J. Grimm, director of events for Joe Coffee. Having worked in the hospitality industry for 15 years, he has noticed a massive disparity in how much time goes into training baristas on beverages as opposed to service. Not only is service training a crucial part of making shifts both satisfying and sustainable, says Grimm, “hospitality training can also give service workers the tools to create a welcoming and inclusive environment for customers.”

Sam Rogers, who has worked in hospitality for over 15 years with experience in both coffee and wine, agrees.

“Hospitality is a skill that is developed over time, and like any skill, it requires ongoing training,” she says.

Ellan Kline, head of retail education and HR specialist at Ritual Coffee Roasters, says that service training has the power to make shifts run smoothly and easily if done right.

“At its best, service training offers baristas the tools to manage their energy in a sustainable way,” she says.

Simply put, well-done service trainings have the power to create better service interactions that also require less work on both sides of the counter. Not only do they make good interactions less effortful and more well-rounded, they also have the potential to reduce incidence of harassment by customers toward baristas and make cafés feel more inclusive to customers.

The Pitfalls: How to Do it Wrong While these are the benefits that come with an ideal service training, not everyone knows how to map service trainings in a way that empowers

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Using Service Training to Empower Baristas baristas and gives them the tools they need to create better experiences.

It’s not always obvious what the goals of customer service training should be, and many start with the false premise that service training is primarily about how to give customers a better experience. While that is a side effect of a great service training, the primary goal of service training should be to empower baristas to do their jobs well in a way that doesn’t leave them feeling burned out.

One thing Kline notes is that it’s easy to come off condescending and disempower baristas if you aren’t careful.

“Don’t go over things that are obvious, like telling baristas to be ‘nice’ or ‘friendly,’” she says. “There’s usually no point in saying those things, and if you do need to say them for some reason, explain why something so obvious needs to be said to a service professional who likely brings some amount of experience.”

Kline also notes that there’s a tendency in service training to imply blame on the part of the service worker when bad exchanges happen—but that’s hardly ever appropriate.

“Bad service exchanges don’t happen in a vacuum; there’s usually a larger context,” she says. “Businesses who simply tell employees to be ‘compassionate’ often don’t offer that same benefit of the doubt to their employees.”

In this light, she says, it’s important that cafés complement their service trainings with harassment trainings.

“It’s very important that you as a café have strong policies on what baristas do and do not have to deal with from customers, and that you stand behind your baristas when they draw that line or bring issues to light,” she says.

For example, because baristas take a lot of rude treatment without complaint as part of the job, they typically have pretty high standards for what crossing that line looks like—so, if a customer raises a complaint, you should never assume that the barista is in the wrong, she says.

Rogers agrees: “Putting up with harassment and abuse does not go hand in hand with providing excellent hospitality. The customer is sometimes just wrong, and that’s okay.”

Grimm also emphasizes the “customer is always right” approach to service training is misguided.

“In a good hospitality training program, service workers must be empowered with information and the ability to decide when a bad customer interaction is salvageable with empathy and patience and when they are being harassed and unfairly targeted and need the support of management or HR,” he says.

Best Practices: How to Do it Right To think about what good service trainings look like, first think about what the worst service interactions look like: typically, they involve some amount of aggres-

52 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

sion, whether active or passive, coming from one party or both. The best service trainings help workers allocate their energy more stably, not only giving them more resilience and patience, but allowing them to project energy that minimizes conflict and address it when it does occur.

Aside from the usual troubleshooting service tips and courtesy guidelines that most service trainings offer, Kline believes that ergonomics and conscious body language have enormous power to foster positive service interactions.

“People get lost in the idea of hospitality training as the knowledge service workers provide and the way they speak to people,” she says. “They often don’t acknowledge that most of our interactions happen on a subconscious physical level with our body language.

A good customer service training should involve ways in which to better inhabit your body so that you can respond to situations in an intuitive and natural way.”

Kline believes that service trainings should be broken up into different modules, one covering all of the basics like menu, general service style, harassment policy, and troubleshooting, and one about how to posture your body in a way that allows you to feel comfortable, confident, and resilient over the course of a week.

“One of the things that I like most about ergonomics and posture is that you aren’t focusing on the interaction with the customer, you’re focusing on your interaction with yourself and your environment,” she says. “You’re checking in with yourself and making sure you’re relaxed. When we work with our bodies, it’s very easy to internalize physical tension into emotional tension and create bad interactions, and vice versa.”

Rogers strongly believes in the principle of nonverbal hospitality as well.

“Nonverbal hospitality means making sure you have all of the tools in place to communicate a sense of welcoming from the moment a customer arrives,” she says.

Rogers also notes that nonverbal hospitality doesn’t mean smiling, rather, “it means being aware of how you move through a space and how your movements affect those around you.”

Grimm says that a beneficial hospitality program should “put service workers in a position where they are supported by their team and can give support to customers quickly and efficiently, but with an eye toward showing care, attention, and respect to customers who are likely to face microand macro-aggressions in many of their everyday interactions.”

He also says that empowerment is key: Not only should service trainings help workers avoid burnout, they should also set them up for growth, whether in the company or outside of it.

To Protect & Serve

This, she adds, comes in part from how management structures the space (Is it ADA accessible? Is the bathroom available for all customers?), but also from servers

and how they can use body language like eye contact to create a sense of welcoming and acknowledgement of all customers, even during busy shifts.

Equipped with the proper tools, baristas can not only give consistently excellent service, they can have a consistently fulfilling experience serving others. Bad service doesn’t happen in a vacuum; it comes from systemic issues of disempowerment and discomfort on both of sides of the counter that can and should be resolved with thoughtful systems, communication, and training. With positive experiences on both sides of the bar, workers and customers alike will keep coming back day after day, making hospitality a worthy investment of any café’s time, energy, and money. FC

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W

hat makes an enjoyable, memorable café experience? Is it a delicious drink with perfect latte art? Instagram-worthy interior design? Friendly, engaging baristas? Free WiFi and plenty of electrical outlets?

For many customers, it’s all the above. But for others, it’s a little harder to define. It’s that feeling they get, from the moment they walk through your door to when they leave, that their time, money, and presence at your store are genuinely valued.

That experience comes from a holistic approach to customer service— and it starts with your staff. When employees are treated well, customers are treated well. Successful café owners recognize the importance of providing a safe, inclusive, and empowering space for employees and customers alike.

Safety First

You Are Welcome Here How to Create a Safe & Inclusive Café Space

By Fresh Cup Staff

54 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

All too often, basic safety protocols are ignored, even when federally required.

When opening and operating a business, don’t forget these best practices: • Request that employees provide emergency contact information upon hiring (keep in mind they have the right to decline).

• Maintain a properly stocked first aid kit.

• Educate yourself, your management, and your staff on basic labor laws.

• Pay attention to ergonomics: Are work stations comfortable for all employees? Are benchtops the proper height? Do you have anti-fatigue floor mats? Are all regularly used equipment within appropriate reach?

• Create emergency procedural guidelines for: • Natural disasters • Medical emergencies • Mental health crises • Non-emergency criminal disruptions • Implement a strong harassment policy that outlines how to address and report harassment not just from customers, but also coworkers and managers.

• Create a service policy that outlines your café’s service style and what good service looks like in your shop.

• Continuously review, discuss, and update policies as necessary, making sure to have input from your staff.

Inclusion is Key As the quintessential “third place,” it is imperative for a café to distinguish itself as welcoming to all customers, no matter their background. Here are some ways you can make your space inclusive to everyone who walks through your doors: • Encourage staff to use gender neutral pronouns with customers unless they personally know a customer’s pronouns.

• Ensure your bathrooms are accessible and gender inclusive.

• Tell your employees to be mindful of their conversations in front of customers, particularly about topics that may be triggering or disrespectful to customers.

• Post signage in public areas to clearly communicate your café’s codes of conduct.

• Be mindful of the story your space is telling customers: What flyers are on your community board? Is there local art for sale on your walls? What sort of magazines and books are you providing for customers?

• Pay attention to who is and isn’t coming into your shop, and recognize what those barriers may be. Take a step back, look around at your space, and put yourself into different scenarios: How does the space look to people of size? Of color? Queer folx? Parents with small children? Re-evaluate any practice or design choice that may be turning away customers.

•

Empowered Employees Toxic work environments are palpable. Many customers are attuned to picking up if employees are happy or if they’re not treated well. Implement these practices to ensure your staff is respected, valued, and empowered to create a well-functioning café customers will want to come back to: • When hiring, make sure the job posting includes a statement of equity and outlines your non-discrimination policy.

• Attitude is just as important as technical ability. While it’s impressive when a barista can pull a good shot, pour beautiful latte art, and speed through closing procedures, you want to make sure your customers are in the hands of someone who is friendly and warm, listens well, and steps up when they need to. Keep more than just experience and technical abilities in mind when hiring.

• Gatekeeping is all too common in

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•

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this industry. Never limit employees’ access, whether it’s knowing what coffees are in your house blend, pursuing certifications and trainings, participating in cuppings, etc. All employees should have fair and equal access to knowing the inner-workings of your café and the chance to further their specialty coffee education.

Don’t forget your employees are people too, with obligations outside of work. Create and post your schedule as far in advance as possible.

If an employee requests a one-on-one or performance review, make it a priority to set up a time to meet. Your time is valuable—but so is theirs. Give them your full attention, listen to their comments, answer their questions, and help brainstorm solutions to any issues they bring up. Most importantly, follow through on what you discuss.

If you promise a wage increase or promotion after a certain period of time, you must honor that promise. If for some unanticipated reason you’re unable to do so, be completely transparent with your employee and figure out a plan for revisiting the topic.

Remember that respect yields loyalty.

If you go into café ownership expecting high turnover and treating your staff as dispensable, that will be reflected not only in your employees’ attitudes, but in your customers’ experience. FC

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menu & beverage program

H

ave you ever walked into a new café, with trendy, minimalist décor and sleek aesthetics, only to be bombarded with an overwhelming menu cluttered with too many options to count? It can be jarring, to say the least, and leaves you uncertain about what sort of experience the café is trying to provide its customers.

Menu development and design are crucial to telling your story as a café and conveying your brand to customers. Crafting a thoughtful food and beverage program that is well-tailored to your customer base and beautifully presented is perhaps one of the most defining elements of a successful café.

Food & Drink

MENU PLANNING 101

By Fresh Cup Staff 58 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

So what goes on your menu? Consider whether you will include origin names next to your brewed coffee or tea offerings. Will you promote a selection of flavored syrups to add to lattes?

Will you offer food? What kind of food makes sense in your space, that your customers will like, and is on brand?

Your prospective clientele and café’s location are key components in figuring out what story you want to tell with your food and drink menu. If you’re located near a university, for example, you want easy, student-friendly offerings, which can include grab-andgo options like pre-made breakfast sandwiches, yogurt and granola cups, or smoothies with healthy add-ins (and, of course, lots of coffee to fuel late-night study sessions). For cafés in residential areas or near parks, where lots of families spend time, have kidfriendly food like simple sandwiches and tasty toasts, and caffeine-free drink options like juice and hot chocolate. Or, if your café is surrounded by health and wellness-oriented businesses like yoga studios, gyms, or natural grocery stores, consider including meals featuring whole, organic foods and offering an array of plant-based alternative milks to easily customize beverages. Your menu is important in showing the community that you

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menu planning 101 understand their needs, which will in turn create a loyal customer base.

Apart from the physical location of your café, it’s important to factor in any limitations your space may have in determining your menu offerings. If you have a full kitchen and plenty of seating with tables, that can lead to larger, made-to-order meals; meanwhile, if you operate out of a kiosk, small takeaway items like sweet and savory pastries will do well for customers on the go.

Access to fresh ingredients will also play a part in shaping your menu. If you plan on offering avocado toast, for example, you need to make sure you’ll always have a good supply of avocados. However, you need to be adaptable in case a shipment doesn’t come in on time or a source runs out of product; having shelfstable ingredients on hand, like nut butters, chocolate hazelnut spread, or local honey can help you out in a bind—pair them with seasonal fruit from your farmers market to make a delicious sweet toast.

What else will your café be known for? Do you want to function as an event space, hosting open mics, trivia nights, and live music? Customers will appreciate being able to order more than coffee or tea in the evening; craft beer, local wine, and even cocktails will greatly enhance your menu.

When first starting out, keep track of what items sell well, and what may not be moving as quickly. As you become more established and are looking to add new items to the menu, utilize your seasonal menu or offer the product as a limited-time special to gauge customers’ reactions.

Menu Design Your menu is a visual representation of what customers can expect from both the drink and food they order. Therefore, you need to make sure your menu design conveys the right message. Well-designed signage allows customers to comfortably order food and beverages.

60 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

Thinking about local demographics, who you want to attract, their unique needs, and their aesthetic preferences will be essential in selecting verbiage and materials that are welcoming and useful to customers.

In just the last decade, signage trends have changed drastically. Neon, custom letter boards, and “Instaworthy” signage have all started to become ubiquitous in café spaces around the world. Social media platforms like Instagram and Pinterest are the likely cause behind these shifts in taste. There are an endless number of design options these days: painstakingly handcrafted signs painted by professional artists, tried-and-true chalkboard signs, high-tech LED screens that show high-res photos of products, and the trendy letter boards of 2018. Choose a format for your menu that you enjoy and believe best reflects your café’s identity—not just what you see is popular on Instagram. Additionally, while Pinterest-inspired text is trendy, it isn’t always legible. Fancy script can make for a beautiful, eye-catching menu board, but you need to make sure customers will be able to read what’s on it. Make sure all prices, including add-ins, are easily identifiable to prevent any sticker shock when customers go to pay for their order.

Write out exactly what you want customers to see when they read your menu and group items, whether in sections or on multiple boards, based on categories such as coffee, tea, smoothies, breakfast, all-day food options, seasonal items, etc. Also, think about how often you plan on changing menu items, whether prices are likely to change, and where the best spot in your café is to place this information. This step will be key when determining what the menu looks like.

Your menu is an important marketing tool in presenting your story and brand to your customers. Café owners should always make sure that their menu offerings and signage make sense for their own brand, their customers, and their business. A thoughtful menu that is beautifully presented will be sure to entice customers—and keep them coming back. FC

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Y designing a coffee program

By Michael Butterworth

ogi Berra famously said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll end up someplace else.”

He probably wasn’t thinking about opening a coffee shop at the time, but the sentiment rings true for café owners as well. The best coffee shops, whether high-volume or boutique, have a clear concept of what they’re trying to accomplish, and have designed their coffee program to match.

Know Your Neighborhood The first step toward developing a clear vision for your coffee program is understanding your neighborhood. Are you a community-focused shop in a residential area? A student haunt near a college campus? A kiosk in a primarily commercial district? Each of these shops needs a different coffee program.

“Our main goal in designing the menu was to not only feature the things that we are most excited about, but to be sure that we cater to the wants of our neighborhood and surrounding community,” says Sarah Hewett-Ball, manager of Full Stop in Louisville, Kentucky.

Tucked away in Louisville’s historic, mostly residential Germantown neighborhood, Full Stop was inspired by the classic neighborhood corner store.

The half coffee shop, half convenience store also features a biodiesel exchange program. But for the coffee menu, it needed to be accessible.

“We felt it was important to have accessible options, think of your first sweet latte perhaps, while providing more coffee-forward beverages to grow into that challenge the palate a bit,” says Hewett-Ball.

Although she decided to keep the espresso menu minimal, Full Stop is happy to oblige a specific request.

“Our basic menu consists of a two-ounce espresso, an eight-ounce cappuccino, and a twelve-ounce latte,” says Hewett-Ball. “We did leave off the macchiato, cortado, and americano, but we’re absolutely happy to make them anytime.”

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Narrative Coffee in Everett, Washington, elected to forego traditional Italian names for espresso beverages— a trend that was popularized by Prufrock Coffee in London.

“We knew in Everett a lot of people didn’t have experience with specialty coffee,” says Maxwell Mooney, Narrative’s co-owner. “Instead of trying to educate the consumer about what a macchiato really is, we decided it’s kind of silly to be arguing about what words mean.”

Both Full Stop and Narrative use a variety of unique signature drinks to inspire customers to try something new.

“We try to have a non-coffee signature drink that isn’t caffeinated that anyone can enjoy,” says Mooney. “Usually one item is cocktail-inspired—a little bit smaller and strong.”

Both shops provide opportunities for baristas to contribute signature beverages to the menu.

“We have built in a staff signature drink contest during our bi-weekly staff meetings seasonally,” says Hewett-Ball.

“Everyone shows off their best creation and we vote on the top two or three to feature on the menu.”

Choose Your Partners Wisely One of the most important decisions a coffee shop can make is choosing

which roaster, or roasters, to partner with. On one hand, cafés are spoiled for choice: there’s never been more specialty coffee roasters trying to grow their wholesale programs. But with so many companies vying for your business, it can be hard to choose.

“I wanted to make sure I wasn’t being persuaded by the branding, or the hype train surrounding a roastery,” says Mooney. “I really appreciate when small roasters who don’t have a big name are doing a good job. I think that happens a lot more than we realize, and I wanted to help reward that.”

Mooney devised an anonymous cupping system to select which coffees they offer at Narrative. Each coffee sample they receive is given a code number and judged by a panel of baristas.

“We average out the scores and work with the highest-scoring roaster,” he says.

For Full Stop, the consistency and customer support that comes from an exclusive relationship with a roaster was preferable to the multi-roaster model.

“Initially it was about an experience—we all thought of the best coffee experiences we’ve had and requested samples,” says Hewett-Ball. “Then it was all about tasting. A ton of blind tastings later, Ritual Roasters was the clear standout.”

Full Stop values their relationship with Ritual both for the coffee quality and the resources they help provide.

“The amount of transparency and information that Ritual shares with us is powerful,” says Hewett-Ball. “It is so apparent that they want their wholesale accounts to thrive and see them as an extension of their own family.”

Find Your Own Voice In the trend-obsessed specialty coffee industry, it can be really tempting to copy what you see other cafés doing on social media. But in addition to being professional plagiarism, don’t expect that trend to necessarily translate to your context.

Likewise, existing cafés updating their coffee program should proceed with caution. Although menu updates are a normal part of café life, there’s almost no way to take a regular customer’s drink off your menu without upsetting them or even losing them as a customer. Anytime you change a menu, make sure you focus on how your updated coffee program creates value for your customers, not what might be wrong with the beverages that were removed.

At the end of the day, any coffee program is about one thing: providing your customers with delicious coffee. FC

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menu & beverage program

CREATING YOUR SPECIALTY TEA program

By Manish Shah

A

sk nearly anyone in the industry, you’ll find most agree that specialty tea is poised for accelerated growth in the immediate future. As Americans pursue more active lifestyles and healthier diets, retailers across the country are rising to the occasion. The shift is already well underway, and the numbers are there to support this. Tea represents a booming $12.6 billion industry in the U.S. alone, up from under $2 billion in 1990. This upward trend is seen particularly in the millennial age group, where up to 87% reportedly drink tea regularly. What’s more, 27% of those 20–37 years old drink only tea.

But there’s more than just the rising demand to encourage coffee sellers. Tea offers some of the best margins in the beverage industry, often soaring well above those connected to coffee or food sales. And despite rumors, tea is easy to make. In fact, brewing tea can be done using many of the existing tools and machines already found in most coffee shops. Tea is easy to incorporate into a coffee shop’s menu, displays beauti-

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fully, and is available in a nearly endless variety of flavors and types. It’s only natural that now more than ever coffee shops are embracing specialty tea for the vital role it plays in the success of their business.

So tea is great—now what? It can sometimes seem daunting to bring in a wholly new and different product to the shop. There are seven important steps to design and execute a successful tea program for any business.

1. Quality first.

The single most effective tactic in establishing a specialty tea program is to source and serve high-quality tea. Traditional advice is that tea bags are to be avoided if you want to be taken seriously—but more and more producers are recognizing the importance of high-quality tea and now offer excellent tea both loose-leaf and in tea bags. The variety of loose-leaf teas available is immense, which allows the retailer to choose what works and what to change based on season, or to bring in teas for specific customer requests. Additionally, the cost of

loose-leaf tea is typically much lower per serving than that of tea bags. No matter what form you choose, the tea should be high-quality and tasty. Don’t skimp—your customers can tell.

2. Serve it up.

Tea can be instrumental in increasing the average check size. It’s wise to offer various service options or suggest good tea pairings with food items to attract broader demographics. For example, pots of tea or larger French presses paired with food can significantly increase ticket sales. Another important tactic is to serve tea samples. Many customers may be new to specialty tea, but offering a variety of ways for them to try before they buy can help to both broaden and tease their palates.

3. Chill out.

Iced tea sales account for 80–85% of all tea sales in the United States in the past several decades. While most people associate coffeehouses with hot beverages, cold tea is an integral part of the overall menu. Nearly all teas are delicious when chilled, and making

batches of iced tea is an excellent way to sell selections that are not moving as quickly as others.

4. Infuse enthusiasm.

A growing interest among baristas has translated into increasing the overall awareness of tea among their customers. Baristas are at the front lines of the coffee shop, directly interacting with patrons, so their knowledge of tea is critical. Today, tea education is more affordable and available than ever, and having enlightened, enthusiastic preparers of tea ensures remarkable infusions and impressed customers.

5. Think outside the cup.

Tea can be amazing when paired with other beverages, such as lemonade in the classic Arnold Palmer or a splash of soda water for an extra fizz. Creative cafés prepare hot toddies, dirty chais, and juice/tea blends to the delight of their customers. Using tea as an added ingredient in other recipes carries its health benefits, flavor, and attractive margins to other menu items.

6. Send it home.

Customers return to specialty coffee retailers because of the quality of their offerings, the comfort of the space, and the warmth of the service. Oftentimes, they will be eager to bring some of their experience home or to share it with others in the form of gifts. Private label products are an easy way to facilitate just that. Private label retail items remind patrons of the brand and experience of the shop.

7. Increase awareness.

The success of any product depends on visibility and availability, which is directly correlated to promotion.

Thankfully, tea is seen as a trendy and accessible drink in the U.S., but that doesn’t mean it can’t benefit from promotion, both passive and active.

Passive promotions are the easy ones: display teas in a prominent, attractive space in the café, presenting and serving tea, whether that’s in glass teapots, appealing glass mugs, or simple to-go cups. Include tea on the menu, complete with descriptions of the flavors and blends or other

info like caffeine content, and offer retail items that customers can enjoy at home. Active promotion involves engaging in tactics designed to draw customers in and get them sampling, enjoying, or talking about tea. Some examples might be hosting tea tastings, sampling new products, running special tea-based events like “tea time” or “tea happy hour” at times when coffee sales might slow, and encouraging return visits with bounce-back specials. Lastly, tea itself is gorgeous, which makes it an appealing addition to any social media campaign.

My own observations and those of our industry veterans coalesce: Tea has strong growth potential ahead, and specialty coffee retailers are poised to facilitate that further. It is up to individual coffee shops to take advantage of specialty tea—its efficiency, variety, and healthy margins— in the best way they can to maximize their benefit. It might seem daunting to initiate a great tea program, but the truth is quite simple: If you have good leaves and hot water, you can make great tea. FC

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Coffee for the People: HOSTING PUBLIC CUPPINGS

Cupping Coffee

By Caitlin Peterkin

C

upping coffee is an essential and informative component of our industry. This practice of sensory evaluation helps newly hired baristas learn more about the product they’re serving, allows for the more established employees to continuously reevaluate their palate, and ensures café owners are offering high-quality beans for their customers.

Below are some standard guidelines for cupping coffee.

Equipment: Scale Grinder Kettle Cupping glasses with lids Cupping spoons Timer Rinse cups Towels Evaluation forms and writing utensils (if scoring) 1. Weigh your desired amount (typically between 8–12g) of whole coffee beans for each sample cup.

(Keep in mind, most cuppings provide two cups per coffee.)

2. Grind the weighed beans to a standard size, somewhere between filter and French press. If you’re sampling multiple coffees, be sure to grind with a cleansing batch in between so as not to cross-contaminate the samples.

3. After each sample is ground, place into a cupping glass and cover with lid.

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4. Once all samples are freshly ground, it’s time to evaluate the dry fragrance. Lift the lids and smell each coffee sample, keeping your mouth slightly open to help you pick up on more intricate smells.

5. Bring filtered water to approximately 200° F (93° C) and pour, using the ratio of 1g coffee per 18ml water, directly and evenly into the grounds, filling to the top of the cup.

6. Let the wet grounds sit for approximately 4 minutes before breaking the crust.

7. Use the back of a spoon to push against the crust that has formed on the top, stirring gently three times, to release the trapped aromas. Keeping your nose close to the cup, inhale and take note of the aroma. Be sure to rinse the spoon after each break.

8. Using two spoons, skim the foam and any remaining grounds from the surface of each cup.

9. Fill your spoon and slurp the coffee, aerating your palate as much as possible. Note each coffee’s taste, acidity, body, and balance.

Don’t forget to rinse your spoon between each sample, and use a spittoon if needed.

10. Slurp again. This time, pay attention to the sweetness, uniformity, cleanliness, and any new flavors that may have developed as the coffee has cooled.

11. Once everyone has finished, discuss and share your notes with your fellow cuppers. FC

As consumer interest in specialty coffee continues to grow rapidly, many cafés are implementing cuppings that are free and open to the public.

In November of 2018, Prince Coffee in Portland, Oregon, began hosting free weekly cuppings for customers and employees alike. Every Friday at noon, they feature a selection of locally roasted beans. The program allows for stronger customer engagement and education, without the formality typically associated with cuppings.

“It’s an intimate way to talk and engage more with customers about coffee,” says Prince barista Michael Burnette. “We go down the line, ask them which ones they like, and why, and it helps guide the conversation about learning about coffee.”

Burnette notes that it’s also fun and beneficial for the staff, to keep testing their own palates. While customer participation varies from week to week, those who do cup enjoy the experience and the opportunity to learn more about coffee.

“It’s informal and approachable,” says Burnette, “while still showing a passion for coffee.”

If you’re considering hosting cuppings for your customers, here are some best practices to keep in mind: • Take things slowly. Begin with one cupping per month; if you see high turnout, consider hosting more frequently.

• Make sure you schedule employees accordingly. You’ll most likely need extra help setting up, but will still need staff to manage the cash register and bar.

• Establish protocols with participants, especially those who may be new to your café. While these steps are industry standard, you know your café, employees, and clientele the best.

Figure out a setup that functions well in your space, and give the participants an overview of how a cupping works before getting started.

• Be intentional about which beans you’re featuring. Will each week have a theme? Will you only cup local beans (or your own, if you’re a roaster)? Will you feature a different country or region each week?

• Pay attention to who’s at the table.

Are you creating a comfortable space for everyone to participate? Does your environment encourage folks from all backgrounds and experience levels to not only attend, but to share their ideas?

• Get the word out! Leverage your social media, and encourage customers who have attended to bring their friends.

menu & beverage program

Cupping TEA

By Bill Waddington

C

upping tea is a century-old process that allows professionals to evaluate a given tea. The greatest benefit of cupping tea is that your evaluations and tea-buying decisions will always be based on objective standards.

This process forces you to consistently compare apples to apples when evaluating teas.

The following tea cupping guidelines are generously shared by G.S. Haly Co., the only family-owned tea company in America that dates back more than 100 years.

Preparation Cupping tea requires a tea cupping set, which has three components: a tasting bowl, a steeping cup, and a lid.

• Arrange teas in order of intensity from light to heavy.

• Weigh 2.5 grams of dry tea into each cup.

• Display additional dry leaf in a clean white tray.

• Bring fresh, filtered water to a boil and pour over leaves. Fill each cup to just below its serrated spout, and immediately cover with a lid.

• Steep for 5 minutes, then tip the cups into the bowls to drain all the liquid out, keeping the lids in place.

Evaluation • Observe: Does the dry leaf appear to be broken or whole, twisted or flat, regular or uneven? What about the color of the tea itself—is it dull or glowing, clear or cloudy?

• Smell: Compare the aroma of the dry leaves, the wet leaves when they’re hot, and the wet leaves after they’ve cooled.

• Taste: Slurp the liquid so that is spreads evenly over the entire surface of your tongue and mouth and reaches all of your taste buds at once.

When identifying the similarities and differences found in each tea, try to isolate the following characteristics: Aroma Most of flavor is smell, and our olfactory sense identifies notes and qualities that our taste buds do not.

Slurping the tea draws aroma through the retronasal cavity so the taster can identify floral, herbal, malty, or honey-like characteristics.

Sensation, or Mouthfeel How does the tea feel on the palate?

What is your perception of its texture?

Common sensations range from soft to round and buttery to crisp and bright.

Astringency A puckery, brisk, or lively sensation on the palate gives tea its refreshing quality.

COFFEE CUPPING PHOTO BY CAITLIN PETERKIN; TEA CUPPING PHOTOS: INSTAGRAM @TEASOURCE

Body The feeling of thickness or viscosity on the palate; how light or heavy the tea feels. Body might range from delicate and ethereal to heavy and syrupy.

Taste or Flavor Simply, what your taste buds can detect—sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and umami. Slurping sprays the liquid across your palate so as many taste buds as possible come into contact with the tea.

Complexity A way to describe flavor when it has many aspects. Simple teas are straightforward, with just a few easily identifiable characteristics. Complex teas change as you drink them, and do not completely reveal themselves at once.

Finish Describes the aftertaste that lingers on the palate. Dry teas have a lingering finish that continues to persist and change on the palate after the tea has been swallowed. Clean teas are just the opposite, with a crisp finish that does not linger.

Discipline is essential in cupping, both in terms of how the tea is prepared and in the analyzing and documenting of results. Cupping tea as a professional ensures that you are offering the best-quality teas possible to your customers. FC

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menu & beverage program

FOOD ALLERGEN SAFETY in the Café

By Caitlin Peterkin

T

hirty-two million Americans have a food allergy. That means on any given day, you’re bound to serve a customer who may have a life-threatening allergy to milk, soy, nuts, gluten, or other standard fare in a typical café.

While the burden typically falls on those who are diagnosed to disclose their allergies and be diligent when

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ordering, it behooves café owners to create a menu, meal-prep space, and staff training program all with food allergen safety in mind.

“A lot of business owners seem to think that being allergen-friendly is more something like a check mark to tick off ... when in fact they should view it as really an opportunity to bring more people into their doors,”

says Noreen Okarter, food allergen specialist and founder of Food Sitch, which provides coaching to individuals with food allergies and trains organizations to become food allergy-friendly. “If you cater to people with food allergies, your customer acquisition can only increase.”

So how exactly does a café assert itself as food allergy-friendly?

Okarter explains that one of the biggest risks in a café is cross-contact. She provides these tips for best avoiding cross-contact in your shop: • Purple Utensils: Purple has become the de facto color for allergen safety in the food industry. When preparing food for someone with food allergies, use purple utensils, which will help to avoid cross-contact with allergens and can be used as a visual cue to your staff that there is a customer who has allergy or dietary concerns. The purple utensils should only be used for allergy purposes and should not be used for customers who do not have allergy or glutenfree concerns.

• Clean your work stations frequently: Be sure to keep your work station in the kitchen as clean as possible to avoid cross-contact and crosscontamination.

• Keep allergen-free foods away from other foods.

• Wash your hands: When preparing foods for people who have food allergies, it is critical to wash your hands to make sure there is no leftover residue from any allergens you may have touched.

• Allergy-free foods first: If you are preparing two meals, one with food allergens and one without, prepare the meal without food allergens first.

• If your café or coffee shop offers flavored coffees that have allergens (e.g. hazelnut coffee, pecan coffee), always use the same coffee pot for each type of coffee.

Okarter also notes that customer service is important in making those with food allergies feel safe eating and drinking in your café. Therefore, it is imperative to train your staff to know what items in your café may contain allergens and to always double-check labels.

Employees should also be open to answering, rather than dismissing, customers’ questions. If you’re at all uncertain about whether or not something may contain allergens, such as items

not made in-house, you should transparently communicate that to your customer; Okarter says that it is fair to tell a customer you can’t guarantee something is allergy-free, rather than make a promise that could ultimately threaten someone’s life.

Cafés can also use visuals to help customers determine which menu items will be accessible to them.

Consider putting icons on your menu that designate any food or drink item with nuts, dairy, gluten, etc., as well as symbols that represent vegan/vegetarian options.

While you can post signage asking customers to let the barista know

if they have an allergy, you can take it a step further and make it regular practice for your staff to ask customers if they have a food allergy.

“It goes back to customer service—that willingness to listen to the customer and any concerns that they have is always well appreciated,” says Okarter. “If a company can have staff that is willing to help—that goes for not only people with food allergies, but anyone—that’s what keeps customers coming back.” FC Learn more about Food Sitch and how to become food allergen-friendly at www.FoodSitch.com.

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BEYOND the BEAN

By Caitlin Peterkin

M

ove over, oolong. Step aside, single origin. Today’s best café menus are teeming with options for non-traditional coffee and tea drinkers. From turmeric, collagen, and CBD oil to cocktails and mocktails featuring house-made shrubs, there are more options than ever to make sure your menu caters to all customers.

“Cafés don’t have to be just a fueling station for coffee,” says Kuros Zahedi, co-founder of SAKU Tea, which specializes in superfood latte tea blends.

Zahedi and his business partner, Steven Mellor, saw an opportunity in their home market of Bellingham, Washington, where a healthy lifestyle is de rigueur for the majority of the community. What began as a tea bar in the Pacific Northwest city has devel-

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oped into an e-commerce company selling award-winning alternative latte blends based on turmeric, matcha, and beetroot—ingredients lauded for their health benefits, which range from reducing inflammation to lowering blood pressure.

The SAKU founders acknowledge that the interest in and demand for café products that provide a healthy boost has dramatically risen over the last few years, and will only continue to increase. Add to that the fact that many people avoid caffeine in the afternoon, café owners are finding success offering creative alternatives to traditional coffee and tea beverages.

Turmeric has been a mainstay on menus as the key ingredient in the seemingly ubiquitous golden milk latte for several years now. There are

many pre-mixed powdered blends and syrups currently on the market that feature the vibrant yellow spice, or you can play around with spices to create your own blend for a turmeric latte.

Infusions are a great way to increase your sales. CBD oil, for instance, has become a popular add-in option for many cafés. The hemp-derived compound is hailed for its health benefits, which are reported to include alleviating anxiety, easing insomnia, reducing inflammation, and minimizing epileptic seizures. Another popular ingredient is collagen, which is purported to improve skin and nails, ease arthritis pain, and promote wound healing. Both CBD oil and collagen can easily be added to smoothies, tonics, coffee, and more.

Shrubs have seen a resurgence in the beverage industry the last few years. These powerful potions combining fruit, vinegar, and sugar can be added to carbonated beverages, tea, alcohol, and even food. Not only do shrubs provide a punch of flavor, they have a gentle cleansing effect on the body, since vinegar is antimicrobial, contains powerful antioxidants, assists insulin management, and supports good gut health.

If you plan on having your café operate later into the evening, consider adding alcoholic beverages to the menu.

Beer, wine, and cocktails also make for an enjoyable accompaniment to live music if you’re planning to have events in your space. For those seeking a nonalcoholic refreshment, mocktails made with local, seasonal ingredients, like shrubs, are extremely popular.

Whether you create house recipes or offer ingredients as add-in options, going beyond coffee and tea provides a boost to your bottom line and keeps customers coming back for more. Play around with your menu, using your seasonal/specials board to test new items, and see what customers are drawn to.

“Café owners can embrace and incorporate all different types of alternative beverages,” says Zahedi. “It provides more sales, happier customers, and a more diverse range of customers.” FC

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can your cafe go zero waste ?

By Jordan Johnson

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ixteen-year-old Nobel Peace Prize nominee Greta Thunberg wrapped up her speech at the 2019 World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, by telling world leaders to “behave like our house is on fire, because it is.”

And she’s right.

Coffee shops hand out an estimated 250 billion paper cups every year, which go straight to landfills. Even the cups that say they’re recyclable on the packaging are misleading, because the infrastructure to recycle them is very expensive and doesn’t exist in many municipalities.

Cups are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to waste produced by cafés. From plastic straws to clam-shell to-go containers, cafés have become a highly visible representation of pollution, abundant waste, and corporate environmental responsibility for consumers.

Switching to recyclable materials has proven to be less than effective at reducing one’s environmental footprint. According to a study published in peer-reviewed journal Science Advances, only nine percent of the plastic ever produced has been recycled—that’s 6.3 billion metric tons of plastic hanging out in waterways, landfills, and oceans for the next 20–1,000 years.

That’s why the zero-waste café movement is gaining traction.

A zero-waste café program is a visionary mindset to help guide operators in changing their practices to emulate sustainable natural cycles, where all discarded materials are designed to become resources for others to use through reduction, reuse, recycling, and rot (composting). To implement a zero-waste program requires an investment of time, resources, and dedication over months and even years. But it’s attainable, even business-savvy, given the right framework and planning.

By implementing a zero-waste system, owners and managers can keep hundreds or even thousands of pounds of resources from ending up in the trash.

Not only can managers divert their cash flow from literally ending up in the trash, but customers will appreciate the effort. According to a 2017 Nielsen survey, 85 percent of millennials ages 21–34 consider it “extremely” or “very” important that companies implement programs to improve the environment. Those people are the very same customers who are driving the specialty coffee market. The National Coffee Association’s 2018 report showed that 48% of 25–39 year olds reported drinking a gourmet coffee drink within the past 24 hours.

Sustainability

can your cafe go zero waste?

Here, we outline the steps and tools your organization can utilize to develop a zero-waste program tailored to your business needs: Step 1. Conduct an audit of your

current waste management.

• Observe! Grab a pair of gloves and use the trash audit included on the opposite page to assess exactly what is going into your trash cans, recycling bins, and compost for one week. This exercise is meant to provide you with an understanding of your waste management flow and know for certain if products are ending up in the correct place, or if your customers need additional education.

• Note your key findings from the audit. ~~ Ex: Are compostables ending up in the trash? Are your recycling bins full of cups? Do the suppliers you source from create unnecessary waste? ~~ Keep additional notes on waste that’s been improperly disposed of, such as food-contaminated containers ending up in recycling.

• Stay safe! Only audit the waste produced within the café space and behind the bar; don’t include the trash the bathroom. Make sure that you’re working in a space that doesn’t violate health codes within your municipality, and have proper gear: close-toed shoes, thick gloves, and sturdy clothes.

Step 2. Designate a waste reduction

champion or committee.

• Make sure your champion or committee has the authority to be effective.

• Set up regular meetings to check on the progress of your zero-waste program.

Step 3. Tackle the low-hanging

fruit first.

Once you have your data from the audit, find the opportunities in your business where you can make the greatest impact with minimal effort. Decide on one or two waste-reducing initiatives to start with; these can be as creative or as simple as your committee decides.

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Keep in mind what the needs and desires of your customers are; start out with initiatives that are fairly simple for your customers to understand and get used to. If you operate in an area that’s unfamiliar with waste-reducing practices, begin by offering an in-house cup option or switch from plastic straws to a plantbased option.

Some options won’t be feasible in certain areas due to lack of composting or recycling facilities, while others might not work for your customer base. Additionally, some options will require research into what’s available in your area. Always keep accessibility in mind when designing a waste-reducing initiative—you want to make sure that any customer who comes through your door can enjoy your space. The choice on what to implement and how to do so is up to you and your team.

Here’s a list of ideas to get you started: • Reduce disposable plastic to-go options ~~ Create a cup lending library ~~ Implement a to-go cup deposit program ~~ Change from plastic to compostable options ~~ Offer a reusable in-house cup option • Reduce or replace plastic straws ~~ Sell reusable options ~~ Offer an in-house option ~~ Offer paper or plant-based straws ~~ Keep straws and stirrers behind the counter • Make use of reusable packaging options ~~ Where reverse logistics are feasible, consider switching to reusable alternatives for pallets or containers • Change your waste management practices ~~ Use compostable trash bags ~~ Implement recycling or composting programs ~~ Partner with a local company or gardening group to take your used coffee grounds

Step 4. Create manageable goals.

• Any successful waste-reducing initiative needs to have a SMART plan in place before implementation. The acronym stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely.

• Start a spreadsheet that monitors key waste management statistics.

• Check in with your employees who work the bar and talk to customers to see if your initiative is working as anticipated or if it needs adjustment.

• As programs start to become established as norms, start finding new ways to reduce waste in your café and go for the more and more difficult tasks. ~~ Upgrade to energy saving equipment, add insulation to reduce heating and cooling, subscribe to composting services, etc.

• You’ll likely need to conduct additional trash audits to assess the current state of your waste management program and find areas to improve.

Even if going zero-waste sounds unobtainable for your business, implementing a few waste-reducing practices could be great for your bottom line—and helping the planet.

For those companies who are able to achieve minimal waste, let your community know about your accomplishments: share your results in-store and on social media, send out a press release, or host a media event. Use your system as a marketing tool to differentiate your business and attract more customers.

Café owners, managers, and baristas have the power to keep thousands of pounds of waste from being produced through thoughtful management and creative problem solving. FC For more information on waste-reducing strategies, subscribe to Fresh Cup and read our regular column, “The Last Plastic Straw.”

WASTE AUDIT RECYCLED

TRASH

COMPOST

DISPOSABLE CUPS Paper Plastic DISPOSABLE CUP LIDS STIR STICKS PLASTIC STRAWS PAPER NAPKINS PLASTIC CUTLERY TO-GO CONTAINERS Glass Plastic Cardboard WRAPPERS RECEIPTS TEA BAGS FOOD (weight) COFFEE GROUNDS (weight) CARDBOARD BOXES SYRUP CONTAINERS COFFEE BAGS MILK JUGS OTHER

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By Fresh Cup Staff

Sustainability Starts Here

very year, billions of singleuse coffee cups and untold tons of paper and plastic waste, from lids and sleeves to napkins, stirrers, and straws, end up in landfills across the country.

To combat the problem, many café owners are deciding to avoid singleuse materials altogether. Businesses have begun implementing more sustainable practices, such as offering a cup lending program, giving a discount to customers who bring in their own to-go cups, adding a 25-cent cup charge for all to-go cups, and providing plastic straws upon request only.

Additionally, there are now more sustainable products and packaging on the market than ever before. Café owners can choose from a host of biodegradable, recyclable, and compostable products for their store. While not an exhaustive list, here are several sustainable foodservice packaging options currently on the market. FC

Eco-Products ecoproducts.com • Compostable cold cups and lids • Compostable hot cups (insulated and non-insulated) and lids • Compostable food trays made of sugarcane paperboard • Compostable food sleeves • Sugarcane and wheat straw take-out boxes, plates, and bowls • Compostable cutlery • Compostable straws • Compostable liners and bags

78 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

Good Start Packaging goodstartpackaging.com • Compostable plastic cold cups and lids • Compostable paper hot cups and lids

Leafware leafware.com

• Fiber and bamboo catering supplies

• Palm leaf dinnerware, including plates, bowls, and trays in an array of sizes

• Biodegradable trash bags and plastic bags

• Sustainable birch-wood utensils

• Compostable straws • Fiber tableware • Palm leaf tableware • Bamboo tableware

Renew Packaging renewbag.com • Renew Bag: plant-based compostable bag available in a variety of sizes and styles, including shopping, draw-string, and die-cut bags • Renew Liner: Compostable trash bin liner

Seaside Paper Products seasidepaper.com • Java Jacket in sizes and styles to fit 8- to 20-ounce cups • Paperboard take-out and catering boxes in various sizes, dubbed SnackToGo and PackToGo

Decent Packaging decentpackaging.co.uk • Compostable plant-based plastic hot and cold cup lids • Compostable paper hot cups • Compostable paper napkins

Detpak detpak.com

• Compostable drink trays • Compostable napkins • Compostable bioplastic cutlery • Compostable food carry packs • Compostable soup containers and lids • Compostable sugarcane plates and bowls

GO Box

planglow.com

goboxpdx.com

• Biodegradable sandwich bags and boxes

• App-based service connecting take-out customers with a network of around 90 GO Box vendors who can serve food in reusable plastic food containers.

• Biodegradable hot and cold food sleeves and boxes • Compostable soup containers and lids • Compostable hot cups and lids

*Currently available only in Portland and San Francisco. Visit gobox.us.com to learn about licensing GO Box in your city.

CoffeeSock coffeesock.com

• Recyclable clear cups and lids • Compostable hot cups and lids

Planglow

Aardvark aardvarkstraws.com • Compostable, long-lasting paper straws in a range of styles, including cocktail, eco-flex, and bubble tea

• Reusable organic cotton filters for a wide variety of brewing methods, including: • Basket

Restoration Packaging restorationpackaging.com

• Cone

• Compostable hot and cold cups

• Bunn auto-drip

• Compostable napkins

• Cold brew (small-batch to industrial sizes)

• Compostable takeaway containers and cutlery

• Chemex

• Compostable plates, bowls, and trays

• Hario • Kalita • Tea

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 79

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FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 81

marketing & branding

By Jordan Johnson

marketing your cafE

Y

ou’ve built your beautiful shop, hired a top-notch team, developed a thoughtful beverage program, and implemented several sustainability programs throughout your operations.

But none of it really matters if you don’t have the right marketing.

What is successful marketing?

Marketing and leadership expert Seth Godin plainly and comprehensively explains in four steps: Step 1: Invent a thing worth

making, a story worth telling, or a contribution worth talking about.

Step 2: Design and build it in a way

that people will actually benefit from and care about.

Step 3: Tell the story to the right

people in the right way.

Step 4: Show up, regularly, consis-

tently, and generously, for years and years, to organize and lead and build confidence in the change you seek to make.

Notice that promotional efforts are number three on the list. Marketing starts when you’re developing the idea

82 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

of your business. As ubiquitous as coffee shops are, they come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, giving customers their pick of the lot. In marketing, it’s just as important to craft a unique product or service that customers respond to, deliver it in an effective way, and show consistency, as it is to promote your shop or product.

Designing your marketing strategy begins by defining what your marketing mix will look like. The marketing mix consists of product (what you’ll sell), price (for how much), place (where it will be available), and promotion (talking about your product). Creating a strong marketing program means that all four components of your marketing mix are consistent in creating the same value for consumers.

Defining exactly who those consumers are is the next step in the process.

Market segmentation is the process of breaking down a large, widely varied market into segments that are more similar in terms of what the consumer is looking for. Identifying and understanding the segment of the population who would be your ideal customers is key when developing a marketing strategy.

That segment is your target market.

Your marketing mix should be calibrated to meet the needs and desires of your target market in a compelling way.

That compelling factor—or differentiation—is what sets you apart from your competition due to perceived differences. The key word is perceived: In order to achieve a perceived difference your marketing strategy must communicate a message that is unique to your café’s brand to your target market.

This means positioning your brand to occupy a distinct and valued place in the target consumer’s mind and then communicating your distinctiveness through all your marketing practices.

When applied well, differentiation and positioning are what make consumers seek your shop out from your competitors.

Consider a college campus with the segmented markets of students and professors. You have the option to gear your marketing efforts towards everyone, but you’ll likely be more successful by targeting one group and serving their needs exceptionally well. Let’s say professors: Set up a kiosk near the staff parking lot, make sure that you’re open early in the morning as professors make their way to campus, and keep operations swift to ensure no one’s late getting to their 8:00 a.m. lecture. Compare to targeting students: Have a café with lots of seating, food, and WiFi, and stay open late to serve those who need a place to study.

The student café promotes itself through social media, while the professor kiosk has a rewards program to promote loyalty. Both businesses could operate within just feet of one another and coexist because they’re successfully meeting the needs of two different market segments in the same area.

Utilize the marketing mix, target marketing, differentiation, and positioning as tools to help shape your business into a strong competitor in your market. Whether you’re opening a single neighborhood shop or considering expanding into a multi-state operation, these core concepts will help you in understanding how to drive revenue through marketing practices. FC

While not necessary, here’s a list of highly suggested information to include as well: • About page explaining the history of your company • Bios of the founders and key personnel • Buttons linking to your social media and/or to subscribe to your newsletter • Menu(s) • Press page featuring all your recent coverage and awards • Wi-Fi accessibility • Shop page for coffee, merch, and wholesale information Use your objectives and the key information you want to include to create the layout of your site. Make pages or sections based on each objective.

Take the time to create a mockup of what information will be found on each page and how you’ll accomplish each objective. Each page or section needs

By Jord

an John INg a WEBSITson E

a succinct, descriptive title that clearly explains what the customer can expect to find when using the navigation menu.

Simple is better than complicated when it comes to web design. While every website should reflect the individual brand of the company, making your information direct and easy to navigate should always be priority number one.

Keep in mind that 40% of mobile users leave pages that take longer than three seconds to load, according to Google.

Website builders such as Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress offer simple, cost-effective tools to help you build a beautiful site, either from

marketing & branding

F

irst impressions are usually the most lasting. Customers often turn to Google first when deciding on where to get their caffeine fix, likely making your website the first place customers interact with your business and make buying decisions. Simply put, a great website increases sales.

Before starting to design or redesign your website, establish what marketing objectives you want to achieve. Do you want to drive foot traffic? Sell product online? Increase wholesale accounts?

Announce events? Book catering and special events? Educate your customers on brewing methods? Increase your newsletter subscribers? Websites are a great tool for an infinite number of objectives; make sure that you know what you’re trying to accomplish.

While the overall design may be unique to your business, every café needs to contain some basic information about your operations: • Address of physical location(s) • Hours of operation • Phone number • Email address

DESIGN

scratch or using templates. Visually, your colors, logo, typography, and overall aesthetic should be consistent with what consumers would find in your shop.

Utilize your website as a marketing tool even on more traditional media.

Include your website address on business cards, menus, and in your social media profiles.

Keep in mind that websites need to change in order to keep up with your business. As your company changes— adds locations, changes logos, adds social media accounts—make sure your website is kept up-to-date. FC

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 83

marketing & branding

SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGEMENT

By Jordan Johnson

unique cultures. Be thoughtful in selecting which platforms your company posts to: Social media management is a job that takes time and resources; it’s better to focus on one to two accounts with specific, resonant content, rather than half-heartedly posting to half a dozen platforms with no specialization.

Handles

S

ocial media management is a brand-new field with everchanging rules and trends. I find myself with four years of food and beverage social media management under my belt, including running accounts with tens of thousands of followers and building my own social-revolving brand from scratch.

I’ve been able to define the role of social media manager for several companies, created my own organizational method, tried out various tools, and field-tested hundreds of posts to find what performs well. Here are the gold nuggets of advice that stay true, even when the hashtags and platforms change in the wild west of social media management.

Platform As with any marketing endeavor, you first have to examine your target market. Look at the channels they use: these will most likely be Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and maybe Snapchat.

But platforms less utilized by food and beverage retailers also offer great opportunities: TikTok, Pinterest, WhatsApp, YouTube, and Reddit all have dedicated user base communities with their own

84 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

Make sure all your social media handles are the same. This makes things much easier for promoting your social accounts and having followers switch between platforms. You should grab social handles on as many platforms as you can. Even if you can’t be active right now, you may choose to become active on that platform in the future. It also helps if you have a basic profile on an inactive platform with a link to your website when someone wants to mention your company in their own post.

Save your passwords in a secure, but memorable location.

Research Understanding how users communicate and use the platform will be key in crafting your message in a way that’s successful on that particular channel. Take time to get familiar with the platform(s) you choose, explore related hashtags, and research popular accounts both with content related to your company and overall. Time spent exploring the platform will help you get an understanding of what content is already popular and find trends that you can tap into with your own storytelling.

Voice Having a unique or relatable perspective in your content creation sets you apart. Look to Wendy’s, Nike’s, and Netflix’s Twitter accounts for great examples of distinct social media voices.

Visuals Don’t post sub-par photos and videos. Here are a few great tricks to keep up your sleeve: • No blurry photos! Make sure your content is in focus.

• Straighten your image—it’s more appealing to look at something that’s perfectly aligned.

• Patterns are an easy way to create visual interest.

• Natural, indirect sunlight is your best friend for taking a good photo or video.

• Apps like Snapseed, VSCO, and Adobe Spark Video are great editing tools.

Be Daring!

If no one ever objects to your content, then no one cares about it either.

If you pour the most delicious coffee ever into a mug next to a croissant and snap a picture with a caption that says the name of the coffee, you’re likely not going to see much engagement. As infuriating as it can be, the most popular posts that I’ve created also have the most negative comments. Creating something that’s truly captivating and shareable requires boldness. Always be kind in your content, but take risks to capture attention.

Tools for Success Utilize tools such as Google Sheets, Hootsuite, and Later (my personal preference) to create calendars of content to publish. Also create a bank of visual content with all your photos, videos, and graphics in one place; Google Drive, Dropbox, or an external hard drive work great. If you plan on directing followers to outside content from Instagram (such as to sell product on your own website), look into using link management sites like lnk.bio or Linktree so you can have more than one link available at a time.

Social media management can be a cost-effective marketing tool, but that doesn’t mean it’s free. You still have to invest time, creativity, and money into developing a strong social following. Whether you personally run your company’s account, have an employee manage the account, or hand the reins over to an outside contractor, be prepared to invest resources into creating quality content. FC

By Jordan Johnson

E

stablish a personal connection to your customers and accomplish a myriad of marketing goals through email marketing efforts. From consumer education to product launches and event promotion, email offers a direct line of communication to a customer base that literally asked to hear from you. Here are some best practices to keep in mind and keep folks from unsubscribing.

Choose Your Service Provider Wisely Mailchimp and Constant Contact have become behemoths in the email marketing service world, and for good reason. Both platforms offer a multitude of features and functionality; subscriber management; list segmentation; email design and templates; automation; and detailed analytics.

Newer competitors with more niche expertise are also options to explore.

For example, Drip offers detailed insights into consumer behavior, while Square’s email marketing services allow customers to sign up for emails at checkout. Most platforms offer a free trial—take advantage of it and test out multiple systems to see what works for you.

Build Your List As tempting as it may be to purchase a list of emails, your messages will likely come across as spam and result in many folks either ignoring you or unsubscribing. Build a list of contacts from customers who volunteer to

receive emails from you. Here are a few ideas on how to increase subscribers: • A physical sign-up sheet in the café • Have a lightbox form on your website • Social media promotion • Encourage forwarding to a friend • Participate in local events, farmers markets, street fairs, and block parties, and bring a sign-up sheet

Start the Conversation Off Right Set up an automated email that’s triggered when a customer is first added to your list. Share something of value to thank your customer and excite them to receive further communication from you. Whether it’s a coupon code, an exclusive ebook, a funny meme, or a heartfelt welcome video, start your relationship off by demonstrating a focus on creating value for your customer, and they’ll be excited to see your next email arrive in their inbox.

What to Talk About Figuring out what to talk about can be difficult, but cafés are filled with a multitude of stories. From your customers to your product and craft, there’s always something worth talking about. Keep in mind what your customers will find interesting and valuable when communicating with them. You can also set up automated emails for special occasions that are triggered for birthdays, low inventory announcements, and holidays.

• New menu and product announcements

• • • • • • • • • •

marketing & branding

@

email marketing

Highlight employees Share brewing instructions Talk about partnerships Birthday discount Recap origin trips Share recipes Announce events in the café Featured artist in the café Sustainability initiatives Holiday well wishes and discounts

Nitty Gritty Details Create a regular schedule for your email marketing efforts based on your time capacity. Whether it’s monthly, weekly, or once a quarter, stay consistent and timely with your schedule.

Review! Accuracy, grammar, and spelling are important when communicating professionally. Maintain the trust of your readers by having multiple team members review your email campaigns for factual, grammatical, and spelling errors before they’re scheduled.

Always feature a direct call to action in every email. From purchasing a coffee related to your recent origin trip to RSVPing for an upcoming art show, make it clear what customers should do with the information you’ve just provided them.

Email marketing can be a powerful promotional tool, but you have to focus on your target market when crafting a successful campaign. Creating value through education, product news, discounts, storytelling, community announcements, or even humor is key to making sure your subscribers continue to open your emails. FC

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 85

marketing & branding

Jordan Johnson [Name of PR representative] Fresh Cup Magazine [Name of your business or PR agency] freshed@freshcup.com [Email address] 503-236-2587 [Phone number] [insert your company’s logo here]

HOW TO WRITE A PRESS RELEASE That will actually result in effective press coverage [Business Location] date that your release is distributed — Public relations can be a powerful tool within any specialty beverage company’s marketing strategy. Developing a solid relationship with writers, media professionals, and influencers can be instrumental in spreading your message to targeted audiences from a source that consumers trust in a cost-effective way. Developing that relationship often begins with a well-written, interesting press release that is accurately targeted to the right people. Anyone with a computer and a little know-how is capable of running a great public relations department. Use the insights and formatting of this article as a guide to crafting releases for your own company.

Newsworthiness First thing to consider before you start writing: Do I have anything newsworthy to write about? All too often as a journalist I receive press releases that contain no new or interesting information. Here is a basic guide to what is considered newsworthy: • Location opening • Significant personnel changes • Giveaways • New product or service launch • Industry firsts • Crisis messaging • Event announcements • Acquisitions • Partnerships • Awards Clear, Specific Details Once you have determined you have something newsworthy to share, list out the necessary details you need to communicate in your press release. The tried and true who, what, where, when, why, and how? are a great starting point. Prominently feature these key details through formatting to ensure your message is clearly understood by the recipient. Journalists do not want to sort through paragraphs of text in order to figure out what you’re talking about; make it easy for them to see the most important pieces of information quickly.

Subject Lines Writing a good subject line for your press release email is one of the most important pieces of an effective public relations strategy. Make sure that your subject line clearly communicates what your press release is about. Truly great subject lines hook the reader into wanting to learn more. Think to yourself, “Why do I care about this?” and lead with the most interesting or compelling piece of the story as concisely as possible.

Contact List The most important part of having a successful press release? Sending it to the right people. You should dedicate time to curate a list of people and publications who cover topics related to your news. Look through magazines, websites, and social media to see who already writes or creates content about similar topics. Find the email address for those people through their website, social media feeds, publication masthead, or even a Google search. Not sure exactly whom to send a press release to at a publication?

An editor, or associate editor, is typically your best bet. This is absolutely the most time-consuming part of sending out a press release, but diligent searching often leads to far better results.

Call to Action End the body of your press release with an actionable request. This could say that a representative from your company is available for interviews, you have additional photography available upon request, or you can send recipes upon request. Make it easy to start a working relationship with a media professional, and be prepared to act quickly with any requests they may have. Ideal media coverage is all about supplying journalists with the information they need when they need it. #### About Your Company Always include a short paragraph that contains basic information about your company at the end of a press release. This helps the writer immensely if they start writing an article about your release, and you ensure that they have current, accurate information about your company. I recommend a short description of what your company does, any relevant accolades that the company or employees have earned over the years, number of locations, and a website, address, and phone number that consumers would use to contact the business, especially if they’re different from the representative’s contact information.

Always review your About paragraph each time you send out a press release to make sure all the information is up to date. Now clear out your inbox and get ready for the emails to start rolling in!

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FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 89

Wrapping up

Expanding your cafe

By Caitlin Peterkin

90 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

C

ongratulations! You’ve realized your vision of opening a café, hired and trained a strong staff and have reliable management in place, grown a dedicated customer base, and business is booming—now what?

For many café owners, after a successful year or two, it’s time to consider expanding your operation and open another location. Fresh Cup talked to Linda Brown, the owner of Joe Bean’s Express Espresso, a drive-thru specialty beverage company in Virginia that has been serving its loyal customers for nearly two decades, about what it takes to go from opening one store to operating six locations in four cities.

Can you talk us through the experience of opening your first Joe Bean’s location in Lynchburg in 2000 to your sixth location in 2018?

We had at least five years between store openings until the last few years.

Last year we did two, but not by original design. We were working on leasing one location for about a year and it fell through, so we went into another area and began building number five. Very soon after opening we were surprisingly able to finally secure a location across the street from the one that fell through. Since we had worked so hard the past year to find that location, we figured we should go forward.

Our sixth unit (which should have been number five) went up eight months later. Two stores in that short period of time is definitely not something for the faint of heart! As owners we did put in a lot of hours, but the real work was done by the crews that trained the new hires. I think we wore them out training for two stores so close together.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JOE BEAN’S EXPRESS ESPRESSO

When did you decide to first start expanding, and why? What were customers’ reactions?

To be honest, we were so busy with just running our first location that the thought of expanding had not occurred to us! One of our friends told us about a location that they felt we should look at. The thought of a second location seemed daunting but exciting at the same time. It was risky, but upon review seemed worth taking.

Our customers were very happy to see our second location! Many of them were driving out of their way to come to us and now we were on their way to work, saving them precious minutes each morning.

What were the initial steps into opening your second location?

We knew it was already zoned for commercial so the very first was to make sure we qualified for a bank loan.

We were still relatively a new business and the bank was still nervous about loaning more. We were building this one on site (our first building was built in Portland, Oregon, and shipped to us across the U.S.), so we focused on satisfying all the building and health department regulations. And somewhere in all that we had to decide who would manage that location for us. I initially took that position but promoted someone into that position within the year.

What were some unexpected logistics that came up when building out your second location?

We had to wait an exceptionally long time to get our building permit, so it delayed opening about four months.

It put a crimp in the budget to have to pay rent those four months!

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 91

Wrapping up

EXPANDING YOUR cafe

When it came time to open the third one, did you deal with any similar issues, or face completely new ones?

Our third location was in a completely different locale and their concerns were different. We were building the drive-thru in the middle of a shopping center parking lot so the city beautification rules dictated I place two trees in planters by the back door.

What I did like was that instead of us going to each of the regulating departments independently, we met with all city departments in one meeting. We met with Zoning, Building Inspectors, Heath Department, and Fire/Police all at once. [It] made communication and obtaining much easier.

Why not stop at two locations?

Why six? And do you have plans to open more?

I have always had in my mind to have multiple stores from the beginning, but never had a solid number of how many.

When we initially opened in 2000, the coffee culture had not quite yet arrived in Lynchburg, so we were paving the way for the specialty coffee industry. I would say we struggled the first three years getting established and educating the public. There were times that we barely had the income to pay the vendors and make payroll, but we knew we were on to something and kept going. It was hard to think about expanding when meeting expenses day to day was a struggle. Eventually business picked up and we had the funds to open the second store on more than just a shoestring!

Do you feel like you’ve worked out the kinks when it comes to opening a new location?

With each location, we redesigned our buildings to meet demands. Sometimes it was a simple, “Hey...it would be great to have an electrical outlet here,”

92 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

to, “Gee…we need to create a smoothie station to reduce steps.”

In time we also switched up the types of A/C systems, flooring, added digital signage, and improved exterior lighting. We tried once to go with open cabinetry to save time reaching for product.

That did not work out so well—those coffee grounds get everywhere! I think now though we are fairly happy with our design.

What advice would you give to café owners thinking about expanding their operations?

It would be wise to think about how you are branding your business.

Showing consistency in your advertising, print, social media, and your physical locations limits customer confusion about who you are and what you offer.

Have a plan to ensure consistency from store to store, from exterior design to recipe adherence to customer service. Have a written manual for everything! Customers want to know they can get the same product no matter which location they visit.

What are the biggest challenges of expanding?

One is being able to have a presence at all the stores. It is nearly impossible to be able to spend quality time daily with

six locations. But it is imperative to do so even if you have great management and staff. I think they need to see that the owners are involved and that they care.

What are the best things about expanding?

Obviously, the income can be good!

But it is satisfying to be able to provide jobs to the community and be able to donate to charitable causes. This year we were also able to start a retirement program for our employees, which was well received.

Anything else you think café owners looking to expand should know?

The old adage of “location, location, location” is true. Pick the best location you can and do not get emotionally involved in your choices. Have a list of must-haves and stick to it.

Proper customer service and product quality are critical to success. Use that to guide your decisions.

You are going to make mistakes. We all do. It’s ok—learn and go forward.

It is hard work, but do not forget to have fun! FC

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JOE BEAN’S EXPRESS ESPRESSO

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Wrapping up

LIST OF RESOURCES Getting Started

Coffee & Tea

These organizations provide crucial information for business owners, from creating an ADA accessible space to trademarking your company.

Connect to the global network of specialty coffee and tea organizations.

AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT (ADA) ADA.gov

COFFEE KIDS coffeekids.org

AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR & CONGRESS OF INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATIONS (AFL-CIO) aflcio.org BETTER BUSINESS BUREAU bbb.org NATIONAL MINORITY SUPPLIER DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL nmsdc.org OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY & HEALTH ADMINISTRATION (OSHA) osha.gov UNITED ASSOCIATION FOR LABOR EDUCATION uale.org U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR dol.gov

CAFÉ FEMENINO FOUNDATION cffoundation.org

COFFEE QUALITY INSTITUTE coffeeinstitute.org GLOBAL TEA INITIATIVE globaltea.ucdavis.edu GROUNDS FOR HEALTH groundsforhealth.org INTERNATIONAL COFFEE ORGANIZATION ico.org INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S COFFEE ALLIANCE womenincoffee.org SPECIALTY COFFEE ASSOCIATION sca.coffee SPECIALTY TEA INSTITUTE stitea.org WORLD COFFEE RESEARCH worldcoffeeresearch.org

Sustainability

U.S. EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION (EEOC) eeoc.gov

Learn more about sustainable practices and the latest research.

U.S. FOOD & DRUG ASSOCIATION (FDA) fda.gov

GLOBAL COFFEE PLATFORM globalcoffeeplatform.org

U.S. PATENT & TRADEMARK OFFICE uspto.gov U.S. SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION sba.gov 94 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

FAIR TRADE USA fairtradecertified.org

GLOBAL REPORTING INITIATIVE globalreporting.org RAINFOREST ALLIANCE rainforest-alliance.org SUSTAINABLE COFFEE CHALLENGE sustaincoffee.org

Staffing & Staff Resources Consider posting this list of resources in a visible area for your staff so they are aware of the tools available to them.

AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION (ACLU) aclu.org COFFEE EQUITY TOOLKIT coffeeequitytoolkit.wikia.com CRISIS TEXT LINE crisistextline.org 24/7 Text Line: Text HOME to 741741 GLAAD glaad.org HUMAN RIGHTS CAMPAIGN hrc.org NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE (NAACP) naacp.org NATIONAL CENTER FOR TRANSGENDER EQUALITY transequality.org NATIONAL DISABILITY RIGHTS NETWORK ndrn.org NATIONAL WOMEN’S LAW CENTER (NWLC) nwlc.org THE PARTNERSHIP FOR GENDER EQUITY genderincoffee.org RACIAL EQUITY TOOLS racialequitytools.org

Wrapping up

HOW-TO IN REVIEW ✓✓ Find the right space to lease. ✓✓ Research and select the best equipment for your café that fits within your budget. ✓✓ Select a point-of-sale system that allows you to streamline the customer experience while ensuring no one will be turned away based on their payment method. ✓✓ Make sure your space is up to code and accessible for all customers, paying special attention to the entryway, the bar, and bathrooms. ✓✓ Implement an inventory management system that works well in your space. ✓✓ Ensure you have all the necessary smallwares and organize them appropriately to maximize efficiency in your space. ✓✓ Hire and begin training your staff in a holistic sense, from beverage making and equipment cleaning to customer service and safety policies. ✓✓ Create a food and beverage program that reflects your café’s identity not only in the offerings themselves but the design of the menu as well. ✓✓ Develop zero-waste strategies for your café and designate a waste-reducing champion or committee to lead initiatives. ✓✓ Research which sustainable products and packaging you will offer in your café. ✓✓ Create your website and social media pages, making sure to be consistent with your brand, voice, and storytelling across all platforms. ✓✓ Set a date for your grand opening and start getting the word out via your online platforms and contacting local news outlets. ✓✓ Subscribe to Fresh Cup Magazine to stay up-to-date on the latest news, trends, and in-depth coverage on running a successful café!

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 95

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6

The Chai Co.

888.922.2424

chaico.com

4

Chocolate Fish Coffee Roasters

916.416.3268

chocolatefishcoffee.com

47

Coffee Fest

425.295.3300

coffeefest.com

48

Coffee Holding Co

800.458.2233

coffeeholding.com

19

Costellini’s

877.889.1866 costellinis.com

Curtis

800.421.6150

wilburcurtis.com

Custom Cup Sleeves

888-672-4096

customcupsleeves.com

Ditting

810.367.7125 ditting.com

49

Divinitea

518.347.0689 divinitea.com

93

Dr. Smoothie

888.466.9941

drsmoothie.com

35

Eco-Prima Tea

877.ECO.Teas (326.8327)

ecoprimatea.com

93

Eight Ounce Coffee Supply

403.457.9844

eightouncecoffee.com

99

Fresh Cup Magazine

503.236.2587

freshcup.com

75

The G.S. Haly Company

650.367.7601

gshaly.com

22

Ghirardelli Chocolate

800.877.9338

ghirardelli.com/professional

Golden Bean

503.706.1330

goldenbean.com

39

Gosh That’s Good! Brand

888.848.GOSH (4674)

goshthatsgood.com

11

Handybrew

jjlmt@ms25.hinet.net

handybrew.com

I Have a Bean

630.384.9657

ihaveabean.com

Java Jacket

800.208.4128

javajacket.com

John Larkin and Co.

973.627.7779

johnlarkinandcompany.com

96 ] JULY 2019 » HOW-TO HANDBOOK

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advertisers

ADVERtiser INDEx (continued) ADVERTISER

CONTACT ONLINE

Klean Kanteen

800.767.3173

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29

La Semeuse

941.830.8818

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53

The Lease Coach

800.738.9202

theleasecoach.com

22

Malabar Gold Espresso

650.366.5453

malabargoldespresso.com

37

Maya Tea Co.

520.918.9811

mayatea.com

31

MoCafe

888.662.2334

mocafeusa.com/charcoal

5

Monin Gourmet Flavorings

855.FLAVOR1 (352.8671)

monin.com

3

OLPR Leather Goods

info@olpr.com

olpr.com

27

Organic Products Trading Co.

888.881.4433

optco.com

19

Pacific Foods

503.692.9666

pacificfoods.com/foodservice

71

Raveler

844.raveler (728.3537)

raveler.io

47

Reg Barber Enterprises

236.422.0558

coffeetamper.com

27

RetailMugs.com

970.222.9559 retailmugs.com

93

SAKU Tea

360-820-3995

sakutea.com

55

Seattle Barista Academy

206.612.8030

seattlebaristaacademy.org

87

SelbySoft

800.454.4434 selbysoft.com

17

SerendipiTea

888.TEA.LIFE (832.5433)

87

Sonofresco

866.271.7666 sonofresco.com

19

Starburst Power

206.612.8030

61

StixToGo

800.435.6789 stixtogo.com

17

Tea Mastermind

360.433.9454

tea-mastermind.com

60

Tea Trade Show

973.551.9161

teatradeshow.com

87

TeaSource

855.320.4832 teasource.com

59

Toddy

970.493.0788

toddycafe.com/business

23

Torani

800.775.1925

torani.com/puremade

Usonian

hello@weareusonian.com weareusonian.com

34

WaterWise

865.724.1200 waterwise.pro

28

Western Foodservice & Hospitality Expo

203.344.7118

westernfoodexpo.com

59

Workbench Coffee Labs

816.419.1904

workbenchcoffeelabs.com

93

Zojirushi America

800.264.6270

zojirushi.com

98 ] JULY 2019 Âť HOW-TO HANDBOOK

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starburstdrinks.com

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