Tags
77 stories
Tim Taylor's second Chicago café, Ipsento 606, trades bottlenecks for breathing room while packing in a slow bar, a dual Slayer espresso setup, beer taps, and a basement utility system.
Peet's Coffee and Tea purchased Stumptown Coffee Roasters outright, then took a majority stake in Intelligentsia Coffee, all inside a single month. The deals drew both alarm and approval from the specialty coffee sector.
Strategies for café owners to reduce barista strain and injuries through ergonomic design, equipment choices, and staff education.
A safe and productive café relies on clear, actionable policies—not just good intentions. From anti-harassment rules and service guidelines to emergency protocols, these five measures help ensure everyone knows how to respond when challenges arise.
A small coffee shop's journey from ambitious food menus to a simpler partnership that cut waste and sharpened its coffee focus.
FAL Coffee is blending high-tech farming and meticulous processing to draw nuanced flavors from Brazil's volume-driven coffee heartland.
Why repeatable pressure beats perfect technique—and how to make tamping a non-issue in your espresso routine.
A growing wave of plant-based choices, from oat milk to meat-free burgers, is pushing cafés to rethink their offerings and their environmental footprint.
Travas Clifton and Justin Hicks built Modcup Coffee Co. by first selling from a cart and a 1969 Citroën H Van near a New Jersey transit hub, then expanding to a café and roastery in Jersey City Heights. Their experience shows how mobile operations can lower the risk of opening a fixed location.
How coffee shops can host round-robin dating nights that bring in new customers and create a lively atmosphere—without disrupting regular service.
A dispute over pay equity at a Michigan coffee roastery and café chain led to a union drive, a discrimination settlement, and eventually the announced closure of all locations, with employees now considering a worker-owned alternative.
A guide to preparing your coffee shop for the holiday season with gift packages, special events, seasonal pastries, and inventive drinks.
How coffee and tea shops are rethinking frappés and smoothies with cleaner ingredients, alternative milks, and natural sweeteners to meet evolving customer tastes.
How a Brooklyn coffee outfit got its hands on a vintage German roasting machine — after a few unexpected hurdles.
Brew café in Traverse City, Michigan, combines prime location, community spirit, and a focus on coffee to create a welcoming space for locals and visitors alike.
Sprenger, a US Aeropress and two-time US Brewers Cup champion, opened Sweet Bloom Coffee Roasters in Lakewood, Colorado, in December 2013 after more than two decades away from his home state.
A two-location coffee company in Illinois moved away from plastic straws before a citywide ban took hold, pairing paper and plant-based options with steel straws, composting, and branded drinkware discounts that turned sustainability into a customer loyalty perk.
A café co-founder explains how to gauge each customer's appetite for coffee knowledge, from a busy morning queue to dedicated tasting events, without turning service into a lecture.
A step-by-step guide to aerating and heating milk so the foam is evenly integrated, from purging the wand to the final swirl before pouring.
Coffee shops distribute roughly 250 billion paper cups annually, most of which end up in landfills. Packaging that claims recyclability can be misleading because recycling infrastructure is costly and unavailable in many areas. A zero-waste program offers a framework for cafés to reduce waste through audits, goal-setting, and practical changes.
