Caffe Culture 2009 – Day 1 roundup

Posted by 5M Coffee Admin

May 20, 2009

When the doors opened at 0930 there was a surge towards the badge printing machines and Olympia sprang to life. Caffe Culture 2009 was underway.

Burying my nose in the show guide for 5 minutes set me up for the day, planning my visits and allowing me to plan which seminars to sit in on.

Making full use of the quiet time (until about 1030) I visited the stands that I knew would be a few people deep later in the day, networking and meeting people whom I had arranged to see.

I was fortunate to stumble upon a few stands and people that I had not expected to see at the show, but had been in touch with over the past few months, both on Twitter and Coffee Forums.

There was a notable absence of bakers and cookie suppliers this year, perhaps they got the message last year (when the show should have been called “”Everything but coffee’ culture”), but this year these were replaced with bean-to-cup machine suppliers.

A late addition to the show was the Uber Boiler stand (http://marco.ie/uberproject), manned by Marco staff as well as James and Anette from SquareMileCoffee and the team at TeaSmith. The Uber Bar was demonstrating alternative brewing methods and was a welcome relief from the espresso offerings. I particularly enjoyed the Lishan Oolong Tea (at least I think that was the one I had) , on it’s second steep, after the dozen or so espresso’s I had consumed in the previous 6 hours.

The free seminars were well attended, particularly those covering trading in a downward market and recession-proofing your business. I would liked to have attended the SCAE workshops but could not justify the registration fees this time around but will be increasing our budget for more targeted training later this year.

Some stands looked completely out of place and were pitching for an entirely different market to the average show-goer. On the other hand, most stands let you get hands-on with the machines and try out the equipment on offer. The short play on the Nuova Simonelli Aurelia WBC Competition Machine was fun.

The most notable absence was the extra-curricular activities, such as Latte Art and Coffee in Good Spirits competitions that have been postponed, resulting in fewer industry members attending. Judging by the feedback on Twitter these events would have been the highlights of some peoples visits and may have helped raise or maintain awareness of the show for the general public.

Caffe Culture 2010 is shaping up to be a bumper show, combining the World Barista Championships, and will be held in the Grand Hall at Olympia (dates to be announced)

Thankyou to everyone who was friendly and welcoming and made my visit enjoyable. The next few months are shaping up to be busy, following up on contacts and business leads.