Keys To The Shop : Equipping Coffee Shop Leaders

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224 : Essentialism: Focusing on what truly Matters w/ Greg McKeown

Emotions, Self-Sabotage, and Telling Ourselves the Truth Nov 03, 2022

Show notes

The coffee shop is a can be a stressful place. There are no shortage of challenges big and small that confront us daily whether you are a barista of cafe owner. The trouble we run into is when our confirmation bias kicks in with every challenges and our emotions run away with us and we start telling ourselves a story about what is happening that may not be true but certainly feels true in the moment

On today's shift break we will be talking about how we can combat overthinking and negative emotions through pursuing objectivity, truth, and growing in confidence as a result.

Related episodes:

Getting Over Guilt

111 : Self Care 101: Taking care of yourself while taking care of others

176 : Harnessing Emotions at Work w/ Andrea Hoban of Oji Life Lab

Professional Distance (Blog)

When Going Above and Beyond Goes too Far

258 : Prioritizing your Mental Health in the New Year w/ Dr. Lara Pence

Make Your Problems More Specific

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Email Chris@keystotheshop.com

376: Career, Coffee Quality, and Advancing the Industry w/ Mat North, of Raw Material Oct 31, 2022

Show notes

Some interviews we have on the show touch on so many deep, important, and impactful subjects that it is hard to stop the conversation. This was one of those. I wanted to talk about our guests' career and then see where it led us and indeed we ended up discussing an assortment of issues that are sure to inspire and spark curiosity in you as you listen. Today we sit down with the great mat North!

A seasoned veteran with over two decades experience, Mat's career has taken in the full gamut of the of the industry. Stints with both national and local chains as well as time in the consumables and engineering side of the business have given him a well rounded view of the coffee world. In 2013 Mat opened Full Court Press, a small specialist multi roaster coffee shop and now Nano- roastery in the heart of Bristol. His knowledge, passion and attention to detail ensured FCP quickly became a forerunner in the city's scene. It is FCP's excellent customer service, coupled with the team's ability to articulate their extensive knowledge in an approachable way that has ensured Full Court Press not only serve exceptional coffee, but have sparked an interest in specialty coffee among their customers. Having sold FCP in 2021 he's moved into the green side of the industry as part of the European office for Raw Material, a not for profit social enterprise working in all aspects of the supply stream. He is also the author of the acclaimed book, Coffee - A Modern Field Guide, and recently served as National Coordinator for the UK chapter of the Speciality Coffee Association.

As we chat I hope you take notes and continue to pursue the subjects discussed. From Mat's career evolution and lessons learned through business ownership - to his take on how the industry has evolved and what is key for us to prioritize in the future, this conversation is loaded with value and insights from start to end.

We discuss:

Learning through early retail experiences
Discovering what coffee could be
Abandoning a phd in physics to pursue coffee
physics and engineering training helping with coffee
How to be inspired by unknowns and learn
Starting his shop Full Court Press
Curating a multi roaster program
Feedback loos in QC
Water in coffee
Writing a coffee book
Quantifying the art of coffee
Marketing vs true innovation
How consumers are leading the way in quality coffee
Evolution of specialty retail
The priority of price equity and leaving efficacy based models

Links:

www.matnorth.com

Instagram @mat_north

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375 : Founder Friday! w/ Roland Horne of WatchHouse Oct 28, 2022

Show notes

I am so happy to share with you this Founder Friday episode that takes a hard look at what is possible when you want to offer excellence at scale in a cafe setting. I am joined by the founder of the iconic and standard setting company, WatchHouse, Roland Horne.

Roland founded WatchHouse in 2014 after extensive experience running small-to-medium-size businesses, including luxury aquarium design consultancy Aquarium Architecture. He holds directorships with property development funds Verum Domus and Coutts & Partners and has a MSc in Economic History from the London School of Economics. Roland is currently pursuing his Executive MBA at the University of Oxford. Over the past seven years WatchHouse has grown from one cafe on London's iconic Bermondsey Street to ten sites, and in August celebrated the one-year anniversary of the WatchHouse Roastery at 36 Maltby Street. A CEO with formative experience outside the speciality coffee sector, Roland has a unique and ambitious perspective on the sustainable expansion of the brand throughout the London and beyond.

In today's conversation we get to hear the story behind WatchHouse and how Roland has grown this brand through values and a desire to keep integrity of service and quality front and center. I think you will get a great deal from this chat.

We discuss:

From luxury aquariums to coffee
Defining modern coffee and evolving
Focusing on your unique value proposition
Why you need to focus on the MLP
Big concept in an initially small space
Making hard financial decisions and listening to customers
Beginning to roast
Scaling and customizing for the community
Living wage and following through on delivering value
Getting better as you get bigger
Staff structures
Overcoming the assumption that big is bad
Providing spaces for Happiness

Links:

www.watchhouse.com

Instagram @watchhouse

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Slate article: My Coffee Shop Nightmare By Michael Idov

Some Tips on Signature Drinks Oct 27, 2022

Show notes

It is that time of year where cafes are all but expected to have the ubiquitous PSL in their menus. But there is so much more. Beyond this staple drink specialty cafes around the world have developed both wonderful signature creations and others that don't really resonate.

Today on shift break we will be chatting about signature drinks and I will be offering some tips on how to approach curating and creating your specialty drink menu so your beverages are more likely to succeed.

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374: Opening a Coffee Shop: Fantasy vs Reality (w/ bonus commentary) Oct 24, 2022

Show notes

Should you open a coffee shop? How hard could it be anyway? Thousands of people around the globe have a dream to open a cafe. Once open however that dream can quickly become a nightmare. I am thrilled to have been able to collaborate with fellow podcasters over at the Adventures in Coffee podcast to put together an episode that deals with this subject head on.

In this episode you will hear from several aspiring, and experienced entrepreneurs as James harper, Scott Bentley, and myself take you through the 3 major areas of inspiration and focus cafe owners need to be aware of. The money, the scene, and the dream.

This was awesome to get to be a part of and i hope you enjoy this very important and entertaining show!

Links:

Adventures in Coffee

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RoR #16 : Ideal Resting Times for Roasted Coffee w/ Joey Stazzone of Cafe Kreyol Oct 21, 2022

Show notes

How long should you let your coffee age after roast? Is freshest always best? How can we ensure our customers get the coffee at its peak? These are some of the questions that we explore around the topic of ideal resting times for roasted coffee, the myths around freshness, and the best practices for managing your coffee's flavor life cycle.

In this episode of RoR from Roast Magazine we are exploring the new data associated with ideal resting times for coffee based on a study recently conducted and written about in Roast and the implication it has for you, the customer, and the farmers. We are talking with the person who conducted this study, President of Cafe Kreyol, Joey Stazzone.

Joey Stazzone is the President (and Chief Coffee Hunter) of Cafe Kreyol. In 2012 Stazzone took his experience with chemistry, cross breeding, and backyard botany, and began working in developing countries with the goal of creating sustainable employment, through specialty coffee. Through a decade of hands-on experience working with producers, he has become an expert in fermentations and post harvest processing. Stazzone has been a licensed Q Grader since 2015, and became a CQI Lecturer on Quality Evaluation in 2022. He has been on the international jury for the Bolivia Quality Cup Presidential Tournament 4 times, and has given dozens of lectures on Direct and Transparent Trading as well as Fermentations and Post Harvest Processing. Through his work at Cafe Kreyol, he provides consulting to hundreds of producers a year, conducting experiments on coffee fermentations, pH testing, and post harvest processing, in order to help them develop the best possible product. Recently his company completed a scientific study on post roast resting times, and the impact on sensory evaluation which can be found HERE

In our conversation we cover:

Standard understanding of resting a degassing
Relaying accurate information
Cafe Kreyol's experiment and results
Tools and methods for evaluation
How to use resting data in your Roastery
Surprising results of long term degassing
Roasting fast or slow and the impact on degassing
How does this work with blends?
Freshness and Marketing

Links:

www.cafekreyol.com
www.roastmagazine.com

Related Episodes:

What Sanding Taught Me About the Cafe Refinement Process Oct 19, 2022

Show notes

The work of running a cafe seems to never be quite complete. While we know that chasing " perfection" is not the goal, we would do well to embrace the idea of dial in and refinement in our work.

Today on Shift Break we will be talking about what a summer woodworking project from years ago taught me about refining what we do in our cafes.

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373 : The Owner's Role: 5 Behaviors for Effectiveness Oct 18, 2022

Show notes

The coffee shop is made up various tasks and roles that all work together to create something magical. Wen those roles are not clear or followed through on then the we lose the magic and gain frustration. No role in the cafe is as important than that of the owner (arguably managers but that's another topic), yet we rarely see owners having job descriptions let alone a schedule organized according to both the administrative / financial needs AND the areas of operations, quality, and people.

In today's episode we will discuss the 5 behaviors that are necessary for owners to successfully and effectively lead and manage those 3 areas so they can facilitate and create a thriving coffee shop.

We cover:

Operations, People, and Quality
The need for detailed scheduled work
Constant curiosity
Tension as needed structure
Honesty at all costs
Using problems to discover and institute solutions
Crafting systems needed for operations that serve the people

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