Keys To The Shop : Equipping Coffee Shop Leaders

Rob Hoos, a coffee roasting consultant and author, dives deep into the prevalent issue of tipping, a defect that can ruin roasted coffee. He explains how tipping affects flavor and what causes it, with practical advice for roasters to avoid this common pitfall. The conversation covers tips on adjusting roasting profiles, understanding coffee growth altitude, and best practices in moisture management to enhance coffee quality. Rob also introduces his informative booklet, which provides valuable resources for coffee professionals.

I am helping my clients establish values all the time. Having a clear understanding of what is important to you and your business is incredibly important because it informs everything you put your hand to. For this show, and in my consulting work, I have my own set of values that have been developing over the course of my career. On today's Shift Break we will be talking about the 4 core values that guide and inspire KTTS, what they mean to me, and how they can also apply to the work you do in your shops. I hope you enjoy! Related episodes: Scaling Values Bridging the Values-Actions Gap 329 : How to Teach Company Values to Your Staff Who you are vs What you Do 059 : Founder Friday w/ Joshua Boyt, Metronome Coffee Visit our Sponsors!!! The best espresso machines in the world! www.lamarzoccousa.com Custom branded mobile apps for your shop! www.espressly.co Subscribe to KTTS Follow on IG @KEYSTOTHESHOP

Being competitive in business is often thought of in the same vein as being aggressive, leading with fear, and creating an us vs them scenario that is antithetical to community. The reality is that while we need to be competitive in order to run successful businesses, we need not do so in a way that alienates. In today's episode you and I will talk about seven way to be what I will call "Consciously Competitive" in order make you business stand out in and become a better version of itself year over year. We discuss: Making space for staying connected Service and open communication Presence and involvement Well curated menus with fresh rotating options Don't employ desperation and Never bad mouth Trends and what they signal Generosity Related episodes: Differentiation Takes Time! Customer Loyalty Getting Them In By Getting Out! You are not your Competition 230 : Making room for Community in your Shop 181 : Organizational Self-Knowledge Interested in leveling up your coffee shop or setting up 1:1 coaching? Click here to schedule a free consulting discovery call with KTTS Click here to book a formal one-on-one consulting call! Visit our amazing Sponsors! www.groundcontrol.coffee www.pacficfoodservice.com www.coffeefest.com

The future of staffing our cafes depends on how effectively we hire and set up our teams for success. Rather than having an unsustainably low or high number of staff working, we need to create lean and effective teams of thoroughly trained, resourced, and well paid professionals. Today on Shift Break we will be talking about investing into and professionalizing the barista role and how we can challenge ourselves and our baristas to do more and better with less and actually thrive in the process. Related episodes: Simplicity is the MVP of the Cafe 248 : The 5 Elements of Resourcing your Team 356 : 5 Barriers to Progress in Your Coffee Shop 002: Master Your Workflow w/ Ryan Soeder 296: Holistic Barista Training w/ David Castillo of Go Get Em Tiger , Los Angeles 162 : Discussing "Baristastainability" w/ Jenna Gotthelf of Counter Culture Coffee Visit our Sponsors!!! The best espresso machines in the world! www.lamarzoccousa.com Custom branded mobile apps for your shop! www.espressly.co Subscribe to KTTS Follow on IG @KEYSTOTHESHOP

A lot has changed in coffee over the last couple decades. As roasters and baristas, our understanding of the current landscape of coffee processing, its impact on flavor, and the possibilities it contains will greatly determine our success. Thankfully our industry has some very bright minds who create clarity around the ever complex world of coffee, and one of those voices is here with us today. Christopher Feran is a coffee industry consultant, green buyer, roaster and lapsed Q-grader with years of experience helping startups and established companies in the Midwest, California and New York City as well as exporters and coffee growers in producing countries like Guatemala, Colombia and Ethiopia. A pioneering coffee professional, he regularly publishes thought provoking blogs and articles that have challenges and pushed the industry forward. Most recently he has published the "sort-of glossary" to coffee processes; which inspired today's conversation. We will be exploring the topic of processing, it's evolution, and how to think about their use and application in your roasting company We cover: Evolution of his understanding of processing Recent developments in processing Shifting expectations of terroir Who is driving these innovations? How much of our menu should be experimental? How some processes roast differently Who is buying these coffees? Pros or consumers? Processes create more consistency? Choosing what is right for you and employing patience First steps in adjusting your coffee roastery's program Links: www.christopherferan.com Related episodes: RoR #14: How to Roast New Processing Methods w/ Mike Ebert ROR #8 How Post-Harvest Processing Impacts Flavor w/ Siva Subramanian and Byron Holcomb of Olam Food Ingredients 251 : Fermentation and the Future of Farming w/ Lucia Solis RoR #16 : Ideal Resting Times for Roasted Coffee w/ Joey Stazzone of Cafe Kreyol Interested in leveling up your coffee shop or setting up 1:1 coaching? Click here to schedule a free consulting discovery call with KTTS Click here to book a formal one-on-one consulting call! Visit our amazing Sponsors! www.groundcontrol.coffee www.pacficfoodservice.com www.coffeefest.com

Professional development and opportunities for betterment and advancing are areas that operators must bake in to the business as much as possible. If you are a barista, manager, trainer etc and you want to take advantage of those things, create opportunities, or simply take charge of your own development for a better future then you must focus on adding value. Today on Shift Break we will be discussing how to make yourself more valuable as an employee both in the job you have now and in preparation for the opportunities you have yet to encounter. Related episodes: 292 : How to Take Charge and Drive Your Career w/ Ed Evarts 077 : How you can Happen to your Career w/ Scott Anthony Barlow : A frame work for finding the right work 226 : The Art of being Indispensable at Work w/Bruce Tulgan 015 : What to do if You don't Advance w/ Anne Nylander : How to take the next step in your barista/coffee career 014 : A Barista's Guide to Advancing: How to take full advantage of where you are and set yourself up for success in coffee 331 : The 7 Deadly Sins of my Career Visit our Sponsors!!! The best espresso machines in the world! www.lamarzoccousa.com Custom branded mobile apps for your shop! www.espressly.co Subscribe to KTTS Follow on IG @KEYSTOTHESHOP

Running a coffee shop means you take on a fair degree of risk. This is why having and understanding of insurance that is appropriate for your shop is critical. On top of that you need to make sure the insurance you do have is optimized and that you are providing an environment that puts safety first. Unfortunately, while all small businesses carry the required insurance, it is often not optimized for their needs and the shop itself is run in a way that invites accidents rather than mitigates risk. This is your livelihood and you own it to yourself, your staff, and customers to throughly explore these subjects. Today we are priviliged to get to talk all about these things with Brennon Pothetes of Butter insurance. Brennan Pothetes is the Co-Founder and CEO of Butter Insurance, which offers a more accessible and efficient insurance experience for coffee shops coupled with a safety program, making them more sustainable. He is a veteran entrepreneur with a background in insurance, banking and software development for companies like Bloom Credit, Rhino and Simple. At Rhino, he helped build a product that saved renters $500 million dollars since the onset of the pandemic by replacing cash security deposits with affordable insurance. This is a very helpful and informative conversation and I hope you apply these insights ASAP! We cover: Understanding insurance and the right coverage Why the big guys have teams How we make mistakes with insurance What you are made to get vs what you need Risk mitigation and safety The small print and getting blindsided Exclusions and Optimizing insurance Negotiating with landlords The importance of talking with your insurance person Safety education and checklists Links and resources: www.butterhq.com Risk + Safety Winter Checklist Related episodes: 101 : Avoiding Legal Pitfalls in Retail w/ Specialty Coffee Attorney, Marshall Fuss 175 : How to Keep your Cool : A Fridge, Cooler, and Ice Machine Masterclass w/ Luke Peterson of The Maintenance Department! 197 : Getting the most from your Equipment w/ Melissa Vaiden of Counter Culture Coffee 128 : Terry's Top 10 w/ Terry Ziniewicz : Best practices for how not to kill your espresso machine 239 : 5 Best Practices for the Best Small Business w/ Henry Lopez 334 : How to Approach Deescalation w/ Melissa Tucker of Mind Over Matters and Pathways to Peace Interested in leveling up your coffee shop or setting up 1:1 coaching? Click here to schedule a free consulting discovery call with KTTS Click here to book a formal one-on-one consulting call! Visit our amazing Sponsors! www.groundcontrol.coffee www.pacficfoodservice.com www.coffeefest.com

Nobody is perfect. No coffee business is perfect. Therefore there will inevitably be complaints that staff have about the business. This could be anything from the schedule and state of the bar, to the performance of co-workers and even your own performance as a boss. Even the best companies deal with complaints. The trick is how to do so well. In today's Shift break we will discuss a few ideas for how you can handle staff complaints with a clear head in order to create a better culture, system, and coffee shop. Related episodes: Taking Offense to Critique 277: Encore Episode: How to respond to Negative Feedback Coffee Compass Article: The Wrath of the One Star Review Shift Break: Stop Lying Shift Break: Creating a Feedback Culture Visit our Sponsors!!! The best espresso machines in the world! www.lamarzoccousa.com Custom branded mobile apps for your shop! www.espressly.co Subscribe to KTTS Follow on IG @KEYSTOTHESHOP

As the 2023 begins it is a great time to take inventory of our cafes and roasteries and really look at what we have done and where we can not only improve, but what needs to change. How can we keep up with the changing industry while still serving our customers? Where do we need to innovate and what are the first steps to building a better business? Today we are discussing all of this and more with our guest Miranda Caldwell! Miranda Caldwell is a coffee business coach and the founder of The Coffee MBA, a community where she teaches business courses for the specialty coffee industry. Since 2000, she has held leadership positions at coffee roasting companies in roles spanning operations, procurement, quality, sales, retail, and education. In 2022 she completed her Masters of Business Administration from a joint program with The University of Manchester and Indiana University. Her primary goal is to improve profitability for coffee roasters, believing they're the key to unlocking profitability for the rest of the value chain. In this conversation we will be discussing Miranda's bold approach to coffee business operation, innovation, and values based leadership and product development that will give you a head start on reaching the next level in your coffee biz. We cover: Discovering, leaving, and returning to the coffee industry Professional development Defining success Profitability Change perspective on our product Where to start to build better Curiosity and innovation Values to rally around What an MBA taught her about what our industry needs Innovation pipelines and Learning from Nestle Customer feedback Links: www.mirandacaldwell.com Miranda on LinkedIn Tik Tok @miranda.caldwell Related episodes: 089 : La Marzocco USA General Manager, Andrew Daday : Leadership, Innovation, service, heritage Sustainability Series #4 : Consumer Sustainability Series #3 : The Cafe Special! "Thinking Differently" Series | Radical Sustainability w/ James Combs of Combs' Coffee 020 Joe Marrocco : Transparency, Origin Knowledge,and Your Shop 239 : 5 Best Practices for the Best Small Business w/ Henry Lopez 184 : Making Great Business Decisions w/ Dave Stachowiak Interested in leveling up your coffee shop or setting up 1:1 coaching? Click here to schedule a free consulting discovery call with KTTS Click here to book a formal one-on-one consulting call! Visit our amazing Sponsors! www.groundcontrol.coffee www.pacficfoodservice.com www.coffeefest.com

Every year we have the opportunity to invest our time and attention into many different things. In a coffee shop it can be overwhelming and toward the end of the year we tend to look back and determine way to improve how we invest our time and attention for a better result. In today's Shift Break we will be discussing a few very important and foundational areas where, if you consistently focus your energy with intention, you will find massive return for your customer's, your staff's, and your own happiness and well being. Related episodes to listen to next: Shift Break: Working Clean Fix the Small Stuff! : Management, Morale, Coffee Bar Culture 067 : 6 Truths About Power : The Responsible Approach to Power Dynamics in the Cafe Feedback Culture : Making feedback a part of what you do not just something you sometimes do 165 : The Art of Deep Listening w/ Oscar Trimboli Being the Point of Clarity 248 : The 5 Elements of Resourcing your Team Visit our Sponsors!!! The best espresso machines in the world! www.lamarzoccousa.com Custom branded mobile apps for your shop! www.espressly.co Subscribe to KTTS Follow on IG @KEYSTOTHESHOP