HOW TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT COFFEE MACHINE

Your coffee machine is a very important part of your foodservice offering.  Choosing the correct coffee machine for your needs is essential.  Your coffee machine once maintained correctly and used correctly is an excellent profit centre for your business. 

Before you choose  your coffee machine and in particular an espresso cappuccino machine there are a couple of things you should consider first.

Traditional machine? Or Fully Automatic?

Advantages of Traditional Machine   

• The only way to make a truly amazing espresso, cappucino etc.
• Very very reliable and bar preventative maintanance they rarely give trouble.
• The right traditional machine looks great and is the right choice for gourmet coffeehouses.
• Speed … in the right hands a traditional machine will make coffees quicker than a fully automatic.
• €€€€€ Price…even the most expensive traditional machine is less then half the price of a regular commercial fully automatic.
• Substantially lower service costs….  

Disadvantages of Traditional Machine

• Staff Training must be embraced at all levels management & staff.
• Quality of drink down to the barista training. 
• If your particular business has high turnover over of staff you must consider its effect.

Advantages of Fully Automatic or Bean to cup machine

• Delivers excellent cappuccino, latte, espresso consistently. 
• Makes it easier to add on speciality coffees to your existing foodservice offering.
• Allows you to offer your customers a self service option for cappuccino, espresso, black coffees and lattes.
• Apart from How to Use and daily cleaning of your machine training is minimised. 
• Most fully automatics have become more and more user friendly and can produce a wide variety of drinks.
• As with a traditional machine the  fully automatic machine can be is an excellent source of income for your business but it must be spec'd correctly.  

Disadvantages of Fully Automatic Machine

• Service back up is essential.  A small error on a fully automatic can often shut the machine down.  Make sure your supplier can support the equipment you have purchased.
• More expensive then traditional machine. 
• Ongoing service costs must also be factored in. You must allow for service costs over 5 – 7 years without routine maintenance as your machine will eventually breakdown and a very costly repair will insue. 
• To ignore service on your fully automatic is false economy.
• While a fully automatic will produce an excellent beverage consistently at a truly gourmet foodservice level it will not bring the theatre and subtleties of your tradtional machine and barista.

Summary

Both systems are an excellent choice for your bar, restaurant or hotel though the main thing to consider is your environment.  If your business has high staff turnover then a fully automatic is a better choice. If you embrace the theatre and quality of the traditional machine at all levels then that will also be fine. The worst thing you can do is buy a fully automatic mahcine that is too small for your requirements. Doing this will put the machine under too much strain and more then likely it will give trouble.   Saving in the short term can cost you in the long term.  Your coffee machine again is something that will make your business a lot of money so do it right! 

Tip:

Before you decide to buy a coffee machine keep a close eye on how many cups of tea & coffee you are making every day or week.  This will allow you to establish exactly what machine you need.  A bit like a car is measured in brake horse power…. Fully automatic machines are based on cups per hour so always buy a machine based on the busiest hour of your day and not how many cups you do overall in a day!

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