Joe Bean Coffee - Coffee that lifts everyone.
https://shop.joebeanroasters.com
Transcripts
Speaker A:
Oh.
Speaker B:
Welcome to dialed in.
Speaker B:
I'm Wade Reed.
Speaker A:
I'm Aaron Pascucci.
Speaker B:
And welcome to our grab bag episode where we have thoughts on coffee.
Speaker A:
You forgot to introduce Chris.
Speaker A:
Come on, Wade.
Speaker A:
What are you tired?
Speaker B:
I am a little sleep deprived.
Speaker C:
Grab bag.
Speaker B:
And our producer, Chris Lindstrom.
Speaker C:
Grab bag, which is.
Speaker B:
Who is just for the rest of the evening going to say the words grab bag in different voices.
Speaker B:
That's the Calgary coming out.
Speaker B:
So, yeah, tonight we just.
Speaker B:
We have coffee thoughts.
Speaker B:
Aaron was like, I have some prompts.
Speaker B:
I'm like, yeah, let's go for it.
Speaker B:
We were going to talk about AI in coffee, which we could.
Speaker B:
I mean, we could probably share a couple facts.
Speaker A:
Po.
Speaker A:
I do want to get to that a little bit.
Speaker A:
I've got a couple other things that have been sitting in the back of my brain.
Speaker C:
Cool.
Speaker B:
Start with AI.
Speaker B:
Let's go there for.
Speaker A:
Well, yeah, I got a short one first.
Speaker A:
Okay.
Speaker B:
Okay.
Speaker A:
So I have a friend that hit me up recently.
Speaker A:
He said, hey, you do coffee?
Speaker A:
I said kind of, yes, as do all my friends who are like, no, you do coffee.
Speaker A:
Anyway, he said, I'm so give you some context.
Speaker A:
He went sober a few years ago.
Speaker A:
He's on a pretty tight budget, and when we hang out, a lot of times he has to plan.
Speaker A:
So he's like, okay, I can go out tonight and we can do X, right?
Speaker A:
Definitely.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
So he reached out and he said, I'm giving up this other thing in my life so I have some extra money.
Speaker A:
He goes, I really want coffee to.
Speaker C:
Be.
Speaker A:
A luxury for me on the weekends.
Speaker A:
I want to sit and enjoy it.
Speaker A:
I was like, perfect.
Speaker A:
So he basically was like, what should I get for a pour over?
Speaker A:
He has nothing.
Speaker C:
Well, and I love the fact that this.
Speaker C:
It's formulated as a little luxury too, because it can be a daily routine, but it can also be that little luxury that just makes your life that little bit better every day.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
And so I ran down the list.
Speaker A:
I was like, hey, do you have a scale?
Speaker A:
Do you have a kettle?
Speaker A:
What do you have?
Speaker A:
And he's like, I have nothing.
Speaker A:
I know nothing about this other than I want to do pour over.
Speaker A:
So I have the things that I would recommend to him.
Speaker A:
But my.
Speaker A:
One of the things that was running through my head was there's like 9,000 pour over drippers out there these days.
Speaker A:
And, you know, I've got a Hario V60 that I've had for 20 years.
Speaker A:
Maybe at this point, if I'm thinking.
Speaker B:
About it getting close.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
And so I was curious what Your thoughts were.
Speaker A:
The biggest thing I've seen is people seem to be loving the Hario switch a lot as one of the newer things out there.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
And I don't know if you guys have seen anything else out there if you're happy with what you have had or is it tried and true and we're good, or is it.
Speaker A:
I don't want to buy another porver dripper or where have your thoughts been there?
Speaker A:
Have you thought about it?
Speaker C:
I mean, I know I've been thinking about it recently mostly because I have considered buying a, you know, high end or a higher end, like drip machine for the first time.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
But I think I love the idea of the switch or some sort of full immersion, you know, thing, because it's the least temperamental.
Speaker C:
It's the thing closest to a French press.
Speaker C:
Pour, pour and wait and go.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
Which is, it's.
Speaker C:
You're going to get a good amount of consistency.
Speaker C:
You're going to have, you know, when it comes to most finicky, like Hario's most finicky because it cares most about being fine.
Speaker C:
It's open bottom, like everything, all the little things matter a little bit more.
Speaker C:
But absolutely with something like a switch or other full immersion, it does allow that, like you don't have to be as technically proficient or care as much as we might care to do something that is still going to be a delicious cup.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
And yeah, if you do do this, you know, small investment of a good grinder, you know, you're.
Speaker C:
Why am I forgetting, you know, the.
Speaker B:
The different baratsa, the standards.
Speaker B:
Oh, great.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Like, like the.
Speaker B:
I have a virtuoso and I love it.
Speaker B:
But the encore is fine.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
I, I love the.
Speaker B:
I mean, I love the seti and if I had an espresso seti, what's.
Speaker A:
The one right above the virtual?
Speaker B:
So I can't think of it, but it's.
Speaker B:
Yeah, no, there are so many good.
Speaker C:
But those are like such an astonishing value and like as a step up from whatever you currently have, it's like such an astonishing jump in consistency and quality.
Speaker B:
Sure.
Speaker C:
For the price, like it's really hard to beat.
Speaker A:
Oh, yeah, I still have my encore.
Speaker A:
I just realized that I was in this context lucky enough that I have enough brewing devices and coffee devices that I have a full setup at school.
Speaker B:
Now without sacrificing anything at home.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Just take the extra stuff.
Speaker A:
I've got an encore sitting on my desk next to whatever pour over method I've got.
Speaker A:
And I think my Hario was sitting at school because I'm like, I'm not going to pour a whole pot here.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
So I think like, it, it, it depends a lot on what you want to get out of it.
Speaker A:
Okay.
Speaker B:
If you want to.
Speaker B:
I think a Hario is a great way to really get into coffee because it does, it leaves nothing behind.
Speaker B:
If a well executed Hario brings out acidity, it brings out sweetness and, and, and doesn't sacrifice body a whole lot.
Speaker B:
Whereas Chemex, because the filter's so thick, right.
Speaker B:
It like really flattens out the body, brings out mostly the acidity.
Speaker B:
So.
Speaker B:
And then French press, kind of the opposite end of the spectrum.
Speaker B:
Great body, tons of oils left in the brew and just you don't get it much of the acidity at all.
Speaker B:
You get a lot of the sweetness.
Speaker B:
So it, it boils down to like what you're looking for.
Speaker B:
Hario is a great kind of everything.
Speaker B:
I do love immersion drippers.
Speaker B:
My favorite, my personal favorite immersion dripper is the Bonavita Immersion Dripper.
Speaker B:
And it's just very much a Chem or a Chemex.
Speaker B:
A clever clone.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Like they just took the concept of the clever.
Speaker B:
They're like, what if it was ceramic and what if the valve operated, you know, a little bit differently.
Speaker B:
I'm a huge fan of those.
Speaker B:
I used those at fifth frame and I just think like they bring out, you know, same filters, the clever.
Speaker B:
Except that instead of plastic you've got ceramic, which I think holds the heat a little better.
Speaker B:
So I like, I like that a little bit better.
Speaker B:
I am also going to name drop here the.
Speaker B:
I think it's called the Compass.
Speaker A:
Ooh, a new one.
Speaker B:
Adjustable flow rate brewer.
Speaker C:
So I've seen some of those.
Speaker B:
Yeah, it's a Kalita.
Speaker B:
So let's, let's give the Kalita its due.
Speaker B:
What's great about a Kalita is you're just going to get the sweetness.
Speaker B:
Whatever sweetness a coffee has, like it's going to come out in the Kalita.
Speaker C:
It's also durable as all hell.
Speaker C:
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:
You get one of those, those steel ones.
Speaker B:
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:
And some of the like copper ones are really pretty, even though they're more expensive.
Speaker B:
Like I, I'm a big fan of Kalita for that purpose.
Speaker B:
Just like, if you have, if you like the sweetness and you want to understand the sweetness of whatever coffee you're buying, like, is it just the open.
Speaker A:
Bottom there that does that?
Speaker A:
Because like, seriously, what's the bottom difference between that and like my V60 there?
Speaker B:
The, the quality of the filter and the flat bottom.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
Okay.
Speaker B:
And those three holes and the flow rate that it achieves.
Speaker B:
And that's what's interesting.
Speaker C:
So much slower.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
And that's what's interesting about the compass is you can cover those holes so you could be dripping through one hole.
Speaker B:
I think it's called the compass.
Speaker B:
I bet I'm going to find out it's called something.
Speaker C:
The other thing is the Hario is way more dependent on very consistent grinding.
Speaker B:
Exactly.
Speaker C:
While the Kalita is a little more forgiving to give entry.
Speaker C:
Specialty grinder.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
That.
Speaker C:
It's going to be a little slower regardless.
Speaker C:
And does process.
Speaker C:
It does flatten out.
Speaker C:
Probably the heights of what you can potentially get to.
Speaker B:
Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker C:
But also like your range of doing something worse is way lower.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
It's Hario's higher floor.
Speaker B:
Lower seal or higher ceiling.
Speaker B:
Lower floor.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Where the Kalita less range.
Speaker B:
But like, I think you get something consistently good, maybe a little more often.
Speaker B:
Two.
Speaker B:
I'm.
Speaker B:
I'm gonna.
Speaker B:
I'm actually gonna say Yama has some amazing single cup stuff that just doesn't get the credit it deserves.
Speaker B:
I love the Silverton.
Speaker B:
Again, it's a flow rate control thing.
Speaker B:
Maybe that's.
Speaker B:
Maybe I'm just the control freak.
Speaker B:
The Silverton with its adjustable valve, I've brewed.
Speaker B:
I actually brewed one this.
Speaker B:
Not this week, last week that I was like, I forgot what I can do with this thing.
Speaker B:
I love the Silverton.
Speaker B:
You can just really, you can bring out again, like a much more fully formed cup.
Speaker B:
And by adjusting flow rate and kind of playing with that, you can.
Speaker B:
You can get.
Speaker B:
If.
Speaker B:
If the acidity is what's interesting, you can lean into it.
Speaker B:
If the.
Speaker B:
If the sweetness is what's interesting, lean into it.
Speaker B:
And if you don't want to mess with it that day, guess what?
Speaker B:
Turn that valve off.
Speaker B:
Turn into a full immersion dripper.
Speaker B:
It's great.
Speaker B:
I've even made cold brew with the thing.
Speaker B:
I love the Silverton.
Speaker B:
One more from Yama because I think it doesn't get enough credit.
Speaker B:
They made a pour over.
Speaker B:
Oh, what is it?
Speaker B:
Looks just like a hario, but it doesn't have the ridges.
Speaker B:
Just sits on top of the cup.
Speaker B:
Same, same idea.
Speaker B:
I thought it never got the love it deserved.
Speaker B:
It's about the size of a.02 Hario.
Speaker B:
And what it does is it takes everything from Hario that's good except those ridges, which are what increase agitation and make for the over extraction of a Hario.
Speaker B:
So I think it's a little bit Hario for Dummies.
Speaker B:
Like it is this Yama dripper.
Speaker A:
Is it The Yama Glass 4 cup dripper?
Speaker B:
I mean, is that literally what.
Speaker A:
It's what I'm finding.
Speaker B:
Yama glass.
Speaker A:
There's some rippers in it, but it looks like ice.
Speaker B:
Yeah, but they're like, they're not vertical, they're horizontal.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
And I, I have loved that thing.
Speaker B:
I have no idea where mine went, but I have love of that thing.
Speaker B:
I've used it.
Speaker B:
Like, again, it's.
Speaker B:
It's cool for waking up in the morning, you're tired, and you probably can't achieve perfect Hario technique.
Speaker B:
So this thing doesn't require quite as much.
Speaker B:
Now, again, Hario has the highest ceiling.
Speaker B:
Like, it's gonna.
Speaker B:
You're gonna get the most out of your hario, but.
Speaker B:
Or V60 specifically.
Speaker B:
And.
Speaker B:
But with this thing, like, I think you're gonna achieve, you know, 80 to 90% of that with less technique.
Speaker B:
So those are my insights.
Speaker A:
This is making me think that my early coffee educators were leading me astray, dumping me into the deep end.
Speaker C:
Well, I think there was also a moment where that was the thing that everybody talked about.
Speaker C:
While I think the variety is way bigger now.
Speaker C:
And I think the other thing is we're talking about, you know, equipment.
Speaker C:
So, yes, this is one choice, but it's great to have a scale.
Speaker C:
You do not need to buy a coffee specific scale for your first outing.
Speaker C:
If you have a kitchen scale that goes down to one gram that is wildly sufficient for what you're doing, you do not need to buy a coffee specific scale.
Speaker C:
If you have a 1 gram, $20 kitchen scale, that would be great.
Speaker C:
And you don't need a temperature controlled kettle to start.
Speaker C:
You can have a kettle that boils.
Speaker A:
Yep.
Speaker A:
Has a gooseneck kettle.
Speaker A:
That's like 60 bucks and awesome.
Speaker C:
Right.
Speaker C:
If you can buy one with a smaller poor neck, that's great for pour over, especially to start learning how to do it.
Speaker B:
Yep.
Speaker C:
If you're using one of these four immersion ones, you don't even need that.
Speaker C:
So you can really lean down on the extra equipment if you make a couple choices.
Speaker C:
If you want to play with technique, get a, get a kettle with a little pour nozzle.
Speaker C:
There's plenty that just have one lever.
Speaker C:
You hit the button, it boils it, and then you pour the coffee, pour the water, and that is perfectly sufficient.
Speaker B:
Can we talk scales for a second?
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Like, the point that you don't need a good scale is so 100% valid.
Speaker B:
Do you guys know who Nick Cho is?
Speaker C:
Yeah, I've heard of.
Speaker B:
Yeah, your Korean dad on TikTok.
Speaker B:
Like, just.
Speaker B:
So the time I met Nick Cho was.
Speaker B:
He was judging a Brewers cup competition that I was involved in that I was competing is actually the very first time I had ever competed.
Speaker B:
And I must have looked like a total nervous wreck.
Speaker B:
Oh, yeah.
Speaker B:
Nick Cho, Wrecking ball, Coffee too.
Speaker B:
Like, that's kind of what he's most famous for in the coffee industry.
Speaker B:
Murky in D.C. before that.
Speaker B:
Anyway, I must have looked like a nervous wreck because Nick Joe comes over to me and he's, like, complimenting my Taylor scales.
Speaker B:
Now, if you know Taylor, that's the brand, that's one of the brands that you buy at, like, Target.
Speaker B:
Like.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
But, like, that was what he felt comfortable saying.
Speaker B:
Like, oh, yeah, yeah, those are great scales, you know, like, to ease my nerves.
Speaker B:
But also because, like, the scale can be whatever, you know, like, it's a scale, it's a value, you know?
Speaker B:
And those Taylor scales, that's what we used to use at Joby.
Speaker B:
Like, Joby.
Speaker B:
And when it first moved into the city from Webster, that's what we were using.
Speaker C:
15 bucks.
Speaker C:
20 bucks.
Speaker B:
Sincerely, I'm looking at:
Speaker C:
And also, like, it's great for your kitchen use.
Speaker C:
If you don't have a kitchen scale, it's just a great thing to have.
Speaker C:
It makes you a better baker.
Speaker C:
It makes you a better.
Speaker A:
Oh, yeah.
Speaker C:
Like, measuring things by grams is hugely valuable in the kitchen.
Speaker C:
Have a kitchen scale.
Speaker C:
If you want a nicer one, buy a nicer one.
Speaker C:
Yeah, they look nicer.
Speaker C:
Sure.
Speaker C:
If it weighs things and it's relatively consistent, it does the job.
Speaker C:
Who cares?
Speaker C:
It's still a scale.
Speaker A:
And these Taylor scales, you can get custom.
Speaker A:
Like, they've got different colorways.
Speaker A:
Dude, my Hario one's been black for, like, 30 years.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Yep.
Speaker B:
I have the silver Hario one.
Speaker A:
So my.
Speaker A:
My first scale was at Ritual.
Speaker A:
They had, like, a custom ritual scale.
Speaker A:
If you guys ever.
Speaker A:
I'm going to get in trouble here.
Speaker A:
Ever buy weed from a guy in the street and they pull out their little scale?
Speaker A:
It's got a little tiny thing.
Speaker B:
Yeah, nice.
Speaker A:
That's what they were.
Speaker B:
All right.
Speaker C:
All right.
Speaker B:
Repurposed.
Speaker C:
Yeah, just for espresso.
Speaker A:
And I walked in and it was like, you guys really selling coffee here or what's.
Speaker A:
Is this a smoke shop?
Speaker B:
Like, what did I just.
Speaker A:
We are on Haight street, so.
Speaker B:
Fair enough.
Speaker B:
Just two more shout outs.
Speaker B:
Aeropress.
Speaker B:
Aeropress.
Speaker B:
Super simple love.
Speaker B:
You can't always.
Speaker B:
Again, get the perfect flavor balance, but consistent.
Speaker B:
And the Hoop.
Speaker B:
I still love the hoop.
Speaker A:
That's what I was gonna say.
Speaker B:
It's way too soft for, for most people's taste.
Speaker B:
If you're just getting into coffee, maybe it's like too subtle.
Speaker B:
But I love the hoop.
Speaker B:
I think it's great.
Speaker A:
It's.
Speaker A:
It's easy.
Speaker A:
I, I've, I'm not sold on it.
Speaker B:
This is our Christmas gift gift guide, officially.
Speaker A:
Yes.
Speaker C:
So we just.
Speaker B:
The Christmas gift guide we should like.
Speaker B:
And we got to contact all these brands before.
Speaker B:
See, see who's going to like send us something for this because.
Speaker C:
But I do, I do love that we, like, we did go in different directions and that this was like we're, we're giving real actionable things for somebody who's new.
Speaker B:
Absolutely.
Speaker C:
There are so many different ways to tackle this that it's.
Speaker C:
Can be overwhelming.
Speaker C:
Pick a direction, go down it.
Speaker C:
Don't invest tons of money.
Speaker C:
You'll do that later.
Speaker C:
If you're really into this, you're going to invest lots of money into it over time.
Speaker C:
Right.
Speaker C:
But you can do something that is really good for a reasonable dollar to make your coffee experience that much better.
Speaker B:
And I think what's happened to most of us is we find the thing we like, we lock in, we do it for a few months.
Speaker B:
Someone else is like, oh, I do this.
Speaker B:
We try it.
Speaker B:
We're like, we love that.
Speaker B:
We lock in, you know, and then we end up with like 10 of these things.
Speaker C:
That's for 200 bucks you can have a setup that is going to make really good coffee.
Speaker A:
Well, and I'm going to go cheaper than this.
Speaker A:
So my first setup was.
Speaker A:
So I had a Hario scale, which was like 60 bucks.
Speaker A:
I think that was probably the most expensive thing I had.
Speaker A:
Then I had the Hario gooseneck, which was like another 30.
Speaker A:
But I just looked up the mini mill is a $20 hand grinder.
Speaker C:
Sure.
Speaker A:
It'll be fine.
Speaker B:
Absolutely.
Speaker A:
So you get the mini mill, you get a $20 yama glass stripper, some filters.
Speaker A:
You're in at a decent brewing setup for under 100.
Speaker B:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker C:
And you can learn so much and it's a great intro.
Speaker C:
And then when you want to try something else, it's a step.
Speaker C:
And not like even like my mid range setup is, you know, would be 6, $700.
Speaker B:
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:
And that's.
Speaker C:
You don't need to do that to have a very good coffee experience.
Speaker B:
Absolutely.
Speaker C:
So I love that.
Speaker C:
That's a great one to start.
Speaker B:
Yeah, that's a, that's a really good place to Start.
Speaker A:
I'm pretty sure the only reason I got to upgrade my grinder is because my wife was t. Waking up in the morning.
Speaker B:
She needs something quiet.
Speaker A:
We get quieter.
Speaker B:
All right.
Speaker A:
I went.
Speaker A:
I went from the encore to the fellow and I. I thought.
Speaker C:
I thought you were waking her up to grind the coffee in the morning by hand.
Speaker C:
Like wife wake up.
Speaker A:
Grind the coffee.
Speaker B:
Go grind the coffee.
Speaker B:
I will brew it if you grind it.
Speaker A:
This would be a very.
Speaker A:
This would be a very different podcast if that was the case.
Speaker B:
Oh my.
Speaker A:
Oh, gosh.
Speaker A:
But yeah.
Speaker A:
So Zach Forrester, if you're listening to this, then there's your guy dude from the.
Speaker A:
From the local pros.
Speaker C:
He better be for the coffee lover in your life.
Speaker A:
He knows we do it, so I'll have to now stick it to him to see if he's actually downloading this.
Speaker A:
You know, just let's keep us on the light note and then we'll dive into AI I think.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Or not.
Speaker B:
I'm grab bag.
Speaker B:
So tired.
Speaker A:
I was grabbaging.
Speaker A:
What do you think was on my.
Speaker A:
I'll give you a hint.
Speaker A:
It was Starbucks oriented.
Speaker A:
What do you think?
Speaker A:
It was on my clickbait when I opened up my Internet today.
Speaker C:
So tired of seeing today red cups.
Speaker C:
Red cups are back.
Speaker A:
Oh, you're very close.
Speaker C:
Not red cups.
Speaker C:
Too early for red cups.
Speaker A:
It's the barista.
Speaker A:
Starbucks has a bear.
Speaker A:
I can text this to you.
Speaker B:
Just like a plush.
Speaker A:
It's.
Speaker A:
No, it's a cup.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
Starbucks new barista cup is causing a stir and is being listed on eBay.
Speaker A:
$600.
Speaker B:
Like let's get rid of this company.
Speaker B:
I don't need this company anymore.
Speaker A:
It's.
Speaker A:
It's cute.
Speaker B:
Getting tired of it.
Speaker A:
I like it.
Speaker C:
Limited edition gem mint 10.
Speaker A:
So this is.
Speaker A:
This is ties into the other thing that I've been willing around.
Speaker A:
I've been fascinated with Starbucks recently.
Speaker A:
Not because they're coffee but because of what is going on with them.
Speaker A:
Just all over the place, business wise.
Speaker A:
Ever since they got bought out by their new CEO.
Speaker A:
They didn't get bought out.
Speaker A:
Ever since the new CEO took over, you know, the automated shops and all of this stuff, it's been really curious for me to just follow along and see what they're doing there.
Speaker A:
And the thought I have is, is Starbucks really a coffee company?
Speaker A:
I know we've kind of tread on this a little bit, but it seems with a lot of the advertising and stuff now that I don't know what.
Speaker C:
They are vc, they're just.
Speaker C:
They're a corporation I think that's shareholder value.
Speaker C:
I think it's capitalism in liquid form.
Speaker C:
It's just whatever form a corporation is, is a corporation and it doesn't matter what their topic is.
Speaker C:
Once you exceed a certain size, you are only shareholder value and every decision.
Speaker C:
If you, if you.
Speaker C:
And I think this, this stands for many things, I will get on my very light soapbox here.
Speaker C:
If you look at any corporation that is listed or is, or is funded by VC pre listing, they all operate the same way.
Speaker C:
Right.
Speaker C:
There's a standard structure for how all these things operate.
Speaker C:
And once you are public, there is now a VC mandate of rapid expansion and growth, cutting costs as much as possible.
Speaker C:
And from a pre listing, you know, be pre public corporations that are VC funded is maximum growth at all costs.
Speaker C:
And making money is secondary until a certain point.
Speaker C:
If you use that as your framework of how to understand how these things work.
Speaker C:
They are the same.
Speaker C:
No one is different.
Speaker C:
They're all trying to maximize extraction by.
Speaker C:
By.
Speaker B:
Yeah, I was just gonna say hit the board.
Speaker C:
Stop whining.
Speaker C:
Is like they're trying to maximize how much they can take from their workers, how little they can pay them, how much they can reduce logistics by any means possible, while still maintaining a veneer of what they used to be.
Speaker C:
Every corporation operates the same.
Speaker C:
This is no different.
Speaker C:
Sure is that.
Speaker C:
Yes, their venue is coffee, but the venue does not define what they are.
Speaker C:
They are an extraction company.
Speaker C:
They're a value extraction company like every large corporation is.
Speaker C:
And that's all they are.
Speaker B:
Absolutely.
Speaker A:
So a couple quick updates.
Speaker A:
The union is at a standstill.
Speaker A:
No surprise calling that they because I was curious.
Speaker A:
I was reading the, you know, the berry stands.
Speaker A:
Like wait, they were unionizing and stuff.
Speaker A:
So there is going to be a potential strike prior to Red Cup Day.
Speaker B:
Yeah, they full circle voted on it.
Speaker C:
Well, that, that would be the, that would be the most impactful time to do it.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker C:
Unfortunately, a lot of union protections have started to be peeled away.
Speaker B:
We're in a bad place for unions.
Speaker C:
For sure because I think, you know, in this case that would be a.
Speaker C:
Probably a net benefit.
Speaker C:
But the likelihood of something succeeding unfortunately goes down when protections go down.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker B:
But also, did everyone see that the union sent a letter to the Olympic committee?
Speaker A:
No.
Speaker B:
Starbucks is the official coffee sponsor of the Olympics and the union sent a letter to the ioc like you got to drop them because of all their abuses.
Speaker B:
So.
Speaker B:
Sure, I would love that.
Speaker B:
That would be amazing.
Speaker C:
That would be fascinating.
Speaker C:
I would, I, it would be, I would say surprising.
Speaker B:
I mean, well, the IOC is As corrupt as anything else.
Speaker C:
Well, I was going to say there maybe, maybe less so than like FIFA, but like they're taking notes.
Speaker C:
But not, not many notes from Take the Fall.
Speaker C:
Not, not many are just like it's.
Speaker B:
It'S hard to be that corrupt in that brazen about it.
Speaker B:
For sure.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
Oh gosh.
Speaker A:
A couple quick updates that I thought were interesting because this is what I saw.
Speaker A:
I was at the gym working out and of course they have Fox News on.
Speaker A:
And Fox News is talking about Starbucks as you do.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
60% of the company is being divested in their China withholdings.
Speaker A:
Starbucks is stepping back to a minority share in China after their initial wave of growth over there.
Speaker C:
Oh, I can, I can tell you what's going on there.
Speaker C:
Somebody offered them a gobsmack amount of money to go in and then buy back shares in their own company.
Speaker C:
So assuredly they took a ton of money and then bought back other shares to raise their own valuation.
Speaker A:
My.
Speaker A:
This is why I'm not a business major.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
Those are the kind of things that happen.
Speaker C:
So anytime they're doing that, it's either because there's no money being made.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker C:
Or somebody in China threw them some God awful amount of money to then buy back shares and then raise shareholder value.
Speaker C:
None of this is done for any reason other than either it didn't sell or they overexpanded and they have to slice back because they're not making the profit they expect.
Speaker B:
And is the incentive that that then impacts a market that the person who gave them the money is invested in.
Speaker C:
They don't care.
Speaker C:
So anything.
Speaker B:
What's the incentive to give them the money?
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker C:
Oh, they're not giving, they're buying.
Speaker C:
They're.
Speaker C:
Somebody's buying that stuff.
Speaker C:
They're not giving it.
Speaker B:
The incentive is.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
That they're so divesting often means somebody bought it.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker A:
Bayou Bayou Capital B A U Y U.
Speaker C:
So they probably offered some, some dollars with a B. Yeah.
Speaker C:
If it's dollars with a B.
Speaker C:
And they can affect a billion.
Speaker C:
Yep.
Speaker C:
And they can affect the stock price by basically then buying back part of their stocks.
Speaker A:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
Or pushing it back to shareholders.
Speaker C:
That's.
Speaker C:
That's all these things ever are.
Speaker C:
I apologize.
Speaker C:
I'm.
Speaker C:
My, my feelings have.
Speaker C:
My feelings for them have turned into just pure corporate distaste.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
No, I mean that was, that was exactly what I was feeling like as I used to have like a jaded view of Starbucks and what they become.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker A:
Still part of the coffee world, so to speak.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker A:
But the recently as I've been seeing all this stuff come up.
Speaker A:
It was like, is this really still no, you know, anything related to what we, you know, used to know?
Speaker C:
No.
Speaker C:
And I think.
Speaker C:
And I mean, I'll.
Speaker C:
I'll say, like, I mean, my, My thought is, unless it's something specific, like about how they're influencing the coffee world, like, I don't know, it doesn't interest me just because, like, just their movements are just corporate movements.
Speaker B:
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker C:
Sure.
Speaker C:
And it's not.
Speaker C:
Just because they exist doesn't mean they matter to coffee.
Speaker C:
Even though they are the dominant force in that, in many ways is that it's just kind of boring because every move is the same.
Speaker C:
No move is actually trying to change culture.
Speaker A:
No.
Speaker C:
Anything they say is about shareholder value.
Speaker C:
They're trying to drive shareholder value.
Speaker C:
Everything they say is a lie, except for that it's about shareholder value.
Speaker C:
Anything they say about culture is a lie.
Speaker C:
Everything they say about those things isn't true.
Speaker C:
Right.
Speaker C:
These are all fundamental things that corporations do.
Speaker C:
It doesn't.
Speaker C:
Nothing they say is actually that.
Speaker C:
It's just trying to add shareholder value.
Speaker B:
And on top of that, I would say there's a lot of legacy third wave that what you just said applies for now too, because they all have VC money and all kinds of weird ownership structures like La Colombe being involved with Dr. Pepper for, you know, however many hundreds of millions of dollars like that, like that.
Speaker B:
I. I think that for a while became kind of the dream of owning an independent coffee entity of some kind.
Speaker B:
So, like.
Speaker B:
Yeah, that.
Speaker B:
That seems to be.
Speaker B:
Seems to be the way things went.
Speaker C:
And there's extremes, Right.
Speaker C:
They're.
Speaker C:
They're at the extreme because they are so big that their, their board demands all these things and the investors demand it.
Speaker C:
There is the.
Speaker C:
There are the smaller versions that are somewhat better, but at that size, it's just like saying, oh, geez, I'm surprised Walmart is taking advantage all of their workers.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker C:
Like, this is not a surprise.
Speaker C:
This is the same thing they do every time.
Speaker B:
Agreed.
Speaker A:
No, well, and then I wanted to tie that back to Wade's amazing panel discussion that we had.
Speaker A:
So our previous thing, I was not.
Speaker B:
On the panel, for the record, facilitated.
Speaker B:
It was at my.
Speaker A:
Wade, the VC behind the.
Speaker B:
My warehouse.
Speaker C:
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:
He owns a certain percentage of that conversation.
Speaker B:
The man behind the curtain.
Speaker A:
No, one of the things that, you know, we've been talking a lot about culture and coffee culture and pushing the industry and stuff there, but what came up a lot was just about Rochester and being a barista.
Speaker A:
In that culture there.
Speaker A:
And it made me kind of think with these two things, like, what should we expect going into a coffee job?
Speaker A:
Let's assume that you're not going into a corporate Starbucks where your expectations are minimum wage and horrible hours and whatever.
Speaker A:
But Mercury Coffee just.
Speaker A:
I met their two new baristas.
Speaker A:
If I'm going in and looking for a job there at least ideally, what should we be looking for as a culture there?
Speaker A:
What should we be looking for in terms of being compensated realistically?
Speaker C:
Well, I think that's also a great, that might be a great opportunity to bring in some people who are starting at new places and let's talk to them.
Speaker C:
I mean, let's see.
Speaker B:
You invited them on the show, right?
Speaker B:
They're come, they're coming later.
Speaker B:
No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker C:
No, seriously, like, I think that would be interesting especially if they've been.
Speaker C:
Either if they've been in multiple places or this is their first, you know, thing in the industry.
Speaker C:
I think, I mean, I would like to learn that because like I've never worked in it.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
And like other than starting a shop recently, like you haven't been that in a very long time.
Speaker B:
Very long time.
Speaker C:
And I think it would be interesting.
Speaker A:
To talk higher at AM fm, right?
Speaker A:
No, no, not at all.
Speaker C:
Yeah, so I mean, I think, I think that would be interesting in of itself.
Speaker C:
Like we talk to somebody who is trying to get into it or is either new or experienced and see what their feelings are at this point.
Speaker B:
Yeah, definitely.
Speaker B:
I, I have the perspective of, you know, the number of places I've helped open and now the number of places we're opening as part of AM fm.
Speaker B:
So coming kind of from a top down perspective.
Speaker B:
I know that a recently opened place in Rochester offered a very competitive rate.
Speaker B:
Sorry, that's my phone and it's probably my iPad too.
Speaker B:
And is now asking me like, how do I, how do I bring that down?
Speaker B:
I'm like, sorry, dude, like you offered it.
Speaker B:
Yeah, well, I mean you're, you're, you're there and it's really good.
Speaker B:
Oh, but you know, with tips.
Speaker B:
And I'm like, tips are not consistent.
Speaker B:
Tips are not compensation.
Speaker B:
You can't rely on that.
Speaker B:
Like the week that tips are thin, that barista feels that you don't like.
Speaker A:
You can't compensate tips.
Speaker B:
It's like it's, it's a tip.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
And you just can't predict anything on it.
Speaker B:
So I find it fascinating that yes, I do think compensation for this type of work has gotten better in certain sectors.
Speaker B:
Rory offers monthly massages to his baristas.
Speaker A:
That's kind of what?
Speaker B:
Fucking awesome.
Speaker B:
Like, come on.
Speaker B:
That's so good.
Speaker A:
Wait, do you mean like physical massages?
Speaker B:
So like as part of their healthcare.
Speaker B:
So he offers them healthcare.
Speaker B:
His.
Speaker B:
His baristas have the option of signing on for company healthcare.
Speaker B:
And, and as part of it, like monthly massages are, are, are a thing.
Speaker B:
Because like he understands it's a physical job and has.
Speaker A:
Sure.
Speaker B:
Requires like, you know, physical therapy, basically.
Speaker C:
So like he also has strong gentle hands.
Speaker A:
I was trying to not to make.
Speaker B:
It creepy ugly duck.
Speaker B:
As part of their health care plan.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
So, so like that, that kind of thing exists.
Speaker B:
It's not common.
Speaker B:
No, but it exists.
Speaker B:
And competitive compensation for entry level work exists.
Speaker B:
It's still not common enough.
Speaker B:
Right, but I mean, as far as what you can expect, like, like why.
Speaker B:
I think you can expect to work for someone who cares and for that to build your own passion.
Speaker B:
And if you find yourself in a situation where you're working for someone who doesn't care in a small independent coffee shop, run.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
Because like, what is that person doing in coffee?
Speaker B:
They have no business.
Speaker C:
And especially if you're looking at this not just as a job for today.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
If you are looking to be involved in the coffee industry, you want to learn something.
Speaker C:
You want to be around people that care like you care.
Speaker C:
But I think you can say that about many jobs especially.
Speaker B:
Yeah, that's why I say entry level in general.
Speaker B:
Right.
Speaker B:
Like.
Speaker B:
Like competitive entry level in any industry too.
Speaker C:
Like, I think that's fair.
Speaker C:
Like if you want to learn about an industry and you can work that job that has lower compensation, maybe part of the compensation is learning about the industry at the time.
Speaker C:
That's not fair.
Speaker C:
If you have bills and all the other things, and we all understand that, but you have to be getting something else for that at the time.
Speaker B:
Absolutely.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
I mean, and that tracks a little bit with food service.
Speaker A:
I mean, if you are going into, you know, be a chef, you do your staunching at different places to learn from those pros who have done that.
Speaker A:
And a lot of times that is not paid.
Speaker C:
Yeah, well, especially at the high end of restaurants.
Speaker C:
Although I will say that the stage system was, you know, also a lot of those places couldn't exist without free labor.
Speaker C:
Yeah, there's been a number of articles that were written about a lot of those places that basically couldn't have existed without free labor.
Speaker B:
Yeah, I don't think coffee companies should do that.
Speaker A:
No, no, no, I wasn't saying.
Speaker C:
But that that is a, you know, was a very prominent thing, especially in the restaurant industry, at the very high end of things.
Speaker C:
And yes, many people made their name on, hey, I got to work at this place for a time period.
Speaker C:
And yes, that did get them something after there was value in it.
Speaker C:
But when the only people who can take advantage of that value, the people that can afford not to be paid appropriately for their work, then obviously that becomes a, you know, a graded system where you have to have a certain amount of money to.
Speaker C:
To be able to have access to that.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker B:
And I. I want to draw attention to, you know, going, like you said, going back to the panel.
Speaker B:
Rory, he didn't articulate it this way, but he really did talk specifically about two different routes for baristas that were outside of what we typically think of as, like, you become a barista so you can become an owner.
Speaker B:
Right.
Speaker B:
Rory did talk about you become a barista so that you can, over time, grow with a company, gain, you know, become gainfully employed so that when you're ready to launch, you can use your.
Speaker B:
Your, you know, the money you're making to negotiate in a totally different employment venue.
Speaker B:
And he used the example of someone who said, I can make more.
Speaker B:
Said to a local college, I can make more money in coffee, so I want more money working for you.
Speaker B:
Right.
Speaker B:
And then there's the other avenue of, like, just staying a barista, which people are doing that, too.
Speaker B:
I think it's really rare in our community.
Speaker B:
But it, you know, I. I could think of a couple examples, and that being a thing that, like, a skill that's valued so much, a position that's valued so much by someone that they just stay there.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker B:
So, like, I think, you know, three or four different avenues, you.
Speaker B:
You should.
Speaker B:
You should expect to have different avenues available.
Speaker B:
If you're being told, like, you're a barista, you're going to stay at this rate of pay and you're never going to make more.
Speaker B:
Like, that cuts off how many different of the.
Speaker B:
How many of those different avenues, you know, you're going to end up trying to launch into a different field, which I.
Speaker B:
And I think most baristas over time, you know, over the past, however many years of specialty coffee, have been told, like, you're going to stay at this rate of pay.
Speaker B:
This is it.
Speaker B:
This, you're just a barista.
Speaker B:
Right.
Speaker A:
And that was part of the expectations I was looking at.
Speaker A:
Like, one of the things that Starbucks got was their 2% increase.
Speaker A:
I don't think I ever got a 2% increase in any of my entry level jobs that I was there.
Speaker C:
Well, and that's a rounding error too.
Speaker A:
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker B:
For them that doesn't mean much.
Speaker A:
Right?
Speaker B:
For them they just got that 4 billion.
Speaker A:
Right.
Speaker A:
But still that's a big deal for me, you know, being down there.
Speaker A:
But I interrupted you there.
Speaker B:
No, not at all.
Speaker B:
Not at all.
Speaker B:
I think, I just think that like something that you should expect if you're getting into coffee is to.
Speaker B:
Is that you're in a position where you have those different avenues and if they're being cut off for you, you're.
Speaker A:
Not in the right coffee.
Speaker B:
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:
Like, like you need to go find something else.
Speaker B:
Like if, if they're saying like, well, you could try roasting and that was it.
Speaker B:
Yeah, like that's not it.
Speaker B:
That is like, that's, that's where, where I ended up.
Speaker B:
And I'm so glad I found roasting because I would not be in coffee any longer if I had to have a public facing position.
Speaker B:
But like it's not for everyone.
Speaker B:
And for a while it did feel like barista, roaster, owner.
Speaker B:
That's the career path, period, you know, Otherwise you do something else.
Speaker A:
I mean, I was surprised that I ended up at whole latte love for when I did.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
And that was tech skills.
Speaker B:
You need tech skills.
Speaker B:
Yeah.
Speaker A:
Well.
Speaker A:
And the crazy thing there is it was my coffee knowledge that got me in there, but it was the back end stuff that I had doing other stuff that secured the job too.
Speaker A:
So.
Speaker A:
But there's more stuff being out there for us once we, we get past that entry level point.
Speaker B:
So did we just.
Speaker B:
I think we've used up.
Speaker A:
I was.
Speaker B:
We've.
Speaker B:
We're used up our time just.
Speaker A:
I was looking for the couple of the grab bag.
Speaker B:
We have successfully grabbed the bag and.
Speaker C:
I think, I think we'll, we'll touch on.
Speaker C:
I mean there's always more time to talk about AI stuff so we can do another time.
Speaker C:
There's a good grab bag that was.
Speaker C:
We had some.
Speaker C:
It was an interesting discussion.
Speaker C:
I wasn't expecting to go on a diatribe about that corporations and the structure.
Speaker B:
I have to keep myself from doing that.
Speaker B:
So I'm glad you did.
Speaker B:
I'm glad you did.
Speaker C:
I know you do.
Speaker C:
I saw it on your face.
Speaker C:
I'm like, I'm going to do it.
Speaker A:
I'm going to tease this because in our beer discussion though, that when we were talking about A.I.
Speaker A:
graham mess Spectrometry came up.
Speaker C:
Sure.
Speaker A:
So that is coming in our AA episode, which is gonna be exciting.
Speaker C:
Awesome.
Speaker C:
So, yeah, let's close out for today.
Speaker C:
Wade, where should people get coffee?
Speaker B:
Co on Instagram aporiacoffee.com I have a plug.
Speaker B:
November 15th, we're dropping more loafers, so we're gonna be out at the warehouse, 175 Dewey Ave. Just doing some espresso, some drip.
Speaker B:
Looking at different.
Speaker B:
We might do a silver tin for you if you ask.
Speaker B:
Dropping a really.
Speaker B:
A really unique Kenyan coffee.
Speaker B:
So I'm super excited.
Speaker C:
Yeah.
Speaker C:
Thanks for filling the grab bag today, Aaron.
Speaker A:
Oh, this was.
Speaker A:
This was a pleasure.
Speaker A:
I like talking about this stuff too.
Speaker A:
So we nerd out and then we got to bring it up a level.
Speaker C:
So.
Speaker C:
Yeah, so make sure everybody go out and vote for everything.
Speaker C:
In the best of for City magazine, we have Bossy Roc, one of the podcasts on the network, up for best podcast.
Speaker C:
We also have a number of people up for best artist, best photographer, Richard Cologne Quadje.
Speaker C:
I think Magnus is up for best artist again.
Speaker C:
I think we have a few others as well.
Speaker C:
Go vote for the places you love.
Speaker C:
It does matter.
Speaker B:
November is for voting.
Speaker C:
November is for voting.
Speaker C:
And we all want everybody else to be dialed in.
Speaker B:
This has been a presentation of the Lunchadore podcast Network work.
Speaker C:
Hey.
Speaker C:
Hey, you.
Speaker C:
Look, look.
Speaker C:
Look at the camera for a second.
Speaker C:
I need you to look into my eyes.
Speaker C:
Ex.
Speaker C:
Get more value for yourself through extracting from labor.
