MILAN — One thing that makes coffee so special is the variety of ways in which it can be extracted, with espresso far and away the best-known method in Mediterranean countries (but by no means the only one).
So what is happening, for example, in filtered coffee? One view of the sector comes to us from Twinky Au-Yeung of the Hong Kong-based company Loveramics. It sees batch brewing as one of the trends for 2019.
The term means making filtered coffee not manually but using machines such as V60s, Chemex, Clever Dripper and the like.
The method has two advantages: you can make more at a lower cost and the quality is kept constant, unlike in the past.
“With labour costs increasing and the rise in demand for quality, single-origin coffee, batching brewing of better coffee makes sense,” Au-Yeung explains.
“Technology is so great these days where products are efficient and we can go scientific about brewing with ease. But don’t forget it should also be beautifully designed and help coffee shops differentiate too. Machines can adapt their aesthetic to fit all sorts of interior trends.”
Offering products that complement espresso is probably the most distinctive development we will be seeing in the coffee shops of the future, in many markets.
“Brewing is becoming more and more popular all over the world and this will also be visible in 2019,” says Diana Nicola, export sales manager for the Romanian Hedone Coffee.
“However, espresso is and will remain the star. In any case quality is always improving, as the interest of consumers towards the product is growing. The Third Coffee Wave is expanding and rumour has it we’re slowly entering a fourth coffee wave.”
This suggests that the coffee itself, however wonderful is quality and origin, is no longer going to be enough.
As competition increases, just like in any other industrial field an establishment will have to find an extra “something” to make it recognisable and able to survive economically thanks to the distinctiveness of its service and the range of products it offers.
