Building a partnership with Espresso Services
So, you have decided to open a coffee shop. That is the first of many steps that lead to making your dream a reality and sharing your passion for coffee with others. Remember, it is a business, and like any other business, you need a sound plan to succeed. Successful coffee shops are the result of careful research, planning, choice of location, training, excellent customer service and high quality products. ESI can help you shape that plan and make a difference in the long-term success of your shop.
Choosing a Vendor
Choosing the right vendor is an important decision during the planning of your new coffee business. The company you choose should provide barista training, menu development,
warranty, service and parts. But that is just the beginning, the initial choice you make will also lead to the continued support you receive, downtime you experience and long term cost of the equipment.
Our Focus
ESI’s Focus is as unique as the equipment we import. Our primary goal is to help our customers serve a high quality and consistently prepared beverage. We accomplish this by offering quality equipment and extensive training. Our broad selection of equipment and products enables us to customize an espresso program for every food service application, large or small. Many companies provide a decent cup of coffee, but few understand espresso like ESI.
Our Experience
Founded as a technical service company in 1989, ESI has worked with Italian manufacturers such as LaCimbali, Mazzer, Macap, Sirman, and others to import equipment directly to ESI in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Our unique direct import concept continues to provide a factory direct value to our customers. We also partner with a wide range of domestic companies to supply brewers, blenders and a full line of water treatment. For equipment support after the installation, we provide service, parts, and scheduled preventative maintenance programs. Our customers include individually owned neighborhood cafes to major coffee shop chains with hundreds of locations.
The "One Stop Shop"
For years, we have provided a “One Stop Shop” concept complete with equipment, products and technical service. Our comprehensive selection enables a customer to find the solution for all their specialty coffee needs with one stop, or one phone call. We offer a variety of choices within each equipment and product category including espresso, drip coffee, imported and domestic flavoring syrups, gourmet chocolate sauces, smoothie bases & more.
Menu = Budget
The first thing you might want to consider in developing your budget is your menu. Ask yourself, "What am I going to serve?" The reason for this is that your menu determines which pieces of equipment you will need. See our General Price Guidelines to get a good start on putting together a core equipment package.
Layout
There is a lot more to opening a shop than simply installing equipment and opening the doors to help customers. Many start up coffee shops either waste a lot of time by trying to reinvent the wheel, or make common mistakes laying out their equipment in an inefficient manner. Avoid last minute confusion and expense by using ESIÕs consulting services which we include in most of our equipment packages. ESI recommends that you hire a professional to plan and draw the layout for your espresso bar. If you choose to do the planning yourself, we will aurely assist you as best we can.
Choosing Equipment
As you will see, there is a wide range in prices for certain kinds of equipment. ESI sells many brands of imported and domestic espresso machines, grinders, brewers, blenders, etc. This broad selection enables us to put together a custom package that suits your particular needs. Call one of our Account Managers in the Sales Department to help narrow the choices and select the right pieces of equipment.
Direct Import vs. Domestic Distributor
ESI imports espresso machines and grinders direct from Europe. We buy directly from the factory, and our customers buy direct from us ensuring the best value on a piece of quality equipment. Every other equipment dealer in the Midwest buys domestically from another distributor or importer. How many times would you like your equipment marked up before you pay for it?
Menu Development
ESI will help you develop a menu and show you how to use premium products, and to calculate accurate cost per serving and gross profit data for your specialty beverages.
Training/On Site Staff Training
At ESI, we take training very seriously. In fact, ESI is the SCAA host training center for the Midwest region We have develpoed a formal training program to ensure that you and your staff become familiar with the set up and operations of a working coffee bar before you open for business. This training covers coffee history, equiptment basics, espresso production, hot and cold drink assembly, and machine maintenance. After your Equiptment is installed, we will come to your location to provide extensive on-site training. We also include our Barista Training Guide as a premanent reference for current and future employees. If you need further training later, our staff is always glad to assist you as best we can.