The “crafting” of food and beverage launches another revolution...

A second installment in our series on Global Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Marketing

We’ve all heard of craft breweries – a known staple in the San Diego market, if not the home of this particular revolution, with many local manufacturers now increasingly exporting their products overseas.  It happens to be one of the most in-demand exporting industries in the region.  “Craft” is the niche, quaint byproduct of the organic, personalized movement in the food and beverage industry.  One that declares itself the creative, Einstein-like child of mass-market parents.  It has not only changed the way we taste food and beverage, but also how it is distributed and shared with us.  And, the concept is gaining traction as it spills into yet another staple segment - coffee.

KSW had the pleasure of getting to know Tom Ryan, co-founder of San Diego’s Ryan Bros Coffee Company, and his craft coffee houses.  He’ll tell you that the modern American coffee shop model makes little to no sense. Since this sort of shop generally tries to offer the same sorts of espresso-based products that Starbucks has made so popular nationally, its owners have to start by buying complicated and expensive equipment for creating espresso shots. The coffee itself is bought in bean form, roasted elsewhere, and purchased with instructions on how to make the final product, ensuring that the barista at the counter has a sizable hand in the actual outcome of what the customer drinks. This leads to prohibitively expensive drinks that vary in quality sold at a relatively small profit margin at a rate much lower than the average national chain.

By contrast, craft breweries have introduced the idea of unique products that can be prepared by the same master brewer, then sold to national chains and locally-owned shops alike, guaranteeing an awe-inspiring variety of uniform products for any customer no matter where they choose to drink. Previously, this sort of model was impossible for a coffee shop to replicate, and since this meant that three shops on the same block could serve the same beans in the same drink three different ways, suppliers of different blends had little to no brand recognition with the final consumer, the daily coffee drinker. Now, however, the advent of keg-stored cold brew has opened up an entirely new avenue for coffee distribution.

For Ryan Bros, this means a chance for their decades of experience roasting and brewing coffee to translate directly to a product that can be sold the same way anywhere across the country. The result is a flagship location in the Barrio Logan neighborhood that looks every bit the part of a brewery, with a line of taps across the store’s main counter offering teas, non-dairy mochas, and a drink brewed from green, unroasted coffee beans, all unique products that could be served at an identical level of quality at any location with the ability to tap a keg. The model opens up new avenues for mid-sized shops like Ryan Bros, not just as roasters, but also as brewers. And, because the product takes up only the space of one keg and can be sold anywhere, it also opens up the same sort of collaborative marketplace for coffee that beer has enjoyed in a city like San Diego, where collaborations between wholly separate corporations and guest brews on tap are commonplace at even the biggest retailers in the restaurant/hospitality industry.

While the craft, cold brew revolution has paved the way for an entirely new angle on coffee-making, Ryan Bros is looking to reinvent espresso, the side of the business that has dominated the North American coffee scene for the past two decades, as well. The result is a handheld espresso machine based around the traditional French press, one with none of the intricate parts that make a traditional espresso machine so expensive and difficult to maintain. Matched with a simple milk steamer and a water heater, this device has already replaced the traditional espresso machine in the company’s flagship location, and a crowd-funded rollout to the home consumer will soon follow. Once paired with a countertop milk steamer, the company hopes that this product will allow the average coffee drinker to replicate the espresso bar experience at home in a way that has previously been impossible.

Getting to know the Ryan Bros model shows us that “crafting” of food and beverage takes a certain innovation and entrepreneurship to get it right, and with the right marketing and distribution, the wheels of revolution keep turning in the coffee industry, regionally and globally.