The Case for a Michelin Guide for Coffee
The Case for a Michelin Guide for Coffee
Whenever I am travelling, there is a common process I go through. Whenever I land or wake in a new city, I fire up my browser and enter the following:
Speciality coffee in X
My phone has recognised this as a frequent habit now. When I begin type 's' + 'p', my phone immediately knows what to autocomplete it towards. I'll run this ritual days in advance of a trip and I'll start to put together a small list of places that are highly rated or look very aesthetically pleasing (my go to sign of quality usually). Taking all of this information from Maps and putting together a hit list I'll try to tick off during my visit. Some visits are extensive and I get a good portion of the way through the list, often times with mixed results. Other visits are flying, with time to fit in 1-2 shops at most. These flying visits often have a much lower hit ratio as I scramble to identify somewhere good.
Outside of Maps ratings, photos, and reviews, I also use websites such as European Coffee Trip and various personal blogs surfaced by the search algorithm. ECT is particularly helpful with city guides and hot spots overlayed with a map. However, general quality control can be mixed. Although the experience is usually pretty good, what I'm really looking to do, especially when I was away, is to maximise the experience. Visiting shops that are more like labs, extending the overall experience from just a quick flat white to go to expertly curated pour overs, experimental and cutting edge milk techniques used with high quality espresso, and coffee flights. Unique experiences that are out of the ordinary and that you're willing to pay a premium for.
It is no secret that the coffee industry in general is trending towards the "prosumer". Of course, high street and global chains still have their place and are continuing to grow. However, these days it doesn't take much for the casual coffee drinker to begin to dip their toe into the world of single origin and roast profiles lighter than granite. As bean-to-cup machines continue to fly off the shelves, a market is growing for elevated coffee drinking experiences outside of the home. The pool of individuals who will make extended journeys to visit highly commended shops, or bolt onto their itinerary as a "must-visit" will continue to grow with this market.
What these customers need now, is a guide. A truly best in class ranking of coffee shops across the globe, starting with the major cities and tourist hot spots. This guide should chronicle the best and brightest shops offering the latest innovations. It would be shops offering tastings, rare beans and roasts, experimental co-ferments, excellence in service, and become a repository of premium coffee shop experiences. It would be able to offer an accreditation, similar to the star system, shops can proudly display and be considered a mark of excellence for coffee consumers to seek out.
The Michelin guide would be the perfect service to emulate. It is the go to for serious foodies the world over. Their categorisation across bib gourmand and the star system is the gold standard in the culinary world. The guide pushes chefs to the limits of what the culinary experience can offer, providing competition and dining experiences that would have been unthinkable just a few decades ago. For any chef, aspiring to a star (or multiple stars), is the epitome of any serious gourmet cooking career. The spoils are evident too, with restaurants that achieve 1*+ status seeing revenues and bookings spike once they're included in the guide.
The Michelin Guide of coffee could act as the same springboard for truly quality and unique coffee experiences. A trusted voice for anyone visiting a new city or looking for the best experience in the city that they live in. Providing serious consumers with all of the information that they need. Additionally, pushing the worlds best baristas into offering unique and excellent experiences and the top service. This competition pushing top level experiences to greater and higher heights.
There will of course be limitations. Gourmet dining experiences are much more varied than what is possible from a coffee shop, with restaurants able to offer various cuisines, tasting menus, and unique service elements that just aren't possible or feasible in a coffee shop. Additionally, there are limitations on how you could categorise shops into a star based system. Would a shop offering some kind of coffee tasting be a 3* experience or just a 1*? With the limited number of shops offering this sort of service today (at least in my experience) then the guide would be incredibly short. Letting too many shops in at the bottom 1* level then dilutes the accreditation. There is an argument for letting the market build itself, selecting just a small number of 1* shops that operate today and building the market up to 3* (or whatever the equivalent would be... beans perhaps? Too obvious maybe) as it establishes itself. Additionally, Michelin have an established network of anonymous reviewers who are trusted given their years of unique experience in the world of hospitality. The world of coffee is much smaller and the qualities of a trusted reviewer is something that would need to be defined.
For coffee enthusiasts everywhere, a better guide for top tier coffee experiences is needed. That could take the form of a more curated equivalent of ECT or a more sophisticated Michelin style guide with a network of established reviewers and a recognisable accreditation. The 'prosumer' market will continue to grow as more and more people move towards higher quality, better tasting coffee. These customers will start to search, in greater and greater numbers, for elevated, unique, and premium coffee experiences. There will be a guide that supports these customers - who will build it? Who knows.