superbarista

blog from the ceo & superbarista of phoenix coffee, home of the best baristas in cleveland, ohio

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Big Compliment

Yesterday, while I was educating three new baristas at our Roastery, I got a big compliment from Michael Corbin, one of our new baristas who will be working at our Lee Road cafe. As the day progressed, from morning paperwork, through two videos, lunch, then the quiz, then hands on practice with the espresso machine, Michael seemed to warm to the task of absorbing information. Around 4 o'clock, as we practiced making latte after latte, polished the ruby (see archived posts for explanation... it's nothing obscene) and then finally fractionated a shot of espresso into its three extraction phases, Michael proclaimed something like this:

"You know, I have worked at two other coffee companies [Starbucks and Arabica] and I have learned more this afternoon than I did at either place."

I was ecstatic and immediately gave Michael a high-five. (High fives are now a frequent occurrence around Phoenix, kudos to Kiley for that cultural contribution.) We work hard to educate our staff, but sometimes I lament our limited time and resources. As a small business, we are constantly challenged to do more with less and to make each minute count. I'm still coasting on the warmth of pride that swelled in me after he made that comment.

Go Team Phoenix!

2 Comments:

Blogger molly said...

this is entirely of the subject, but it is the morning of august 17, and a new credit card policy haas apparently been put in place, no credit cards undcer five dollars. the policy is good, but i did not see the tiny little sign letting me, the customer, know that it was coming and ended up feeling embarrased that i had no cash and silly for being surprised and a little annoyed because i felt uninformed.

i think it is your, the', responsibility to have clear and visible warning/ information signs for a policy change like this, not a tinyh little square taped to the cash register.

thanks for your time

6:00 AM, August 17, 2006  
Blogger Sarah Wilson Belzile said...

Molly,
The new policy isn't no credit cards under $5, it's just that we need to impose a surcharge of $.50 for purchases under $5 because we are getting reamed by the credit card companies on small purchases. If we ring up a cup of coffee for $1.45 and the fees cost us $.50 on that transaction, it doesn't actually make sense to sell the cup of coffee. I'm sorry if the policy wasn't explained to you clearly!

7:52 AM, August 17, 2006  

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