Barista Champion Fritz Storm discusses his passion for sharing knowledge, and how Eversys machines suit the needs of Denmark’s evolving coffee culture.
When deciding his next career move after becoming the third ever World Barista Champion in 2002, Fritz Storm didn’t follow the path many victors now take.
“A lot of the winners tend to do their own thing like running a café, but I knew from the beginning that wasn’t my goal,” he says.
A Denmark native, Storm has experienced the evolution of the Scandinavian coffee industry firsthand. The region produced six of the first seven World Barista Champions, including Storm. However, he felt the knowledge gap between coffee professionals and consumers was widening, which inspired him to establish Coffee by Storm in 2013.
Its mission is to provide consultancy services to businesses across Denmark to guide them towards the right coffee, equipment, and service.
“We want to be the one stop solution for any business, big or small,” says Storm.
Coffee by Storm has provided an outlet for Storm to follow his passion for coffee education, and to show future champions the potential career opportunities outside of the café space.
Storm says coffee culture in Denmark has bloomed significantly throughout the company’s first decade.
“When we first started, coffee was just a black drink, and no one knew its capabilities,” he says. “What has changed the most in the past 10 years is the collective realisation that people don’t want to drink the same thing they’ve been drinking their whole lives, and they’re looking for new ways to enjoy coffee.”
When Storm was leading a barista camp in Shanghai alongside Japanese coffee icon Kentaro Maruyama in 2015, he decided to check out the new machines on display at a nearby tradeshow. As the owner of Coffee by Storm, a complete coffee solutions company catering to the Danish market, he never missed the opportunity to add new kit to his catalogue.
“The e’4 machine from Eversys immediately caught my attention,” says Storm. “At the time, I didn’t know of any great super-automatic machines. Once Eversys told me about the e’4, I was eager to start working together.”
For Storm, it was the ability of Eversys machines to adjust to the desired parameters of the user that made him fall in love with the brand.
“Using these machines, I feel like I can take all the knowledge I have developed from manual machines and apply it to an Eversys machine,” he says. “As a barista, it works exactly how I want it to. I can dial in my recipes and the machine can recreate it automatically and consistently.”
As a World Barista Champion, Storm looks for consistency and quality in the products he uses, something he was particularly impressed by in Eversys machines’ espresso capabilities.
“This is incredibly important to what we do at Coffee by Storm, because our number one priority is producing the best in-cup taste,” he says. “To get this quality result, you need everything to be perfect, and that’s what Eversys provides.”
Since the company first partnered with Eversys, it has been the machine manufacturer’s direct distributor in Denmark. It’s just one of the many countries that make up the Eversys Rest of World (ROW) division, which Sales Director Sandra van den Bergh leads.
With sustained growth comes added responsibility. Van den Bergh says the Eversys team knew they couldn’t run an office in each individual country it distributes in, so the ROW division was created to ensure each country was represented within the company. This includes Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and surrounding African countries, South America, and all of Europe excluding the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Austria, and Poland.
“We’ve continued to grow quite rapidly, and we’re always looking for new countries to join the ROW division,” van den Bergh says. “With these new partners, we want to push the limits of coffee, and inspire and spread consistent coffee quality everywhere.”
To keep up with each country’s specific trends, Eversys has selected trusted distributors such as Coffee by Storm to be the eyes and ears on the ground.
“The industry and the taste of consumers is changing fast, but we are faster,” says van den Bergh. “We can help optimise your daily performance because we understand and listen to our customers.”
Eversys has learned that the office coffee culture in Europe has become a topic of discussion, particularly in Scandinavia.
“The market in these countries is demanding greater workplace coffee. When people in Scandinavia interview for a new job, they have two concerns during the interview process: the first is about the food, and the second is about the coffee. Therefore, Scandinavian companies generally budget for a high-quality coffee solution, and this is where the Eversys equipment and the service provided by Coffee by Storm come into play to keep the team happy,” says van den Bergh.
“I usually recommend the Eversys Cameo for offices, but I see a very bright future for our Legacy machine in this space too, because it has all the same capabilities as the Cameo but with a smaller footprint,” she says.
These capabilities include the ability to make chai, chocolate-based, or other powder drinks through its powder unit, which can store up to two kilograms of drink powders, as well as up to three different types of coffee beans.
“The Legacy will serve any hot drink an employee may need to be happy and productive all day long,” she says.
Van den Bergh adds that the Legacy, much like other Eversys machines, can be relied upon to produce quality drinks consistently, while also support the facility management thanks to the Eversys easy cleaning process, and quick and efficient maintenance visits.
Fritz Storm adds that coffee breaks are highly valued by employees for both social interaction and emotional wellbeing, making office coffee one of the more important sectors in the industry.
“We were seeing a lot of people complain about the quality of their coffee at work,” he says.
He believes Eversys machines have helped address the two biggest needs for an office coffee machine.
“It makes really good coffee, and it’s silent,” he says. “In a fast-paced environment, you don’t want something that takes a lot of time and makes a lot of noise, especially when people are trying to concentrate.”
Storm’s willingness to help and educate others about coffee solutions, both in and out of the office, will be put to good use during this year’s World of Coffee (WOC) expo in Copenhagen, taking place from 27 to 29 June.
Eversys’ stand will incorporate the company’s Driving Performance theme, where it will build on a commitment to espresso innovation. It hopes to deliver experiences and inspire tradeshow guests to explore the latest trends to maximise their coffee menus. And, just like at Host Milano, the innovative Specter solution from Coffee by Storm and Smyze will again be the star of the show.
The Specter is a complete under-counter coffee solution that removes clutter on the work bench. It features an on-counter tap that can be connected to either the Legacy or Cameo stored underneath. Orders can be made through a tablet connected to the hidden machine, producing a quality coffee through the display tap.
“Nothing like this exists right now,” Storm says. “It’s got that Eversys quality we’ve come to expect, all while taking up such a small amount of space.”
Storm will be supporting Eversys at WOC Copenhagen as the two companies look to continue their Danish partnership for years to come. The Eversys team is excited to partner with Coffee by Storm as they hope to elevate the country’s coffee scene to the next level.
“We love supporting our friends here in Denmark,” says Storm. “It’s very exciting to have the big show come to town.”
For more information, visit eversys.com
This article was first published in the May/June 2024 edition of Global Coffee Report. Read more HERE.
