CoffeeGeek • Nespresso and the WBC

Nespresso and the WBC

If I cared more about the World Barista Championship these days, I’d probably do a lot more research on the following subject and do a front page article for CoffeeGeek, where the readership is a bit higher than here on tumblr for me. But the truth is, I think the WBC (and especially some countries’ national competitions (coff coff USBC)) are pricing themselves (not to mention marketing themselves) out of existence and potential relevancy to the vast majority of quality driven baristas. Not to mention how irrelevant the whole thing is to many home baristas and enlightened espresso consumers. So a tumblr post it is.

In case you haven’t heard, Nestle, via its Nespresso brand, is the $60,000 Premier Sponsor of this year’s WBC.

This is wrong on so many levels.

First, I’ve seen some people compare it to the syrup companies who have sponsored national competitions and the WBC in the past. If this were just about the pure quality of espresso as a beverage, the argument might be good, but it really isn’t.

Syrups are what some consumers want added to coffee - be it bad, mediocre, okay, good, or even great coffee. Syrups aren’t responsible for bad coffee or things like the Coffee Crisis.

Nestle is bad for coffee. All around. Bad for farmers. Bad for the children of coffee farmers. Bad for lobbying. Bad for screwing with national infastructure. Bad for sourcing horrible coffee. Bad for storing bad coffee for years, even decades in the past, then using it. Bad for the quality of coffee. Bad for commoditizing coffee in a way that can (and has) completely destroy entire farming communities. Bad for taste. Bad for everything surrounding coffee.

So they get George Clooney in a tux, get him to flash a smile, put a fancy name on a non-recyclable plastic and metal container that contains low grade commodity coffee and flavourings, and all of a sudden they’re forgiven? All of a sudden they’re in the realm of specialty coffee?

Nespresso is all about image. It is nothing about paying farmers a fair wage for their labour. Nothing about actual quality in the cup unless aided with chemicals and flavourings. Nothing about what the specialty coffee movement is about.

Further, Nestle is, in my mind at least, the complete polar opposite of what the WBC was supposed to be about. The only thing the two have in common is actual coffee, and even that is a stretch. Nestle has to steam bath a lot of the crud-grade commodity coffee they buy to in effect bleach out harsh and disgusting flavours. Mmmm burnt rubber.

I know (because I’m told often enough) that the WBC is starved for money. Supposedly they got over half a million from Nuova Simonelli in NS’s three years of sponsorship (along with free tech support, free machines, yada yada) but that gets burned through quick. The WBC charges volunteers to become expert volunteers. And still they have to go out and find money from the devil. Another thing wrong with this whole deal.

And what about the message Nestle’s sponsorship gives to the baristas competing? I can’t even begin to broach that subject.

If the WBC is starved for money, and more appropriate sponsors (or side industry sponsors, like culinary-driven companies, or technology companies, or even car companies) aren’t coming forward or answering the WBC’s cold calls, maybe it’s time to look at the entire structure of the WBC from top to bottom and figure out how to do things differently so that great sponsors, appropriate sponsors can come on board.

The first thing I’d suggest, and I’ve been suggesting this for years, is make the competition and everything surrounding it more approachable to consumers. Why this isn’t clear as day to the powers that be, I’ll never know. National competitions (like our own in Canada) are held in the back parts of closed-off commercial trade shows. The Canadian Barista Championship had as little as 10 people in the audience during portions of the finals. Attendance at US competitions, once you take out competitors’ friends and co-workers, isn’t much better. Reminds me of the poor starving musician who manages to cajole his friends to come out and see him play his set at Barrymores.

Approachable also means the public gets to taste things. A lot of things. They get to taste sig drinks. They get to taste espresso. It could be as simple as requiring every competition barista to pull 8 or 10 shots for the audience after their competition round (and find a sponsor to pay for the product).

The second thing is, make the competition more marketable. It has to be more appealing and enticing to an audience. One suggestion I posted five years ago to Coffeed was a complete redesign of the stage: judges would sit at a half-moon cafe table with their backs to the audience. Audience all wrapped around the judging table and back behind. Three machines situated at 135degrees, 90degrees, and 4g degrees from the judges’ table. Judges sitting THE FUCK down. The barista would come serve at the table, addressing the judges, but the audience would be facing them head on. Just that alone would make this entirely more approachable for the viewers. Hell, it might even make it televisable.

Third, once the competitions are more marketable and more appealing to consumers and culinary inspired people, approach more mainstream, more dynamic sponsors. TV is full of haute culinaria with great sponsors. The WBC has to get a “low grade commodity coffee company with a pretty dress on” to sponsor.

I really, really, REALLY wish that Instaurator had taken over running the WBC back in 2005. Shoulda happened, but never did. Might be a radically different beast today.