New Starbucks Reserve Coffees

Brought to you by Starbucks

11 | 21 | 2024

[dropcap]F[/dropcap]or the past ten years or so smaller, hipper, more nimble roasting companies have dominated the coffee conversation in America, outflanking Starbucks in roast style (lighter than Starbucks), freshness (roast-dated packaging), coffee selection (precisely identified seasonal small lots), brewing (by the cup, often by hand), and even design sensibility (usually blunt, simple and utilitarian, often reflecting the bold shapes and primary colors of retro Russian Revolution design). But then, a few months ago, Starbucks opened its palatial Reserve Roastery in Seattle, a spectacular answer to the challenge of the growing swarm of its newer, more-authentic-than-thou competitors. The new Seattle Roastery appears to be intended as a full-on counter-attack: “OK, we may have 21,000 locations worldwide and roast a zillion pounds of coffee per year, and we may be huge and corporate,” this facility seems to say, “but we are still a true coffee company, and what you guys can do, we can do as well or better.”

The facility and its operations reflect most current tastes and trends in high-end coffee with impressive perception and intelligence. The plant and its demonstration-style layout illustrate fine coffee production with an almost museum-like thoroughness. The visual design is impressive, tactfully interpreting current tastes with materially rich understatement: cupper, leather, fine woods. The green coffees are precisely sourced and described. The coffee in the tasting room is brewed by the cup using the visitor’s choice of brewing method, from Chemex through siphon. Bigger than the other guys, certainly, and more discreetly spectacular for sure. But what about the coffees?

One of the greatest features is what the space lacks—the presence of physical barriers between the customer and the barista. Kevin worked with John Ermacoff to install the first prototype of a new under bar espresso machine similar to the MOD Bar used in the new Counter Culture Training Center. The machine is still unnamed and uses the guts of a Synesso Sabre. It features the same volumetric and PID benefits, while being extremely low profile. There are two groups and two cool touch steam wands that are controlled by foot pedals on the floor for hands free milk magic. The groups themselves have a profile that’s more aesthetically similar to an Über boiler and less like the flowing lines of the MOD Bar. But most importantly, guests are no longer walled off from baristas. The espresso bar now provides the same theater as the pour over bar. There will soon be two espresso machines (a second low pro is being built) which will add the option of ordering single origin espressos ground on the EK43.

Lighter-Roasted and Higher-Rated One thing was clear, however. The eleven coffees we purchased from the three smaller Starbucks competitors all rated better than the Starbucks did. Much better. They all were roasted light or medium-light, they all were roasted consistently, and they all were roasted well. Average Scores: Starbucks Reserve: 88.25 Allegro Coffee: 92.0 Blue Bottle Coffee: 92.0 Victrola Coffee: 94.0 However, if we only include in our comparison the three Starbucks samples that were roasted moderately dark rather than full-on dark, their average would be 91.0 – only a point lower than the Allegro and Blue Bottle averages. Which suggests to me, again, that the Roastery Reserve program is buying excellent coffees, but subjecting them to what would appear to be arbitrary roast profiling, a profiling not related to either the potential of the green coffees or to coherent positioning in the marketplace. In the reviews associated with this report, we review the highest- and lowest-rated coffees from each of the three Starbucks competitors – Allegro, Blue Bottle and Victrola – plus the two highest-rated and two of the lowest-rated of the eight Starbucks samples. Spectacle or Coffee? I hope that Starbucks Reserve management gets a handle on the roasting, and begins to handle it as coherently and deliberately as it has everything else about its impressive new facility. Otherwise Starbucks could be accused, justifiably I think, of caring more about the marketing spectacle of its amazing Roastery than about the quality and character of the coffee that Roastery produces.

New Starbucks Reserve Coffees

shop No Comments

For the past ten years or so smaller, hipper, more nimble roasting companies have dominated the coffee conversation in America, outflanking Starbucks in roast style (lighter than Starbucks), freshness (roast-dated packaging), coffee selection (precisely identified seasonal small lots), brewing (by the cup, often by hand), and even design sensibility (usually blunt, simple and utilitarian, often reflecting the bold shapes and primary colors of retro Russian Revolution design).

But then, a few months ago, Starbucks opened its palatial Reserve Roastery in Seattle, a spectacular answer to the challenge of the growing swarm of its newer, more-authentic-than-thou competitors. The new Seattle Roastery appears to be intended as a full-on counter-attack: “OK, we may have 21,000 locations worldwide and roast a zillion pounds of coffee per year, and we may be huge and corporate,” this facility seems to say, “but we are still a true coffee company, and what you guys can do, we can do as well or better.”

The facility and its operations reflect most current tastes and trends in high-end coffee with impressive perception and intelligence. The plant and its demonstration-style layout illustrate fine coffee production with an almost museum-like thoroughness. The visual design is impressive, tactfully interpreting current tastes with materially rich understatement: cupper, leather, fine woods. The green coffees are precisely sourced and described. The coffee in the tasting room is brewed by the cup using the visitor’s choice of brewing method, from Chemex through siphon.

Bigger than the other guys, certainly, and more discreetly spectacular for sure. But what about the coffees?