WatchHouse is a boutique specialty espresso group constructed on craft and human hospitality. LAP Espresso is reshaping specialty espresso with automation at its core. Two profitable espresso companies, two very totally different visions. Is the espresso business sufficiently big for the each of them?
For Roland Horne, Founder & CEO of WatchHouse, human hospitality experiences can by no means be totally replicated by automation, nor ought to that ever be the objective. For WatchHouse, automation is an enabler of its human-centric ethos. However does performing repetitive handbook duties actually make a barista a craftsperson? For Horne, delivering a really artisanal espresso expertise is way extra advanced.
Tonalli Arreola is one other details-obsessed espresso entrepreneur. He co-founded LAP Espresso with a mission to liberate specialty espresso from the constraints of excessive operational prices. The answer? Automate each stage of the café course of for optimum operational efficiency – and a few of the lowest-priced specialty espresso in Europe. However ought to specialty espresso experiences be about extra than simply the liquid within the cup? Arreola is aware of that eradicating people from hospitality is dangerous enterprise.
