Aldo Coffee Company

How to Use Email Spam to One's Advantage

Melanie and I are both former corporate marketing executives.  We both ran email marketing campaigns for our companies.  And we're both pretty well educated on permission marketing.  You don't get any emails from us that you haven't specifically asked for.  And if you change your mind, you can unsuscribe with a press of a button and *poof* you're off the list.

While you don't get spam from us, there's a lot of spam out there and some of it gets through even the best filters.  We normally get a few emails each day that sneak past our filters.

t's not often that you get spam you can use.  It's annoying.  So it's all the more gratifying when you get something like the spam below (after the break), which you can use to your advantage.

Now Serving By the Cup

First it was the ice machine, then a grouphead on the Linea, then the dishwasher, now our Fetco Extractor volume brewer... all within the last 10 days.

Apparently, somebody needs to volunteer to jump into Waponi-Woo to appease the gods.

The bright side is you'll all get to experience our new hand brew method as everything needs to be done by the cup until the Fetco is fixed.  We hadn't planned on introducing our new Abid brewers this way, but we're happy we're ready to go with them.

Our apologies, but we can't do 20 ounce cups until we have our volume brewer back.

Ruhlman On Cheesecake Factory and the Soullessness of American Dining

So much good stuff comes down the pike via blogs and Twitter, it's tough to keep up.  But finally got around to reading Ruhlman's post on the "Cheesecake Factory Challenge".  Watch the video, read the comments.  Pretty much everything that's good and bad about American food habits and culinary arts is discussed. 

Before you ask, 1) yes, we've eaten there and it was neither horrible nor life-affirming, 2) even though coffee isn't specifically mentioned, all you need do is substitute Starbucks/Caribou for Cheesecake Factory and the same things apply - good and bad.

Final Belly Dancing Show This Afternoon

Free all ages show, 4-5pm today.

We hate saying goodbye to Amethyst and her troupe, but music licensing issues dictate we must. 

This is our final ever in-store performance of any kind.  We're simply not shelling out $1000 each year for various music licenses.  We don't make money off of performances.  We provided this venue because it supported local acts and was fun and interesting for us.  Now it has to come to an end because of a bunch of greedy lawyers and accountants.

Local musicians - your associations (BMI, ASCAP, SESAC) are making it difficult for small business to provide outlets for local entertainers.  Do something about it.

Brrrr... Iced Coffee, Frappes, Shakeratos and Other Cool Stuff

For those that haven't seen it already, China Millman writes about cold coffee drinks in today's P-G.  We're briefly mentioned a couple of times.

In the article, China talks about unique brew methods at different cafes, but also includes a curious (to us) paragraph:

The real money for cafes is in flavored, iced lattes and frozen coffee drinks, which cost pennies to make (at least at most cafes) but fetch premium prices -- usually $3 to $4 for a small and often approaching $5 for a large. That's why cafes go to such efforts to differentiate their products from the competition. Most of those frozen, flavored drinks are similar, but a catchy name goes a long way. Starbucks has frappuccinos. Caribou Coffee has Northern Light Coffee Coolers and Snowdrifts.

We must be doing it wrong.  Our frozen drinks, whether frappes, smoothies, or iced chai (and all chai for that matter) are among the menu items with the lowest margins in terms of cost of goods v. net profit. 

But we're fixing that next week ;-)

China also mentioned our Shakerato (and a recipe for making one at home).  We're still surprised (and disappointed) that Shakeratos haven't found wider acceptance here as they have in much of Europe.  It one of our favorite ways to enjoy a cold coffee.

For the record, we don't use a cold brewer here (although we have a Toddy system in the basement).  We simply brew double strength coffee right over ice.  Nothing against cold brew methods, we simply don't have the space in our refrigerators (in fact, our milk orders are now spilling over into the display case).

Challenge Your Palate - With a Taco

When we first started selling expensive coffee in the 'burbs, it was a big risk.  We were higher priced than anyone, we were talking about flavor notes in coffee that wasn't artificially flavored, we preached specific brewing parameters and invested in people who could enter and win barista competitions.  Very little of this made sense to people who just wanted a dose of caffeine.  It was just coffee, after all, right?

In the ensuing years, a handful of shops caught up and pushed the boundaries of what coffee can be even further.  Those people have our respect and should be appreciated, even if they're competitors.  Today there's a weekly coffee column in the P-G.  Few other cities have that.  So congratulate yourselves on making a difference by coming here for coffee or going to the others on the short list who pay attention to excellence.  You're raising the tide for all those little boats that are still stuck on the supermarket coffee sandbar.

With that said, right now nobody is taking a bigger risk in the Pittsburgh food scene than Kevin Sousa.  He's taken up residence at Yo Rita on the South Side (Carson & 11th) and has turned a "normal Pittsburgh" taco menu into a something of a degustation menu of $5 tacos.

Those who know and follow Kevin (and while not best buds, we're certainly acquainted) trust the guy implicitly to serve something that's wonderful, even if it's nothing they'd ever considered putting in their mouths before.  And he's running with that concept as if he expects Andrew Zimmern or Bourdain to show up any minute for some offal on a tortilla.

Belle, Frank, Michelle and Rich were at Yo Rita last Friday noshing on tacos filled with things like eel, pork mole and apple, huitlacoche (corn fungus), tongue and beef marrow. 

It was all delicious.

Decaf: Methylene Chloride > Water

The decaf we sell is Swiss Water Process (SWP). 

We sell beans decaffeinated using SWP largely because customers who drink decaf routinely ask for this process by name. We believe this is because the folks who market SWP have branded it so well that customers think it's both tastiest and safest.

Unfortunately neither is true.  This article does a great job of discussing the benefits/flaws of the four major decaffeination processes.

We don't drink decaf ourselves so we haven't spent a lot of time thinking about it.  But as we're all about taste and transparency, looks like it's about time we revisited our options for decaf.

The more you know...

Slow Food: The Story of Milk

This seems like it will be interesting, so sharing it here in case any of y'all want to attend.
Here's the email from Slow Food Pittsburgh (contact them, not us, to reserve a spot - see boldface type below for how):

The Surprising Story of Milk

Come and hear the real story of milk.
Or shall we say the story of REAL milk.
Meet the cows, taste various milks,
stay for organic lunch.

Your hosts: Slow Food Pittsburgh,
Eat 'n Park, East End Co-op,  Green Chef, Brunton Dairy
Reserve now:
Saturday, July 11
10 am to 2 pm.
$12 members, $15 nonmembers
( details below)

Happy 4th. Open Until 1pm Today

We could be open later if we wanted, but we'd make you drink straight espresso if we were.  Enjoy your cookout wherever you are.  Regular hours tomorrow.

Mt. Lebo First Friday Tonight, We're Open Til 9pm. Free Espresso 12n-5p!

Tonight's First Friday theme is "Positive Vibrations", featuring sounds of the Caribbean.  Main act in Clearview Commons is The Flow Band. Other acts and entertainment will be up and down Washington Road.

We'll be open until 9pm tonight.  No entertainment here, but feel free to duck in for coffee, dessert and some air conditioning.

This afternoon, as we were the recipients of a lot of coffee leftover from last week's Sprodown, we're sharing our bounty and doing something that we hope might make some converts to a more continental lifestyle - FREE ESPRESSO.

From noon to five today, during the Frank & Rich shift, we'll have three different espressos on bar.  We - will be serving FREE doubles for consumption in ceramic demitasse in the store.