Formed in 2002, after spending time in New Zealand, Coffee Charisma evolved because of the Antipodean attitude towards quality coffee. The New Zealand and Australian coffee cultures have always been far superior to the UK's and has no reflection on what we know as the "high street culture" we experience today.
Kay Middleton owner of Coffee Charisma decided to revolutionise the poor coffee market that seems to have taken hold in the last couple of years and bring some of a new culture home with her from her time away from the UK
It all started by sourcing freshly roasted coffee beans, selling these every week at markets in and around the Guildford area. What a great experience and opportunity to understand the wonderful world of selling - street trading in all weathers. But that was never going to be enough for me. Next I wanted to make my customers delicious coffee so they could experience part of this new way of thinking about quality coffee drinks.
A year later I had designed a very unique mobile espresso van, launching it at Cowdray Park Polo (where Prince Charles used to play polo). The following year, I opened up Platform 1, at Farncombe Station, getting up at 5.00am to serve delicious coffee every morning to all my regular customers. I now have everything I had ever wanted, I am converting all my customers to understanding the difference between high street coffee and great coffee.
I am delighted to serve coffee anytime, any place, anywhere and that really does sum up my business ethos, from weddings, product launches, music concerts, inside or out, on land or sea, and from dawn to dusk, I have developed tools that allow me to take an espresso machine anywhere and serve great coffee time and time again.
One of the biggest hurdles that I have come across, is to make sure your Barisatas have full support in their ever improving skills, and therefore I am constantly training my staff inhouse, with occasional help from the London School of Coffee from time to time. This helps contain the consistantly good coffee from barista to barista and that is how we get to serve every cup with care and consideration.
