“Wait what? There is a QR-Code on the back of the label?”
- You, Beloved Guest
Behind the Early Bird
Our cherished summer coffee, released every year at the Easter Market. This year, our goal is to develop Early Bird to work seamlessly with fully automatic machines. The taste profile we strive for is a sweet coffee with great depth that suits most styles of drinks.
Our first attempt was a complete shot in the dark. We used Brazil, Indonesian wet-hulled, and Nicaragua.
While the taste and style were heading in the right direction, it lacked both depth and sweetness. The conclusion was… too boring.
Fine Tuning
How do we tackle boring?
We decided to add a fourth component: Peru.
The result is promising. We found both the espresso and Americano to be more pleasant and closer to the right direction taste-wise.
Next up is to try it in the fully automatic. We tested it on the Jura machine and are pleased with the result. So far, it really feels like a good coffee, with depth and sweetness, not extreme, but stable.
The depth is there, with lingering dark chocolate notes and subtle sweetness.
Design
As soon as the coffee blend and flavor profile have been set, we hand the mission over to design. Here, our designer gets a general mood and feel of the coffee from us. She tastes the coffee and reads our tasting notes, as well as what mood we believe the coffee gives off. She then sets out to match the color and theme of the label to the coffee. In this case, it is an early morning vibe, so the label should feel like the sun has just risen.
Original Heidelberg
Once the design is ready and the labels are printed, we move on to Hot-Foil Stamping. In this step, the color of the foil should complement the colors of the label. For the Early-Bird we went for an iridescent color.
