Latest / Coffee People Podcast / A Pop-in with Michael Barthmus, Sivetz Roasting Machines

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A Pop-in with Michael Barthmus, Sivetz Roasting Machines · Coffee People Podcast

• 0:01
  The way we got Rostar started was looking at and discovering
• 0:05
  who coffee roasters were and what their problems were.
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  You're going to get unmatched legendary customer experience
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  here from start to finish. Rostar has evolved a ton over
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  the last few years. We've invested in new equipment
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  and technologies. We have really put a lot of
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  effort into continuous improvement out on the shop
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  floor. What I'm most proud of with Rose
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  Star is I love how they. Seek.
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  Cutting edge technology. We also make things that are
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  really cool for really cool customers too.
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  We're really interested in getting to know our customer and
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  discovering what we can do to help them out.
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  Any questions for me before we get going or any thoughts do?
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  You think it's what we got? Is that OK, seeing the roaster
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  in the background like that? Is that?
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  I think that's perfect. I saw it right away.
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  Yeah, it looks good. I mean, it's not the fireplace,
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  but it's still pretty nice. The fireplace with the yes.
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  A. Little cozier.
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  All right, well, let's get started.
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  And I'll start by just welcoming everyone.
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  Hey everyone, welcome to the Coffee People podcast.
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  I'm your host, Ryan Wolt. The show is presented by Rostar
• 1:49
  Coffee Packaging, which you can find online@rostar.com.
• 1:52
  Please go there so that they continue supporting the show.
• 1:54
  I appreciate it. And if you like the show, you
• 1:58
  can also go online to coffeepeoplepodcast.com.
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  You'll find recaps of this episode or Coffee Smarter
• 2:03
  podcast, all the other random coffee stuff that we kind of
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  compile every month. And if you haven't poured a cup
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  of coffee yet, now is the time popping in today with one of our
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  previous guests, Michael Barthmess, the CEO founder, the
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  face of the iconic Civets roasting machines as it's
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  entered a second life in the industry.
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  You can find them online at civets.com or the Civets on
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  Instagram where you'll see the SRM 15.
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  It's their stainless steel handmade fluid bed coffee
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  roaster. All those links in our show
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  notes. And of course, you can detour
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  through a newsletter if you want.
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  Michael, welcome back to Coffee PEOPLE.
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  Thanks for taking a minute to check in with us.
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  Thank you very much, Ryan. It's great to be here again.
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  It's been a couple of winters since we last spoke for the
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  show. At least I saw you at SCA this
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  year, 2024. I suppose you know a lot has
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  happened. In particular, I see you are
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  sitting in a new space. You know what's new over at
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  Sibits? Yeah, we moved into a new
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  headquarters. We've got a nice, pretty big
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  space where we've got the roaster and we do, you know,
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  demos here and we can bring guests in.
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  We're only an hour from Portland.
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  So even though we're not in the thick of it, it's an easy drive.
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  And we've had several visitors come by and, and come in.
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  And we can, It's one thing to read about a roaster or to, you
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  know, check the website, but seeing it in action and, and you
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  know, being in front of it and being able to answer all the
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  questions that that arise, you know, it has been very
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  beneficial. And I've seen, I've seen an
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  uptick in interest now that that we have the showroom.
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  I've seen a kind of a plethora of photos of you standing next
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  to a new customer, smiling, you know, congratulating them on
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  their new roaster. You know, in the two years since
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  we talked for the show, it seems like across the country there
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  are more civets out there. How does that feel?
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  As you know, the last time we talked, you were still kind of
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  in the throes of re educating people on the brand, you know?
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  What's that been like for you? It's been great.
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  I mean the, you know, for the most part in the very beginning
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  for the first year, in the second year even we were just
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  seeing sales on the East Coast. There is kind of more of a, a
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  Civets tradition over there, even though it's a West Coast
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  brand. You know, Mike Civets was based
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  in Corvallis. We've got a couple machines in
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  California now, we've got Oregon, we've got Washington,
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  we've got one in two in Arizona. So it's kind of evened out now
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  to where if you look at the map of the US of where we have our
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  roasters, that is kind of evened out.
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  And 24 was our best year yet and we had the most sales.
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  And so it's just been fun to be a part of this and, and to get
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  validation that the updates and the upgrades we've made from
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  Michael Civitz's days seem to be hitting the mark and people that
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  wanted to see some improvements, you know, we've addressed those
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  issues and kind of brought the roaster into the 21st century.
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  So that's been really kind of fun to see and, and be a part
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  of. A lot of it also has to do with
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  the growth of awareness of air roasting, whether it's hybrid
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  air roaster like a lowering or an IMF, or whether it's a pure
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  fluid bed roaster like the Civets.
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  The the overall awareness and recognition of air roasting as a
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  an alternative, better alternative, a win win situation
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  where you're you can roast more coffee with less, more with
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  less. So it's kind of this win win
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  that seems to be appealing to especially production roasters.
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  Sure. When we were chatting in 2022,
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  we were kind of in the heart of this chaotic supply chain.
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  Have things gotten better or just different or more chaotic?
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  I mean, are you still just doing everything you know, internally,
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  locally and and domestically rather?
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  Yeah, we're doing everything. You know, when I talked to you,
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  we were still building them here in Hood River and since then I
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  found a fabricator in Beaverton, just outside of Portland and
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  they do the complete assembly and everything up to creating it
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  and getting it ready to ship out.
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  They use only stainless steel. It's a stainless steel
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  manufacturer. So everything you see on the
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  roaster there is is stainless steel.
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  That the supply chain issues have definitely dissolved over
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  time. In the beginning we had the
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  problem that there wasn't enough supply and we were just a little
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  guy, so we were put at the back of the line.
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  So that made a difficult situation even more difficult.
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  Now we find ourselves in a position where those things have
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  kind of levelled out and we're able to get all the components
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  and parts that we need. You know, we source our blowers
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  and fans here in the US from New York, blower, our burners, our
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  Midco burners out of Chicago. So most of the roaster, almost
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  every component is still sourced and and built in the US.
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  This is a question that's just kind of coming to me as you're
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  talking about these US based companies.
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  We're going into an administration transition and
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  the word tariff is in the news a lot.
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  Does it help kind of not worry about changes in your
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  partnerships with people because they're domestic or is there
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  still concern there? It remains to be seen.
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  I think most of our competitors are US based anyway.
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  So that isn't going to change much.
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  I think in the, in the smaller like 3K5K in that size there's a
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  lot more competition from overseas that I think they are
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  going to be, you know, maybe benefiting from that a little
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  more than than we will because those cheaper products coming
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  from overseas are going to be marked up.
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  And. That will give them a more
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  competitive advantage. But for us, most of our
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  competition is either coming from the US or Europe.
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  I haven't heard any talks yet about tariffs coming from
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  European products. I mean that I have heard, but
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  nothing has been finalized yet and the focus seems to be on the
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  Far East and Canada and Mexico. I think, like many, I've been
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  taking a little bit of a break from the news, but I just think
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  about it as, you know, it's one of those things where businesses
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  are beholden to, you know, all sorts of factors on the outside
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  that they don't get to control. You know, you get to control
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  what's happening there in the HQ and like the partnerships you
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  make. Then there's this whole world of
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  things that happen, whether it's climate or politics or, you
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  know, whatever it might be. You know, if the Milwaukee
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  Brewers win the World Series at some point, I will be spending
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  all of the money I have on just celebrations.
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  So anything else that has that's been happening for you?
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  I mean, if I come to the the HQ this summer, is there still
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  going to be nice peanuts to eat? I.
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  Mean it's a situation there actually that's kind of evolving
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  into something. Now we are roasting the the
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  cashews and walnuts and we're actually going to be launching a
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  a nut roasting brand. Wow, really that was just kind
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  of be kind of off the cuff there.
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  I didn't know. That no, it was just kind of
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  something that we experimented with, something that, you know,
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  I found out about that Mike Sibitz was roasting and selling
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  hazelnuts. He comes from the Willamette
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  Valley, which is the hazelnut, one of the hazelnut capitals of
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  the world. After Turkey, Turkey's the big
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  one. But next after Turkey is is the
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  Willamette Valley. And so he was roasting and
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  selling these nuts in his shop in Corvallis.
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  And you know, I heard that it's on some days he was selling more
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  nuts than he was selling coffee, so.
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  That's such an interesting thing to me and it's one of the
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  reasons I love this show and and I kind of actually got my start
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  years ago. I don't think I've ever
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  mentioned this, like, writing A blog about entrepreneurs and it
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  was all about people who are starting businesses in their
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  garage. And I was always so surprising
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  to me, the things you find in your own community when you
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  start looking for them, you know, just wandering around and
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  going, well, I wonder what's happening behind that door.
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  And, you know, I would have never known that about nuts in
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  the Willamette Valley. That's just, That's going to
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  send me down a Wikipedia rabbit hole later today.
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  Yeah. It's been a lot of fun to kind
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  of branch out into that because it the same advantages that you
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  have with coffee beans translate to the nuts.
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  You know, you've got, you've got uniformity, you've got
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  repeatability, you've got, you know, just the way that they're
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  heated in this motion. If you think of kind of these
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  nuts moving around the whole time and being heated while
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  they're being moved, it just does a really good job of
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  heating them uniformly and bringing out the the natural
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  oils that are already in these nuts.
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  So like cashews have a very, very high fat content.
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  And when you heat them in this way, it brings all that to life
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  and it gives it its its own flavor without the need for salt
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  or sugar. Most other roasted nuts use oil
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  in some way. Like they cook it, you know,
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  they put them in a VAT kind of deep frying them, heating them
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  that way. So even though they're they're
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  just nuts without salt or, or sugar or anything, they are
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  cooked in oils. And often time, you know, these
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  are plant based oils that have their their own issues that I
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  think are kind of surfacing more and more now when people are
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  talking about these oils. So this is a purely natural
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  product that all just is just heated inside this roaster.
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  And and we can use the same concepts that we do for for
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  coffee. That's such a it's a great way
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  to diversify. Is there a brand name for these
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  nuts that we can keep our eyes out on yet or is it still on
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  what? We're working on right now
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  that's kind of the challenge. You think, oh, we'll just, you
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  know, whip up a brand and throw it out there.
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  And now we're like, you know, we're turning the stone over
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  1000 times. Like, well, that name is too
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  cheeky or that's too campy. You know, how do we get across
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  what we're trying to say? You know, it's going to be a
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  higher end product. So how do we market it?
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  How is the labeling done? What kind of package it's in?
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  All these things are kind of, you know, where we're at right
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  now, but it's going to be very soon sooner.
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  Than that I'm looking forward to that.
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  Anything I missed today? Anything new about civets that
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  we want to share with people before we we pop out?
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  Well, I we did add a few things. We have a new sound shield.
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  One of the biggest drawbacks to the roaster, you know, based on
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  our feedback is that it's a little bit noisy.
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  But if you see here we've got this sound shield, that's the
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  black shield that you see there is covering the combustion
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  chamber now. So we're right around 8082
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  decibels when we're roasting with that.
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  So you no longer need headphones, you know, to, to to
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  protect your ears. That has been very well
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  received. And we've seen, you know, a
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  pretty good order rate with those people who are ordering
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  roasters picking those up. We're working on.
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  We're about to release a de Stoner and a bean loader.
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  Oh cool. So we'll take away some of the,
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  the physical drawbacks of, of loading 15 kilos of time into at
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  a time into the into the roast chamber.
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  And then we're working on a heat exchanger with Oregon State
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  University. So we're going to be trying to
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  bring some of the heat back into the roaster.
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  And you know, it'll, it'll be done with most likely with like
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  a heat coil where you're not actually bringing the smoky air
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  back into it because that's been an issue with others who have
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  tried to do this. But you are just bringing some
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  of the heat as it's leaving the exhaust stack back into the
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  roaster. And only a little bit of that
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  can do quite a bit for reducing the amount of gas it takes to to
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  heat to heat the roaster. Sure.
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  And always just a, you know, I just paid my electric bill this
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  morning. So yeah, let's let's try to be
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  more efficient if we can. And we, and we got some feedback
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  from one of our biggest roasters, Brown Bag Coffee
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  Roasters in Quebec. They've just done in December,
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  they did their four thousandth roast on this machine and
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  they've had it for about a year and a half now.
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  And they did the calculations and it worked out to about two
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  cents per pound of coffee of roasting.
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  So 33 lbs was costing about I think $0.78 Canadian of, of of
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  fuel. So I think it's more efficient
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  than people, than people think of it.
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  That's much less than I would have guessed.
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  And that's cool that they did that.
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  And it's nice to know that I think just for anyone listening,
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  like 4000 roasts in a year and a half is a lot of roasts.
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  I mean, it's it's taken a pounding.
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  So if they're still pushing away at it, I mean, it's one thing
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  that always amazes me about roasters in general and it's
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  just the longevity of some of the really well made roasters.
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  You know, it's going to take maintenance, it's going to take
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  work, but you'll see roasters that have been in in action for,
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  you know, dozens of years. Yeah, we just put in a new
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  roaster in Tucson at Arbuckle's Coffee, which is a brand that's
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  been around since the 1800s and they're running it next to 1/2
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  bag roaster from 1975. Wow, it's just such a cool
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  industry, I think. Yeah, there's still quite a few
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  of them running and that's one other thing that we're working
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  on now. I'm hoping by the end of the
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  year we're going to be getting into the half bag, so the 35K
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  size. So we'll have one coming up
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  towards the end of the year where we can double the capacity
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  of what this one can do. Well, I think it's all just,
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  it's just a lot of continued growth.
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  I mean, when we talked a couple years ago, you know, there was a
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  lot of, I don't want to say stress and anxiety, but it was
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  still kind of at the the beginning of that climb.
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  And now you're kind of halfway up the hill, it seems like.
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  But with I think I can see more optimism, like, yeah, this is
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  working. Like we're going to keep going.
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  We're going to keep pushing. Not that it wasn't there, there
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  wasn't confidence, just that, you know, now you're a couple
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  steps further down that path and it's cool to see.
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  It's the snowball effect. When you're in the beginning,
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  when the snowball is slow, even though it's gaining traction,
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  it's not still not gaining much traction.
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  But when the snowball gets bigger as it gains traction,
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  it's just becomes exponential in in in reaching out and getting
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  the word out and just creating the awareness that we needed in
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  the beginning but weren't getting.
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  Well, I hope that we're able to be part of that.
• 18:41
  And obviously, I'm grateful you came back on the show and
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  grateful of everyone listening. They can find the links to
• 18:47
  civets.com at the Civets, on Instagram, in our show notes, in
• 18:51
  the newsletter. Yes, Sir.
• 18:53
  Can I say one more thing? We will be at the Expo in
• 18:56
  Houston. We're going to have a booth
• 18:58
  there. We'll have another booth 20 by
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  10 booth there where we will have the SRM 15 and hope
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  everybody can come by and visit us at the booth if you're there.
• 19:08
  I know that I will be and the show is part of our Roast West
• 19:12
  Coast network. Shout out to the presenting
• 19:14
  sponsor, Rostar, the coffee packaging company.
• 19:17
  They really enable us to offer up this platform to tell coffee
• 19:20
  stories, share businesses, share ideas.
• 19:22
  Find them online at rostar.com. Thank you to Michael for coming
• 19:26
  back and everyone listening. Please tip your baristas, be
• 19:29
  sure to drink good coffee, and in the future make sure you're
• 19:33
  eating good peanuts. Thank you so much.
• 19:36
  Appreciate your time. Thanks for inviting me back.