Coffee bars, like mobile phones, are everywhere. Posturing with your Nokia while trying not to gag on your Mocha Valencia (chocolate syrup, orange syrup, coffee and steamed milk), is a tall order, but if you want to live up to your urban swashbuckler image, it has to be done.
The proliferation of branded coffee bars - Starbucks, Coffee Republic, Aroma and Costa - on the streets of London and other major cities has far from reached its zenith. Costa recently declared war on Starbucks: it plans to have 256 outlets by the end of the year - way ahead of Starbucks, which currently has 115 sites.
People might fantasise about running their own cafe but surely the market has become far too daunting for an individual to fulfil caffeine-fuelled dreams. Where exactly would you start? "Location, location, location," says Michael Fairholme, of the Urban Espresso Training School in Maida Vale in London, where would-be cafe owners can learn the ropes. "Finding a site is a full-time job."
Victoria Reid, who founded Urban Espresso after owning and operating cafes in Australia and who now advises people who are setting up businesses, agrees: "It's a long slog: it can be more than 18 months before you make your first cup of coffee".
Jones Lang Lasalle is retained by Starbucks to search for sites around the country. You can appoint an agent to look for you and they will charge you around 10% of the rental as a fee. If they don't find you what you want, you don't pay anything. If you have never traded before, you won't get a prime site as you need a covenant to show the strength of your accounts, which is why, according to Jones Lang Lasalle, "most start-ups are in slightly quirkier positions".
Annual rent can be anything from £50,000 for a site in a fairly busy sidestreet in a commuter town to £200,000 for a site in a prime section of, say, Long Acre in Covent Garden.To help get you started NatWest publishes The Business Start-Up Planner and any bank will have a smallbusiness adviser who will be able to put you in touch with your local BusinessLink. Estate agents will also help you get to grips with the legalities of leases.
When it comes to staff, Michael Fairholme reckons that the minimum is three people: one on the till; one cleaning up and managing stock and, most importantly, the person who could make your business a success: the Barista. The person who operates the coffee machine - be it a model by La Marzocco (approx £3,500) or a Faema (expect to pay around £2,500) - is in a profession, which, in the UK, is about to come of age.
For as the chains scramble to secure the best sites they are creating a market for Baristas with a more professional vision - not for their own branches - but to work in the new, independent coffee shops being opened by maverick entrepreneurs.
At Cuppa-cino, situated between platforms 9/10 and 11/12 at Clapham Junction station, Jorge Fernandez is in his element: "I will always consider myself first and foremost a professional Barista. I love it. I love to go behind the bar and shout and rant and rave and create. It's a real buzz. When it's busy, and it's pumping, it's a little bit special. You get in for six in the morning. You start guzzling your coffee. It does help to be caffeined up"
Created by Andrew Roberts and Amanda Fletcher, Cuppa-cino opened last summer. "It worked pretty much straight away," says Andrew Roberts, who is committed to growing the business without having outside shareholders: "We don't want to lose the fun of it."
"It doesn't have to be about cut-throat competition," adds Amanda Fletcher. "It's about quality of life". With plans to open a maximum of seven or eight stores, Mr Roberts suggests that Cuppa-cinos will tend to be located in "unconventional locations".
Quality of coffee and developing a loyal, professional team are key, believes Mr Roberts, who buys his coffee from specialists the Monmouth Coffee Company and experiments with offering single origin coffee (espresso is made from a blend), often bought direct from estates, which helps to raise awareness. On the recruitment front, he is quick to point out: "I couldn't pay someone £4 per hour. I just couldn't expect them to arrive and do a good job".
Out of London, the entrepreneurial spirits is also flourishing: "Starbucks wants to rule the world like McDon alds so it will do it at all costs", says Steve Sartori, co-owner of the Italian Coffee Company in Worcester. "This leaves opportunities for small individuals. With my hands-on approach I can always do better than them. My service will be 10 times better."
Mr Sartori persuaded a family of Birmingham-based farmers, A E Becketts and Sons, to diversify into coffee bars and hopes to open no more than 10 outlets in the next two years. His staff have been with the business since it opened last July and the second shop opened in Cheltenham on 13 March. Looking at sites in Gloucester, Malvern and Leamington, Mr Sartori is avoiding the big cities: "I looked at a site in Bristol which was four or five doors away from Coffee Republic and across the road from Starbucks.Why do I need to jump into that?"
Mr Sartori and his team all learned to make good coffee at the Urban Espresso Training School where an afternoon's course will set you back £70, during which time Michael Fairholme will endeavour to help you find "that sweet spot".
Infused with passion, Mr Fairholme studied his art with professional Baristas in Italy and is consequently committed to spreading the word about good coffee. "It's a drug," he admits, and after an afternoon learning that you need 7 grammes to make a single espresso and pondering "gramme throw" (the weight dispensed by the grinder) - you have to believe him.
The ultimate, reveals Mr Fairholme, is Jamaica Blue Mountain, sold at approximately £35.00 per kilo, which is "naturally perfectly balanced".
John Kavaliauskas also learned to operate the "Ferrari" of coffee machines - La Marzocco - under the tutelage of Michael Fairholme, and is now ready to set up shop. Together with his partner, Maria Clancy, he is launching a cafe business called Organic Xpress which has backing from the Social Venture Network Europe (SVNE). Starting in London, and then looking towards Liverpool and beyond, with the first London outlet due to open before the summer, Mr Kavaliauskas can only reveal so much about the nature of the Organic Xpress brand.
If it were a car, he says, it would be "something coming out of the RockyMountain Institute: the ultra-light Hypercar, a more enlightened expression of contemporary sustainable living and lifestyles" and adds that while the property search is fraught - he has already been gazumped by a fast food retailer - he remains motivated and enthusiastic.
"The organic movement has evolved mainly from the 70s: maybe it's ready for a fresh outlook that's really vibrant." He admits he would like to do for food "what Malcolm McLaren did to the music industry"
Currently researching fairly traded products, Mr Kavaliauskas is unfazed by the likes of Costa: "Despite the voracity of the big brand chains, it is creating a space for the individual," he says with conviction.
And back at Clapham Junction, where the the Cuppa-cino team know all of their regular customers by name, referring to "Mr Short White Brew" or "Mr Tall Latte and Pain au Chocolat", Jorge Fernandez believes that the Barista as a profession will grow as smaller, more personally-driven businesses are developed.
"A certain percentage of people will appreciate being recognised by staff and will appreciate the fact that a coffee shop has a soul and a heart and isn't driven purely by money."
