Upper Midwest Gourmet

Hooray for Spring!

Please check out our newest Brewsletter – Volume 40 – Spring 2010

Also, please go to the Brewsletters Page on our website to download and read previous Brewsletters. They contain lots of useful information!

Enjoy and thanks again from all of us at UMG!

UMG/Flamenco was able to go to Dominican Republic last month for a coffee origin trip. It was a blast overall! We all learned a ton about coffee and a whole lot more about the island and its history.

Please check out our Flamenco Origin Trips Page to view pictures and videos. We will have some stories and more information soon. Enjoy!

Wisconsin Food Expo Milwaukee, WI; March 8th through the 10th, 2010 - Booth 748

Ah yes, the show season is soon to be upon us. For starters, Upper Midwest Gourmet will be showing off our duds again this year in Milwaukee Wisconsin at the Wisconsin Restaurant Associations annual Expo to be held at the Airline Center in downtown Milwaukee on March 8th trough the 10th (Mon-Wed). Go to www.wirestaurant.org/expo/ for more details on this show and to register. As in the past years, UMG has a boat load of FREE PASSES for Wednesday the 10th, the last day of the show. Please contact us direct at 612-728-7208 or contact Kevin direct at 612-250-8277 or Kevin@umgcoffee.com and we will mail you the tickets. You will need to register them once you have the ticket code. This can be done the day of the show at the door. This year we will be highlighting our new line of Ce Organic and Fair Trade, all natural flavoring syrups, our new International Paper Insulated Hold & Go Hot cups, Angela Marie’s Mega Marshmallow Munchies crisp rice bars, Pacific Foods Organic Simply coffee & tea ready to drink products, Deep River all natural chips and snacks, and our new Flamenco Organic Coffee Direct coffees. We will also have a new espresso machine on hand for your review, use and sampling of our espressos.

This is one of those shows that our staff ALWAYS looks forward to because of the amount of you that take the time to visit with us there and the many new customers we are lucky enough to meet each year. Of the many food & coffee shows that we show at, this has always been the best run and most fun to attend so I encourage you to try to make it if you can, you will not be disappointed!

Coffee Fest Minneapolis, MN, June 04 – 06, 2010

We are very excited to announce that the folks at Coffee Fest have scheduled one of their 2010 show right here in Minneapolis this year in June. Coffee Fest is still one of the better coffee focused shows in the industry so we expect nothing less at this show. We among many other local, regional and international companies will be showing. This Upper Midwest region of the country is finally getting the recognition we have so rightfully earned in the coffee world so this show should be full of useful information for any café owner in this market. As more details come in, we will continue to pass them on to you so please stay tuned or go directly to www.coffeefest.com for more details and to register for this show.

We always love to see our customers at every show we attend so please do come and say hello at one or both of these shows. Upper Midwest Gourmet will also be announcing our annual picnic/open house very soon so please stay tuned for that date to be made.

We thank you all for your continued support and patronage. We are nothing without our great customers and we are driven by your support to continue to improve our services and offerings to you!

See you at the shows!

All of us at Upper Midwest Gourmet would like to wish you, your family, your friends, and your staff a very Happy and Healthy New Year in 2010! We truly believe that your success creates our success and we promise to continue to support and serve you as much as possible!

Please always know that we are just a phone call or email away. UMG has been on the cutting edge of the coffee shop and cafe industry for almost 20 years! We have seen the latest and greatest fads come and go, but there are a few constants that will always remain the same. Coffee drinks and blended beverages are your bread and butter because  of their great profit margins. I agree with my previous statement, but I’ve learned that to be truly successful offering retail sales and food is a must.

One constant that makes any businesss successful is a self-motivated staff with ambitious goals along with a desire to always work hard no matter if it is within their job description or not. This is something amazing that I witness everyday working at UMG, but also something that is very obvious in many of the most succesful cafes that we work with. Striving to always be better is something that rarely breeds anything, but success.

Our guarantee to you, our customers, in this new year and decade is that we will continue to strive to always be better. In fact, we will be taking a coffee origin trip to Dominican Republic to meet our Flamenco Direct Relationship coffee friends and their families in February. This will give us a better understanding of all aspects of coffee production, but will more importantly build a stronger relationship with people we care about, just like our customers. We want you to know that there may be other companies that sell similar type products, but you will never find a company with more personal dedication to their customers than us.

We aren’t just a Midwest distributor of coffee shop products or just a Fair Trade Organic coffee roastery in Minnesota or just a gelato equipment and ingredient company. We are so much more than all of those titles and all we want is a chance to prove that to you this year!

Please Contact Us if you have any questions about what we can do for you.

Thanks for your support!

Check out UMG and Flamenco Organic’s own, Charles Roberson, hanging out with some of the Vikings O-Line, Pat and Kevin Williams, over the Holidays!

Who else thinks Charles should be trying out for the Vikes next year?

Next time you are in the Fargo/Moorhead area make sure to stop by Fargo Coffee Company.

Finally a cafe that serves high quality drinks and food in a very comfortable and classy atmosphere. From the dark wood counters and furnishings to the plasma televisions, this cafe is truly stunning.

They serve Fair Trade Organic coffee and espresso drinks that will be sure to impress you. I can personally say that it is one of the few times I’ve ordered a dry cappuccino and received an espresso drink that was nothing short of perfect.

Fargo Coffee Co. is still very new to the scene in Fargo/Moorhead, but is already getting a ton of attention and positive feedback.

Just check out their guest comments: http://fargocoffeeco.com/guestcomments.htm

Please enjoy some pictures of the cafe. (just click on picture to enlarge and view)

Please Contact Us for more information about Fargo Coffee Co. or about the incredible products they serve!

1601 University Dr S
Fargo, ND 58103

Goodbye Winter, Hello Spring!

Please check out our newest Brewsletter – Volume  37 – Spring 2009

Also, please go to the Brewsletters Page on our website to download and read previous Brewsletters. They contain lots of useful information!

Enjoy the new format and thanks from all of us!

As UMG finished our last show of the season in Milwaukee, it was in no means the end of the work to be done. There are many months of follow up to be completed. We look forward to contacting those of you who requested us to do so.

We wish to take a moment to offer our thanks and appreciation to those of you who took the time to stop by and say hello at the Wisconsin Restaurant Expo a couple of weeks ago in the lovely city of Milwaukee. As usual, this show was a great success for UMG. We especially appreciate the opportunity to meet with many of you face to face each year, and to meet some of you for the first time. It’s funny though how our mind can create an image of what you think someone is supposed to look like prior to ever meeting them face to face. Sometimes you are right on, and some times you are way off course! (I am usually the off guy). Either way, it makes a relationship that much more rewarding once you can actually place a face with a voice.

If you missed the show this year, here are some of the highlighted products that we were offering samples of; Zola Acai in Ready-to-drink, blender and concentrate formulas, Pro Bar meal supplement bars, Wally Biscotti (Mr. Wally himself graced us with his presence at the show this year), Dirty all-natural potato chips, Boosta shot pure all-natural energy, Cappuccine blender/frappe mixes, Rancilio Leve manual Lever espresso machines (this truly was the hit as we sold 2 of them off the show floor) and of course, our very own Flamenco Organic coffees. Jesse our Roast Master has been busy since last year and was offering some of our award winning coffees for sampling.

Without gloating, I believe that we were the hit of the show this year with our product offerings. We were just informed that we are to be on the front cover of next years Expo Info packet handout.

Take a look at this cover by clicking the following link;

http://www.wirestaurant.org/expo/exhibit/index.htm

You can also take a look at some of the photos we took ourselves at the show.

Again if you took the time to stop by, we say thank you a thousand times over. If you missed us this year, we say shame on you (OK, that might be a little harsh!), no, we do encourage you to try to make next years show if you are within 4-6 hours of Milwaukee. This show is definitely worth your time.

For all of our customers, we say thank you very much for your continued patronage and support. We would be nothing with out all of you! We strive to ensure the success of every customer that we have a relationship with. It is our goal to be able to always offer you the products and tools needed to meet that success. Please feel free to contact any one at UMG with any comments or concerns, we are ready to listen.

Your Bean Head staff thanks you

Upper Midwest Gourmet/Flamenco Organic Coffee Company was honored to be a part of this year’s NACUFS Conference!

Roastmaster, Jesse Grote, and Sales Manager, Michael Applen, took part in the conference.

We had a blast presenting an interest seminar on Monday themed “Why Choose Fair Trade, Organic Specialty Coffee?” and also took part in the vendor showcase on the following Tuesday. Thanks to everyone that came to the seminar and visited our booth at the showcase.

Here are some pictures of the showcase. Please click to enlarge.

Special thanks to host of the conference, Concordia College of Moorhead, for their hospitality and especially for their gift to us of the “FARGO” DVD!

Feel free to Contact Us if you have any questions about us or the show or if you were at the show and loved the coffee and would like to order for your school!

It’s show season again!  Look for Upper Midwest Gourmet at the shows this weekend, next month and all year:

Chicago, IL - Coffeefest 2009: Friday, Sat, Sun: Feb. 20th – 22nd:Look for Kevin and David, we’ll be mixing up all those yummy Frappes in Cappuccine’s booth

Minneapolis, MN - UP Show 2009: Monday, Tuesday: Feb. 23rd & 24th: Look for Kevin in the Vita Mix booth for some delicious smoothies.

Moorhead, MN (Concordia College) NACUFS Conference: Monday,Tuesday: Feb. 23rd & 24th: Michael and Jesse will be giving a presentation on the benefits of using Fair Trade, Organic Specialty Coffee. They will also be focusing on ’Going Green’ and how it can improve your profits and strengthen sales, all while leaving a better mark on the world.

Milwaukee, WI Restaurant Show & Expo 2009: Mon, Tue, Wed: March 9th-11th:  Jesse, Kevin and David will be demonstrating all the new products for 2009.

Minneapolis, MN - UMGWHQ 2009 (Upper Midwest Gourmet World Headquarters): February – December 2009: The show that never ends!  Come to our showroom and try out any product anytime. Our showroom is fully functional so you can brew coffee, extract espresso and froth milk, make gelato and sorbetto, prepare pastry or even bake bread! You can also see the latest equipment in action, watch training videos, see what’s new and exciting before anyone else or just come to play some foosball (beware, Michael can really run a table).  We’d love to have you here.  If your going to the UP show, stop by before or after the show?  David,  Sarah, Eric, Alan, Brandon and Charles will all be around to help you.

We hope to see you all soon!

Cheers,

David – Chief Beanhead

Ahhhhhh…

A great weekend of roasting and hanging out with other roasters. Most of us are pretty starved for contact with other people who care about maximizing acidic snap by quickening first crack ramp-up.

Well, my friends, it is time for me to say good-bye. Some of you know this already but for those of you that don’t, I am moving to Urbana, Illinois on Saturday, August 30. That means that my last day hear at Upper Midwest Gourmet is this Friday, August 29. I am moving to Urbana to attend the School for Designing a Society. SDaS was started by a group of people, including Patch Adams (remember that movie about the crazy doctor played by Robin Williams? well it’s based on a true story), that believe that we really can change the world. So this fall I will be with between 15-20 other people discussing where society is at, where we see it going, where we want it to go, and how we are going to get it there. We will all be working on projects (individual and/or group) that actually implement the things that we will be discussing. I am extremely excited to be involved in SDaS. I think it is going to be a fantastic experience. It does, however, make working in Minnesota a bit difficult. It would be a rather nasty commute, don’t you think?

 I want to tell you all that you have been absolutely lovely. I have thoroughly enjoyed working with all of you. You have made me laugh and made me cry (well, almost). It has been my pleasure to have had the priveledge of working with all of you. You guys rock! Thank you for all the memories; shows, barista jams, gelato, coffee (which, much to the dismay of the guys at UMG, I still do not drink), mispronouncing words, silly sayings, and just laughing in general. I’ve really loved it here. Thank you so much for everything.

Every time I hear a phone ring I will look around like a crazy person needing to answer it. And then I’ll remember that it is no longer for me and I’ll laugh at my silliness. Thank you again for everything. Don’t forget to work hard AND play hard! You are all wonderful.

“It’s a beautiful day at Upper Midwest Gourmet. This is Kelsey.” I’m going to miss helping you.

Upper Midwest Gourmet was proud to be in the booth with the Technogel Equipment and the Fabbri 1905 ingredient companies at the National Restuarant Association trade show in Chicago May 17th-20th.

It was our pleasure to meet everyone that stopped by the booth to learn how to make gelato using the Technogel batch freezer, blast chiller, heater/mixer, and whipped cream machine and also to enjoy the awesome gelato samples made with all-natural Fabbri ingredients imported in from Italy. We apologize, but we were too busy to take any pictures for you to enjoy.

Please Contact Us if you were at the show and wanted more information about anything you saw and enjoyed.

Comments are OPEN if you would like to ask questions or make show and/or product reviews.

Thanks again to all that attended.

We had a great time at the Lake Geneva NATO trade show on May 14th & 15th!

Thanks to all that visited our booth and sampled our Flamenco & Quarry coffees, espresso, and gelato.

Please enjoy some pictures from the show.

Please Contact Us if you would like any more information or

would like to set up an account with us so you can serve our amazing coffees, espresso, and gelato.

Comments are OPEN if you would like to ask questions or give show and product reviews.

Thanks again!