Letter From The COBAA President 17th April 2020
By David Parnham
What’s Proving To Be A Difficult Year 2020
Dear Members of COBAA (Café Owners & Barista Association Of Australia)
Thank you for all the support you have shown since our COBAA association incorporation in January 2015.
In the past few start up years of COBAA we have had many leading Café and FoodService suppliers that have greatly assisted us with hosting state-based events such as Café Talk and Food Safari Café interaction. These first goals were successfully achieved over the opening three years of COBAA with full attendance at the many breakfast sessions held by state and together we can again create further discussion and networking with our Australian Café Industry in 2020.
I must apologise for my part-time Presidency over the past two years, as I have been extensively travelling and developing the Asian café market expansion for Café Culture China, also with many of the past COBAA Committee members sadly changing their work roles and/or leaving the café industry during this time. Thus, leaving the dynamic Edwards couple, Sean & Kristine from Café Culture International, along with Ned Schepis from Just Coffee Insurance holding the COBAA reins until my return to Australia in October 2019 to reunite the new COBAA Committee direction for 2020.
We are wishing, in this difficult trading restriction period of the COVID-19, to recreate a supplier networking event, with the previously successful “Café Talk” to again be held in 2020 in the mornings by state.
The Café Pulse annual Café State Of The Industry Report was always a highlight for COBAA Corporate members to gain much needed Café Industry BIG Data specific feedback directly from café owners and barista’s. This year in July will successfully see our 5th bi-annual café industry survey completion and once again this collective respondent summary will be made available to COBAA Members. A special thank you must go to Café Culture International, for being our main media partner who has greatly assisted in promoting the survey and collecting the valued responses. More details will come later this year – however, we do request if you have any café industry questions that you wish to be included into this year’s report survey then please contact me prior to 1st June 2020.
We have received a lot of café supplier feedback and accolades for the State Of The Café Industry report and that of the Café Talk networking sessions in the past – now it is time to further engage the benefits for being a café owner and barista member, because it is more than just a survey, a COBAA Masterclass and/ or merely a passing trade show chat. This year we will offer in May a FREE MEMBERSHIP to cafes to assist them into the future with knowledge and information sharing, Start Up assistance, Product and Services guides and benchmarking Big Data research opportunities, our COBAA Members Directory services, EDM’s and assistance at trade events plus much, much more.
Most important is that we will again commence a direct In-Café benefits to further improve café products, FoodService excellence standards and services offered by the COBAA Corporate Café Suppliers. This will be achieved by using focused and better-informed café suppliers and their management teams across Australia.
Free Café Owner & Barista memberships will be made available during May 2020, with regular COBAA Facebook updates, website friendly access for new and current member registrations to events, social media posts, regular EDM Newsletters and the like throughout 2020. This will provide a two way interaction between the vested parties of Coffee Professionals, Roasters and Café owners connecting with their best fit COBAA corporate members of choice for a WIN WIN outcome for all.
Our new 2020 COBAA Executive Committee will be elected shortly to serve the Café Industry and we all hope for your “Business Survival” for this very challenging year ahead.
If you require any additional information please contact me
Thank you
David C Parnham
Café Owners & Barista’s Association Of Australia
P. +61 2 9380 5559
A. PO Box 86 Wyong NSW 2259
