Last year, we reported that Starbucks would be hosting their own version of the World Barista Championship, which they are calling the Starbucks Global Barista Championship. (Individuals from union stores can’t participate, by the by.) And after a year of worldwide competitions that somehow garnered over 84,000 competitors, the Global Barista Championship is set to take place later this week in Las Vegas, pitting the top 12 finishers in a three-day battle for the title of Starbucks Global Barista Champion.
Kicking off today, Monday, June 9th through Wednesday, June 11th during the Starbucks Leadership Conference, six coffeehouse barista champions and six Roastery barista champions representing North America, China, Japan, Asia Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) will test their skills in a variety of “skills and knowledge-based competitions.” Per the website, the event will focus on Craft, Connection, and Coffee Storytelling, or “how the barista tells the Starbucks Coffee Company story.” Expect plenty of that—fealty to the mermaid is a component part to each routine at the Starbucks Global Barista Championship. The competition also includes “blind coffee tastings, latte art, and creating a signature beverage.”
All 12 competitors will take part in the Semi-Finals round on the 9th and 10th, and will be judged by Starbucks Coffee Masters and members of the company’s coffee quality and development teams. Just four will move onto the Finals on the 11th, where the winner will be announced to the “more than 14,000 partners (employees) from the United States and Canada” who will be in attendance.
It’s unclear what the winner of the Starbucks Global Barista Championship will receive. The North American Barista Champion, Darcy Todd of Arlington, Texas, won a trip to Hacienda Alsacia, the company’s Costa Rican research and development farm. (Todd is not competing in the Global Barista Championship and according to LinkdIn, now works at the Texas Coffee School.) Whatever it is, it’s probably better than the Freaky Friday body switch with Howard Schultz, wherein one gets to live for a day as an out-of-touch billionaire with frustrated political ambitious and several metric tons of olive oil he’s desperate to move.
If you really need a coffee competition fix to tide you over until the World Barista Championship in October, you can watch the Starbucks Global Barista Championship live June 9th through 11th, via the Starbucks YouTube channel.
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
