The coffee pop-up is a romantic thing. Running your own cafe whenever and wherever you want, the barista troubadour. And with the emergence of electric vehicles, the cafe on wheels dream has come fully into the 21st century and is sure to turn some heads (especially if it’s THAT electric vehicle.)
That’s certainly what Vauxhall is doing with their latest car. The Mokka Coffee-E is the brand’s new electric vehicle and it comes with a full pop-up coffee station in the back.
But before you start placing your orders, the new Mokka Coffee-E is a just a one-off concept. As reported by Yahoo!, Vauxhall, the name under which Opel operates in the UK, the new compact crossover thats part of the Mokka line comes armed to the teeth with everything you’d need for a pop-up cafe, including not one but two coffee machines, a milk steamer, grinder, knock box, and a fridge, all of which are integrated into the trunk pace, or the boot as they call it over there. It also features a pull-out drawer full of barista tools of the trade: scales, tampers, portafilters, etc.
Despite what you think the conceit comes from more than just the name (though that surely had to play some part in it). Per Vauxhall managing director James Taylor, “three-quarters of EV drivers plan their trips around their desire for coffee.” With the Mokka Coffee-E, you can stop and make a coffee for yourself during the 30 minutes it takes to charge from 0 to 80% battery. And if I know anything about home espresso machines, it’s that it takes longer than 30 minutes to pull a good shot. Full battery here I come.
But alas, it’s only a concept, but one can’t help but consider the possibilities. Just imagine buying a new car straight off the lot, with a full coffee setup ready to do in the back. I would of course want to completely rip out all the equipment that it came with and put in my own. But still, for the not-constant-tinkerer, an out-of-the-box coffee shop on wheels—that isn’t a gas guzzler—would be pretty intriguing. I mean, I certainly wouldn’t mind grabbing a quick coffee from the person next to me in bumper to bumper traffic.
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
