Cropster highlights its software suite and how it can improve workflow management for the coffee sector.
Since entering the Australian market almost 16 years ago, roasting software company Cropster has continued to develop its products to help connect those working in the coffee industry.
Its suite of forward-thinking technology provides solutions for four different sections of the industry: origin, roasting, commerce, and café. According to Product Marketing Manager Kelsey Maher, over the past few years the team have focused on making their technology more beneficial to more people in the coffee supply chain.
“When designing the software, the main drive is creating a tool that ultimately helps coffee-focused businesses increase productivity and achieve consistency,” she says.
Cropster’s software provides an overview of workflow and details on inventory for a huge range of businesses all over the world, from farmers to roasters and café owners. Its Roast product, for example, provides roasters with real-time data on roast curves and inventory, and includes the Roasting Intelligence profiling feature.
“Roasting Intelligence is specifically designed to help roasters get the best out of their coffee,” Kelsey says.
“The software is very progressive and enables the user to connect the program to their existing machinery, set their profiles, and then use it as a reference curve for future roasts. This is a great tool for teams with multiple roaster machines, who can then cup the coffees to ensure a high-quality roast is achieved.”
In addition to helping roasting teams maintain consistency, Roast also features a sample management tracking system, which gives green bean suppliers the opportunity to record samples and see how they perform each year.
“It can also act as a tool to help them remember a sample they’d like to revisit in the new purchasing year,” says Kelsey.
Making its debut at Melbourne International Coffee Expo (MICE) in 2013, Roast has become one of the company’s most popular products in the Australian market.
“Regularly attending MICE has really helped us demonstrate what our product can do for key players in the coffee industry,” says Kelsey.
To complement Roast, Cropster has developed sister product Commerce, which provides roasters with planning and traceability tools to help sell their coffee.
“Commerce was recently added to our suite, designed for roasters who would like to receive orders from their online shops automatically and fulfil orders using packaged, loose, or freshly roasted inventory,” says Kelsey.
In the spirit of innovation, Kelsey and the Cropster team are particularly excited about their latest software solution, Cropster Café.
“For high-volume café owners, Cropster Café can act as an enterprise resource planning (ERP) tool,” she says.
“If a café owner has more than one location, it can provide insights into what’s happening at each individual venue.”
Designed for precision, the plug and play system is connected to the espresso machine and tracks key telemetry data.
“Cropster Café provides focused analysis via a user-friendly interface, helping café owners make data-driven decisions to increase revenue, productivity, and customer satisfaction,” Kelsey says.
“It’s an easy-to-use system that ensures consistency in coffee while also helping to create efficient workflows.”
Recognising the importance of machine maintenance for busy café owners, Cropster Café provides key performance-based reports.
The Focus View cross-references recipes with the collected telemetry so users are able to swiftly analyse performance of each espresso machine and location. Managers will easily spot rush hours and slow hours. Sustainability was another key consideration for the team at Cropster when designing the four software products.
“When we talk about achieving high quality and consistency with our products, it also means we want to help customers reduce their waste,” says Kelsey.
“The reporting feature helps to avoid out-of-range batches so customers can make better use of their inventory, team, and equipment. Whether it’s roasting the right profile, taking less time to dial-in recipes, or just knowing every process can be standardised by Cropster, we want to help make a more sustainable coffee value chain.”
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This article appears in the August/September 2024 edition of BeanScene. Subscribe HERE.
