How choosing the right gravimetric grinder can help baristas in their goal of crafting a consistent, quality cup.
Baristas around the world continue to embark on the quest to find the exact method that will yield consistent quality coffee, cup after cup.
But what goes into crafting this ideal setup? The beans, of course, are integral. The coffee machine, too, as is the training and capability of the barista using it. The same goes for the water, milk and alternatives, and tamping pressure.
Yet the grinder itself, the coffee’s first point of contact in the cup creation station, is crucial. After all, a variation of just a couple of grams will result in a significantly different shot.
This desire to create a consistent dose size to within tenths of a gram has seen grinder technology progress towards gravimetric – also known as grind-by-weight – technology.
The Markibar Izaga W is becoming a major player in the shift to grind-by-weight, according to Honeybird Coffee Owner Ryan Lynch and Zimmah Coffee Co-Founder James Murdoch, who both supply the machines to customers around Australia through their partnerships with Barista Group.
“We supply about 100 cafés across the country with our Honeybird beans, and I’d say we have our own equipment free on loan (FOL) in more than half of those. Within that, we have more than 20 Markibar Izaga Ws around the country at the moment,” says Ryan.
“I’ve been drawn to grind-by-weight technology since it was first developed. I’ve tried every brand that’s come out with it and attempted to implement them into our fleet, but with no real success until the Markibar.”
The consistency provided by the Izaga W was a key reason in Honeybird’s switch.
“It’s a pretty big decision to go a certain way with equipment, but I need to know my customers can use it to make a really good coffee from the get-go and be able to deal with volume and demand,” Ryan says.
“There’s a lot less variability they have to worry about with the Izaga W to be putting out really good coffee more often.”
One typical criticism of gravimetric grinders is their increased sensitivity to the café environment. With carefully calibrated scales and sensors typically on the outside of the machine, one knock or stray movement can disrupt the machine’s calibration, and the grind weight can be thrown out of whack.
The Izaga W, however, has internal scales that are designed to consistently control dosing without the need for barista adjustment. James says these internal scales make the model a more durable and café-friendly machine.
“The grinder’s scales being inside the grinder is a big thing, because when baristas are rushing to supply lots of different customers, they can be rough with the equipment. They could bang the portafilter on the spot it usually sits, which also happens to be the scales,” he says.
“That makes it much more likely the machine is going to go out of calibration. Secondly, because scales on these types of grinders usually protrude out, if someone moves it for cleaning they’ll often accidentally pick the grinder up from the scales, which will ruin the calibration.
“The internal scales mean people working with or around the Izaga W are far less likely to accidentally put it out of calibration or damage it.”
A key point of difference in the Markibar Izaga W’s café-readiness is its ability to switch between Instant Dose and On Demand functions at the touch of a button, with the work mode and status of the dosing chamber shown on its display in real time.
When Instant Dose is activated, the machine will automatically prepare the dose for the next cup and hold it in the chamber until the portafilter is re-inserted. Then, the dose will immediately drop, saving baristas precious time in peak periods.
“This grinder is great if you’re looking for the potential to work at speed. If you’re busy, you usually can’t get much faster than just putting the portafilter in and having the coffee drop in straight away. That’s what Instant Dose is,” says James.
“If you think about how much time it takes for a grinder to grind on demand, between five and 10 seconds a cup, it’s a lot of time saved with this function.
“It’s really easy to press a button and switch between modes. If you go from a busy period to a quiet period, you just press a button and then it goes back to dosing On Demand, which means the coffee won’t get stale sitting there. Then, if it gets busy again you put it back into Instant Dose where it’s pre-dosing, and it’s very, very fast.”
James says the Instant Dose function is just one of a multitude of features that make it a quality option for fast-paced, hardworking café environments.
“It’s very fast and very good in that the coffee is already collapsed, but it’s also not very loud. It’s easy to clean – you just lift part of the machine up and poke a bottle-brush cleaner down, where other grinders can be more difficult to clean,” he says.
“We’ve got 15 to 20 of them out there at the moment and we’ve been supplying them for about 12 months. We haven’t had a single problem with any of them yet. The issues we found in grinders we were previously supplying haven’t come up in the Izaga W.”
Ryan says the efficiency and consistency gained through not only the Instant Dose function but also its ease of use enables cafés and staff to place a stronger focus on improving the customer experience due to the trust that can be placed in the grinder to produce a quality cup every time.
“Having this grinder allows you to hire for personality, not skills straight away. I would be happy to put my grandmother on this grinder, and she would be able to put out a very good coffee very easily,” he says. “It takes out the need to have someone watching the grinder and grind size like a hawk.
“Sometimes it can be hard in hospitality to get staff with the skills you want and it’s impossible to oversee everything yourself all the time.
“In most cafés there is a lot more at play than just coffee. The Izaga W helps my customers make their product incredible. Because it’s easy to use, you can just hire good people and know you’re going to get good coffee.”
Barista Group aims to supply some of the world’s most innovative coffee systems and resources, such as the Markibar Izaga W, to the Australian coffee industry. Its main focus is providing tools that are engineered with precision to improve the workflow of cafés and venues around the country to save them time and money.
For more information, visit baristagroup.com.au
This article appears in the August 2025 edition of BeanScene. Subscribe HERE.
