Many of us need our daily coffee fix. Now a group of Kiwis at the cutting edge of caffeine have opened a world-first facility in Auckland, catering for the booming global market for coffee in a can.
While the ribbon-cutting ceremony was pretty low-tech, the facility it opened is anything but.
"We started out trying to make good-tasting instant and provide an alternative to Moccona," said New Ground founder Connor Nestor.
"We very quickly found out that there was no one to take that idea to who could help us. And so we pivoted into what ended up being a three-year engineering journey."
A journey that led to this - New Ground's patented 'NGT' extraction system, capable of producing 60 kilos of espresso-strength coffee an hour.
Coupled with a factory, New Ground can now produce 40 million servings of coffee annually - and not just in cans.
"This core ingredient that we can make through this, you know, scale brewer that was built can also go into coffee in a can and can also go into a coffee concentrate product that can be an ingredient for beer brewers, for dairy producers, for bakers," Nestor said.
"And so now we're in this really interesting space of being a flavour house and a manufacturer. So we've got the lab at the front to make a world of new products. And the world is our oyster I guess."
For Nestor's business partner and self-described mad coffee scientist, it's a dream come true.
"It's like I'm a giddy little kid. You know, all of this equipment is big, proper industrial stuff for us to make, world-class products with," said head of product Ralph Jenner.
"And it's like when you're first starting a journey like this, you know, you're always sort of pulling it together. You're bootstrapping all the time and to get to the fully commercial, professional level is just amazing."
And with a new generation of coffee drinkers wanting everything from a hit of mushroom to high protein in their coffee, this world-first facility can do it all.
"We can bring an idea to life and in a matter of days, you know, from a rapid prototype with the customer to the first manufacturing run of a product which might go to the other side of the world or all in the same week," Jenner said.
But while it's all hands on deck after opening, rest assured there's always a bit of time for taste testing.
