How to choose a grinder for a cafe: for filter coffee

You can offer filtered coffee from a Hario dripper for one, a French press for two, or have an automatic dripper for a batch brew. In any case, the taste of the coffee, for whatever method you choose, is significantly influenced by the coffee grinder. So, how to choose one?

Decision factors when choosing a coffee filter grinder

Why do youneed a grinder?
How much do you want to invest in it?
Where will you place it in your coffee shop?

Now try to answer these basic questions to choose the right grinder. Yeah, the second and third points are probably immediately obvious. These questions limit the choice of grinder based on financial and space constraints.

Question number one is the most complicated. Sure, you want a filter grinder for your coffee shop. But, what does that mean exactly? What all will the grinder need to handle? You're going to grind coffee on it:

for manual preparation of filter coffee,
for batchbrew,
for grindingpackages of coffee to take home.

I'll explain why this is important to know up front. The main reason is the performance of the grinder. That is, whether the grinder is adequately equipped with a powerful motor for the job. Here you should also think about the future, whether you will want to expand your service offer.

Will a home grinder be enough for me in a café?

Are you looking for a grinder that would cover the preparation of filter coffee for a small group of coffee drinkers who visit you daily and actually ask for the addition of filter coffee themselves? If you are planning to prepare filter coffee in the so-called home mode. Then yes, even basic home filter coffee grinders will do. This is where the grinders from Wilfa, Fellow and the Mignon range from Eureka come into play.

But beware, do you also have beans for sale? Keep in mind that not every customer who wants to buy a package has a grinder at home. So they'll ask you to grind it. To give you an idea, here's a story from the life of a coffee drinker:

You have a small café with your own pastry shop in a village in a tourist area. During the week, you'll use your new grinder for your morning batch and keep it busy during the afternoon with a few more grams of coffee.

You'll invite your guests for a hand-poured V60, because you want to offer your customers the sweetest coffee in the world from a unique microlot that your roaster managed to get directly from a Gomez farmer in Peru. He was incredibly lucky last year to have the most ideal conditions for growing his unique pink bourbon. They only sent you a few packages of this coffee from your "mother" roastery.

In these situations, your grinder can easily cope, but can it handle the onslaught of tourists from a passing bus who have decided to refresh themselves in your café?

The filtered coffee you prepared for them absolutely charmed them. That is why three of them decided to buy a packet of this coffee from you for home preparation and as a pleasant memory of this stop in your cosy café.

Unfortunately, none of them has a grinder at home and they ask you to grind the coffee for them. Despite the tears in their eyes at the amount of aromas and flavours that the ground coffee has been awarded for, with a score of up to 93 on the cupping assessment, you decide to oblige and grind the coffee for them. ( How do you rate coffee?) However, your grinder was not expecting this onslaught of work and is not built for it. That's why, when grinding the last packet, the motor overheats and stops grinding altogether.

What's next? You put the grinder in for repairs, grind coffee on your home hand grinder for a month, so you consider taking filter coffee off the menu due to cramps in your right hand. You wait for the repaired grinder to be returned to you after a month. Your repaired grinder is delivered not only with a new motor, but also an invoice for an amount close to the cost of a new grinder.

You set your re-functioning grinder on the bar, replenish the shelf with packets of irresistible coffee novelties from Brazil and prepare a fresh batch. From the window of your café, you watch the bus park and the tourists heading for their coffee.

So, how do you choose a filter coffee grinder?

You've just decided not to take the purchase of a filter coffee grinder lightly, and you want a really powerful grinder that can withstand years of grinding even larger batches of coffee.

Mahlkönig "éclair" forever

My choice of professional coffee grinders has to start with thefamous EK43 from Germany's Mahlkönig. It is the king of grinders in character, performance and quality. It's a sturdy grinder, in fact it would be more appropriate to call it a grinder. Maybe that's why it got the "tinier" version S. In real life it just has a lower base. You can have both versions in just about every color of the rainbow. ????

For the Mahlkönig EK43 mill, expect:

98 mm grinding stones made of cast steel
vertical setting of the stones
grinding speed approx. 20 g/s
motor with 1450 rpm
power 1300 W

Mahlkönig Guatemala

The popular practical grinder. You know how to set it up at first glance, plus it has a flexible shelf for the filter basket of your batch brew coffee machine. Compared to the "éclair", the smaller stones are compensated by adjusting the motor for higher speeds. It looks even more appealing in the new face-lift today. Want one?

Expect it with the Mahlkönig Guatemala grinder:

71 mm grinding stones made of special steel
Vertical setting of the stones
grinding speed approx. 14 g/s
motor with 2900 rpm
power 1100 W

Ditting, the king's brother for bulky coffee batches

You've probably heard of the Swiss grinder factory Ditting. The coffee shops of the Starbuckschain, for example , are very fond of them. Besides, Dittingis one of the top four brands of professional coffee grinders in the world. Together with Mahlkönig, they are the founders of the Hemro Group, which knows the secrets of the grinding stones of these grinders they produce.

For the Ditting 807 grinder, expect:

80 mm grinding stones made of special steel
horizontal setting of the stones
a grinding speed of approx. 7.5 g/s
motor with 1400 rpm
power 500 W

Eureka filter grinders for professionals

Italian Eureka has always been the standard for high quality. You will find its grinders on almost every corner, meaning the coffee shop or home café, with good coffee. For making filter coffee in a pro environment, it presents to the world, and to you, two types of grinders - the Drogheria and the Atom Pro.

For the Eureka Atom Pro grinder, expect:

75 mm hardened steel grinding stones
horizontal setting of the stones
a grinding speed of approx. 7 g/s
motor with 1400 rpm
power 900 W

Expect the following with the Eureka Drogheria grinder:

85 mm stainless steel grinding stones
horizontal setting of the stones
grinding at approx. 12 g/s
motor with 1430 rpm
power 750 W

Comparison of professional filter grinders

	Ditting 807	Mahlkönig EK43/S	Mahlkönig Guatemala	Eureka Atom Pro	Eureka Drogheria
mass	approx. 18 kg	approx. 26/24 kg	approx. 30 kg	approx. 12 kg	approx. 14 kg
(W×H×D) cm	21×54×30	23×82/68×41	22×62×33	18×47×24	18×65×27
hopper	510 g	1500/800 g	900 g	300 g	1400 g
advantages of the grinder	reliable for large batches	extremely fast grinding	practical for large batches	quiet technology	multifunctional classic
equipment options	vibrating tray, coffee straightening	"T" adjustment for jazz	vibrating basket, coffee straightening	Blow Up attachment	Blow Up attachment
Price	86 440 Kč	84 690 Kč	68 900 Kč	44 500 Kč	28 900 Kč

Table comparing the technical parameters and prices of professional coffee shop grinders suitable for filter coffee. Sorted by price, which is current as of 7/2023, in descending order.

Conclusion to professional grinders for drip coffee and other alternatives

We've included all the grinders in our selection primarily because of their high quality bar. Both the resulting grind and the product itself. Therefore, know that each of these grinders will be with you for many years. Each of the presented five grinders is also the owner of a number of certificates:

Ditting 807: CB, UL/CSA, NSF, KTL, EAC
Mahlkönig EK43: CE, CB, ETL Safety, ETL Sanitation
Mahlkönig Guatemala: CE, CB, ETL Safety, ETL Sanitation, UL/CSA, NSF
Eureka Atom Pro: CE, CSA
Eureka Drogheria: CE, CSA

But don't forget to take care of your chosen grinder with love! Cleaning the grinderregularly and replacing the grinding stones when the time comes will guarantee a great grind and thus perfect coffee results.