The story behind my video with 100k+ views
So, if that isn’t a clickbait title…
No really, I uploaded a video more than two years ago on my YouTube account called “Morning Espresso with The La Pavoni Professional” in which you can see me making an espresso with a restored italian levermachine from La Pavoni. It just passed the 100k view mark, which to me is pretty sick.
Story behind the video
I used to work at Van Pommeren a specialized store that sells anything related to espressomachines. It was founded in 1951, as a bicycle-shop. Around the 80’s they shifted to the home electronics market and eventually found their way to selling espressomachines. They learned me so much about coffee, electronics, pressure and Thermal stability, but also learning stuff about reading people and how to sell stuff.
One day, while working in the store, a guy came in with this 2006, really damaged, old school La Pavoni levermachine. The heating element was busted, al the seals where leaking and the machine looked if threw it a couple of times.
After offering to repare the machine for him (we had our own service deparment), he bit the bullet and bought a brand new one, leaving the busted ’06 machine in my hands.
Restoration..
I had two colleagues, Sven and Robert. Both were big fan of the old school machines from La Pavoni. They always talked about these little devices as the GOAT of domestic espressomachines. They really talked hours about the termostability of the pre-1998 versions or discussing different techniques how to flush the grouphead so you had the exact temperature when pulling a shot of espresso. You get it. Big time coffeenerds.
With their help I gave the machine a big restoration. Cleaning every bolt, sprint and spending to much hours polishing the chrome, replaced all the seals and a couple of weeks later I had my own La Pavoni espressomachine. The owner of Van Pommeren even gifted me an grinder, I was really proud, making my own espresso’s at home.
A couple of months later I got a new job, at Coffee IT (you get the irony?). I still had some vacation days left before starting that new job. So, what did I do during those days off? Jup. I had to record a video of my new baby. I recorded, edited and uploaded that video within a couple of hours, without a plan. Just with a passion for making videos and coffee. Now the video is on top of the Youtube search results when you type in ‘La Pavoni’.
Why did I tell you this story?
So, here we are. Why did I tell you this story? Maybe it’s just because I like telling it. It’s funny that something so small can grow to a big thing (at least for me). Maybe it’s to tell you that it doesn’t need to be perfect to be picked up by a big audience. Or maybe I just like to show you my espressomachine.
*PS more than 1000 people commented on my video, and yesterday I deleted each and every single comment on that video. Oops.
Between that first La Pavoni video and today, I made a couple more. Please do check them out on my channel
See you at the next one! 👋🏻
This post is part of my #100daystoOffload challenge. Post 7/100.