One of the most fun—not to mention important—traditions of the NBC is the Bazaar, which raises the funds needed to make the annual charity project possible. Basically, a charity is identified in whatever that year’s focus country is. So this year, with the focus country being Colombia, money is being raised for Jose Maria Obando, which is an agronomy school which is attended by the young people from the rural region of Cauca, where we will hopefully be able to fund the building of a new computer room, with 15 brand new computers as well as Internet access. This will change the lives—and the futures—of a lot of people.
In addition, the team that wins this year’s Nordic Barista Cup will travel to Colombia to visit coffee farms as well as the school, to meet the students and see the fruits of the NBC in action.
It’s a fantastic program within the Nordic Barista Cup, which has been working well and giving back to coffee producing countries every year.
The actual money-raising is an always fun event known as the Nordic Barista Cup Bazaar, and among the many items graciously donated, which include grinders, books, artwork, coffee tools, and more, the most famous item that is always up for sale is the goat trophy that Klaus Thomsen was awarded as the winner of the World Barista Championship in Berne, Switzerland, in 2006. It’s a funny item, symbolic of the NBC at this point, as a means to donate large sums of money to the wonderful organization that is the NBC.
It has traditionally moved between the NBC’s Jens Nørgaard of Europa 1989 in Copenhagen, and Andreas Hertzberg of Solberg & Hansen, and at the end of the bidding this year, which took place after lunch today. And this year, once again, Jens was the winner, buying back the goat for 2000 Euro. Thank you, Jens!
The men who have possessed the goat over the years: Andreas, Klaus, Søren, and Jens
Next up on the docket was a Clover machine, and emcee Davis Latourell had fun auctioning it off; David used to work for Clover, before it was bought by Starbucks. David even offered to visit the home/cafe of the winner of the Clover to repair it! So long as that person would get him to said location.
The bidding sheet for the Clover, which was heated between Jens and Steve Leighton (of Has Bean) on paper, and then got really heated verbally! As all good auctions should!
Jens and Steve went back and forth quite a few times over the Clover, but finally, Steve Leighton was the winner, claiming the Clover for 3350 Euro. He’s quite excited! Well, he’s excited to have the Clover, but not really to tell his wife that he spent 3350 Euro on it…
Here, Steve holds the Clover squeegee while Bjørg runs his credit card.
The auction/Bazaar will continue tomorrow during the public day, at the end of which we will announce how much money was raised in total. But we seem to be off to a pretty great start!