Coffee, it’s the world in your hands
Our philosophy is to drive passion and ensure quality training and cafe experiences for all. We aim to teach employable skills through direct access to wider industry and provide practical on the job training in functioning hospitality and retail environments.
With over 25 years international experience hospitality runs in our blood.
As leading industry trainers, we know the importance of tailoring our teachings to the learners needs, but as an employer we know the importance of having the needs of the business met to ensure streamlined processes, how to minimise wastage, how to maximise profitability as well as ensure happy staff and customers.
The journey began for Claire Matheson by establishing Co-Ed Cafe back in 2014 with the goal of having a cafe that provided practical training and real cafe experiences for those wanting to develop careers in the coffee industry. Quickly it became apparent that Co-Ed was a hit with the local community and with the growing connections and providing barista, coffee and cafe training to secondary schools, commercial establishments and the domestic coffee enthusiast. Co-Ed evolved into a hub for those with differing abilities.
Being involved with Co-Ed Cafe, Claire saw a need to change the values in the industry to be more diverse and inclusive by being inspired by many who have differing abilities. She saw an opportunity to inspire this change by ingraining it into the next generation of baristas from the beginning. Combining that with over 25 years international experience in the coffee industry, Coffee Educators was born.
Co-Ed quickly grew into Coffee Educators, a full Barista and Cafe training school where learners with barriers to employment were not only trained but supported into employment.
Training is tailored to the specific needs of your business. We do not believe that one size fits all but we do however believe that forming a collaborative group of businesses can result in better buying power and a crossover of processes that mean you dont need to reinvent the wheel.
In recognition for Co-Ed Cafe’s and Coffee Educators achievements we have won:
- 2015 Employer of the Year award from Deaf Aotearoa
- 2015 Diversability Award from the Equal Employment Opportunities Trust – Diversability Winner
- 2015 Runner up – Wellington Regional Airport Community Award for Education and Child Youth Development
- In 2015 Co-Ed Cafe was featured on Seven Sharp – Coffee In Silence
- 2016 – ACC Employer of the Year Attitude Award Finalist – Employer of the year
- 2017 – Diversability Award from the Equal Employment Opportunities Trust – Diversability Winner
- 2018 – NZSL Accessible Service Award
As we grow to be industry leading trainers, we know the importance of tailoring our teachings to the student’s needs, however as an employer, we know the importance of having job-seekers who have tangible experience which transfers into employable skills. We continue to focus on developing strong, practical and diverse coffee training courses for all.
We strongly believe that coffee offers the skills to support further education and travel. But also the door to a diverse and exciting industry where many careers have been forged through the making of that one special cup.