Coffee Conversations: Barista Education with Rachel Apple

A lot of people in the U.S. coffee industry miss Barista Camp, the education-focused retreat hosted by the Barista Guild in the 2010s. While other events have popped up to try and fill the gap after the guild transitioned to a different event called Access in 2018, there hasn’t been anything to replace the combination of education and sleepaway camp vibes of the original Barista Camp. 

Now, though, a group of coffee educators is trying to revive that vibe. Raise The Bar is the brainchild of Rachel Apple, a coffee consultant, competition judge, and photographer based in Boston, who founded the non-profit alongside industry pros Ivana Chan and Sandra Loofbourow. Their first event, Level Up, takes place over the weekend of September 27-29 at Mill City Roasters in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Eighty baristas will learn from a who’s who of industry luminaries including Morgan Eckroth, Kat Melheim, Ever Meister, Carly Green, and lots more. 

Importantly, Level Up is designed with baristas in mind and will be specifically non-competitive.

“I’m not a competitor, I don’t have the competitive spirit”, Apple tells me. “I want to support people, which is why I judge, but I don’t want to compete. And I think that a lot of people don’t think competitions are for them, or that they have a problematic framework to begin with, and since there’s no longer a Barista Camp there’s not a good space for baristas to just come together”.

I spoke with Apple about her background, the state of barista education in the U.S., and what she hopes Level Up can achieve.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity, and I should also note that Apple is a paid subscriber to The Pourover.