Interview with Breville’s Phil McKnight

An influencer in the espresso and drip coffee industry for the past 15 years, Breville has long been one of our favorite brands. Not only do they create beautiful die cast espresso machines, coffee makers, grinders, blenders and even ice cream makers, but they also put a lot of work and research into developing their products. For instance, when Breville makes an espresso machine there is nothing left behind; all the gadgets you need to create a drink (portafilter, different sized portafilter baskets, frothing pitcher, cleaning tools, etc.) are included an there is even a place to store them. As a result, you can expect to receive machines with great functionality like the new Oracle BES980XL, which enables you to easily pull a shot and froth your milk for latte while still giving you control over the parameters involving the extraction of your shot. This approach also permits Breville to improve products that have become old standbys, like their dual boilers, by gathering customer feedback to create something even better, such as the Dual Boiler BES920XL. A couple of weeks ago we were lucky enough to have Breville pay us a visit all the way from Australia to do some training. While they were here, we got a chance to chat with Breville’s Global Business Manager for Beverage Products, Phil McKnight. Since he started at Breville Phil has been known as the “coffee guru” as he has over 10 years of industry experience in coffee, including judging the Australia Barista championships and running his own café in Sydney. We were eager to hear his thoughts on coffee makers and espresso machines, and asked him to if he’d be willing to do an interview with us so we could learn more about one of our favorite brands. Phil happily obliged and shared some of his insights about the brand’s history, manufacturing techniques and what products we can look forward to seeing in the future.

Interview with Breville's Phil McKnight