Good Coffee Festival Brand Residency

Story Cups

Cadu

Café

FlavouRITs

Café

Savi Gelato

Café

Чай във фабриката

Café

Martines

Brewing Dealers

Café

Blue Bag Specialty Coffee

Flow Cacao Roasters

Spojka

Café

kafeto.bg

Café

Aroma Coffee

Café

100%Caffeine

Café

Kofi Ti

Café

718 Breakfast & Brunch

Café

Бар Самар

Food & drinks

Caruso pizza

Food & drinks

Tuscani cioccolato

Chocolate

BePure

Artisan space

Хранкооп маг

Farmers market

Open the festival map

Venue Profiles

The profiles behind the taste

See all profiles→

Who stands behind the cup, who selects the bean, who guards the craft. Deep editorial portraits of the venues in the Good Coffee Festival network. The people, the philosophy and the craft.

11 min read

We Are Not Clairvoyants: Dimitar Petrovski of Ritual Coffee and Cocktails

☕️ Which aroma would a barista keep forever, and why does the answer have nothing to do with coffee? Dimitar Petrovski of Ritual Coffee and Cocktails answers the question about the morning's first sip with the name of his own bar. 📖 On the neighbourhood that has to know you, on recipes that are not secrets, and on why "we are not clairvoyants" is a working position rather than a joke. Read the full conversation ahead of Good Coffee Festival on Slow Made City! 👉 [link to article]

9 min read

Every Cup Tells a Story: Ivan Spasov of Story

☕ A coffee shop called Story with the motto "Every cup tells a story" reads like a closed loop. In Ivan Spasov's answers the story turns out to belong to someone else. 📖 On the farmer he would rather listen to, on teaching yourself out of curiosity, and on why explaining good coffee is harder than making it. Read the full conversation ahead of Good Coffee Festival on Slow Made City! 👉 [link to article]

10 min read

Cleanliness Is the First Lesson: Nikolay Kostadinov of Better Specialty Coffee

☕ What is the single most important thing a barista learns about coffee? Nikolay Kostadinov of Better Specialty Coffee answers with a word that appears on no menu. 📖 Cleanliness behind a bar is not decoration, it is taste: yesterday's flavour goes into every cup that follows. Read the full conversation ahead of Good Coffee Festival on Slow Made City! 👉 [link to article]

8 min read

The Coffee Repeats, the Person Never Does: Alexandra Fileva of Urban Embassy

☕️ What do you learn about people after five years of making them coffee every day? Alexandra Fileva of Urban Embassy answers with one sentence that arranges everything else. 📖 The bean sets the ceiling; the person at the machine owns the distance down to the cup. And "bad coffee" turns out to be a definition that never mentions taste. Read the full conversation ahead of Good Coffee Festival on Slow Made City! 👉 [link to article]

The One Word Banned Behind the Bar: Anton Krinchev of Flow Cacao Roasters

🍫 Which single word is banned behind the bar of a cacao roastery? Anton Krinchev of Flow Cacao Roasters gives an answer that arranges everything else. 📖 Espresso teaches speed, cacao teaches patience - and the work is finished long before the bean reaches the machine. Read the full conversation ahead of Good Coffee Festival on Slow Made City! 👉 [link to article]

5 min read

What the Paper Cup Takes: Alexander Skrinjaric of Martines

☕️ Ever wondered what truly makes a coffee experience unforgettable? Dive into our latest article featuring Alexander Skrinjaric from Martines, where he reveals the hidden costs of the paper cup! 📜 Don't miss out on this insightful conversation ahead of the Good Coffee Festival in Sofia. Spoiler alert: it’s more than just about the brew! Explore how a Slow Made City approach can transform your coffee ritual. Click to read the full article now!

5 min read

Some Drinks Never Leave the Bar: Story Cups in Yavorov

☕️ Ever wondered what happens to drinks that never leave the bar? Dive into the hidden stories behind Yavorov's beloved Story Cups! 👉 Read the full article to uncover the secrets of this Slow Made City gem. Spoiler alert: not all drinks make the cut, and the reasons are as fascinating as the coffee itself! Don't miss out-click to discover what makes Story Cups a must-visit! 🌟

Reading the Land: What Coffee Origin Actually Means

That farm name on your coffee bag? It represents GPS coordinates, harvest records, and skilled labour you'll never see. Here's what origin actually means, and why it matters.

The Barista Who Knows the Farmer's Name

In Sofia, Blue Bag Coffee Europe roasts in small batches on a Probat, where Head Barista Francisco Lopez follows every bean from farm to cup. When the barista knows the farmer's name, coffee becomes a record of decisions.

Georgi Gagov and the Quiet Work of Roasting Well

Somewhere in Sofia, a roaster drum turns at 7:30 in the morning. Georgi Gagov has been listening to this sound for 27 years, building Aroma Coffee into proof that consistency and craft outlast trends. This is the quiet work of roasting well.

Cacao Roasted Slow, Served Warm

In central Sofia, Flow Cacao Roasters treats cacao beans as sacred raw material, slow-roasting single-origin beans from Costa Rica into ceremonial drinking chocolate. This isn't your instant cocoa-it's chocolate that tastes like the fruit it came from, served warm and deliberately slow.

5 min read

Small Batches, Full Stories: Blue Bag Specialty Coffee

Francisco Lopez names the farm, altitude, and processing method for every shot he pulls at Blue Bag Specialty Coffee. In Sofia's growing specialty scene, this Bulgarian roastery proves that small batches and verified farms create stories worth telling.

Global Scene

The coffee scene beyond Sofia

Melbourne, London, Copenhagen: what coffee festivals look like in cities with a long tradition in the craft, and what from their experience could work in Sofia too.

Fifteen Years of Crowds, and the Coffee Still Tastes Right

The London Coffee Festival has quadrupled in size since 2011, drawing 22,000+ visitors to Shoreditch's Truman Brewery. But can a coffee festival grow without losing the craft that made it worth attending? London's fifteen-year experiment offers lessons for any city building specialty coffee culture.