(upbeat music) - [Narrator] In a world where two billion cups of coffee are consumed every day, an Omaha man is on a mission to be the best barista on earth.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) He's already a national champion and placed fourth in international competition.

(upbeat music) His name is Isaiah Sheese, and he's a rockstar in the world of coffee.

- [Isaiah] I am the 2023 United States Barista Champion, fourth in the world.

(upbeat music) Top six is where you wanna fall.

(upbeat music) That kind of locks you into coffee stardom as being top six in the world.

(upbeat music) It kind of just puts you in that weird niche world of coffee fame.

- [Narrator] Most days, you can find Isaiah working at one of his three coffee shops in Omaha.

(upbeat music) He opened his first shop in the historic Blackstone District in 2014.

(upbeat music) - [Isaiah] There was nothing really open, a couple bars, but everything else was kind of like boarded up or run down at that point.

We were the first one open in that whole district, first coffee shop, first restaurant, first anything at that point.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Now, almost a decade later, Archetype Coffee has expanded to the Little Bohemia and Millwork Commons neighborhoods.

(upbeat music) Isaiah shared his passion for coffee might be rooted in a family tradition.

- [Isaiah] I think my grandma was gonna make sure that I drank coffee.

So to carry on the legacy, right?

And so I started drinking coffee probably when I was like five or six, you know, just a little cream and sugar, you know, probably more cream and sugar than it was coffee.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] While in college, Isaiah worked at a small coffee shop and he says that's where he got his first taste of competition.

(upbeat music) - [Isaiah] The guy that owned that coffee shop signed me up for one of the regionals, and my first year to compete at that qualifier, I came in fifth, and so it was just kinda like a slippery slope to becoming a little bit more passionate about competition.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Isaiah's been competing since 2009.

- Laser focuses them and transforms them.

- [Narrator] But it was the year he qualified for the United States Barista Championship when he realized the seriousness of the craft.

- [Isaiah] And there were just, you know, 50 baristas, you know, across the US, just like polishing all of their wares with a polishing cloth, headphones on, stressed out of their minds.

I walked back there and I was like, I will never be like these people.

You know, where I'm polishing my, like what is this?

So like it's coffee, you know?

That year, needless to say, I didn't do very well.

All of the hard work.

I realized really quickly that if you're gonna be an expert in your field, you have to compete at a very high level.

Let's write down some tasting notes.

- [Narrator] Competitors have 15 minutes to present and prepare three different coffee drinks for a panel of judges, and before a large audience.

- And a pleasant lingering dark chocolate finish.

Now, Diego's processing is in, by no means a happy accident, but what does it do to the coffee?

It takes..

The way that we always describe it is kind of like a coffee Ted Talk while making 12 drinks, while also curating the music as well.

I believe if we want to continue to progress the landscape of our industry, that's gonna take intentional innovation.

You have to come up with the concept, you have to come up with the coffee, you have to come up with the tasting notes, a signature drink.

It's a pretty involved competition that takes a lot of creativity and to be able to execute on a high level.

Thank you, time.

(crowd cheering) (soft music) - [Narrator] Isaiah's winning presentation was inspired by a popular American painter.

- [Isaiah] My presentation really wasn't focused on Bob Ross.

It was just that little concept in the beginning of just talking about happy little accidents.

- [Bob] I know this is gonna look like we're destroying everything.

Don't worry about it.

We don't make mistakes.

We have happy accidents.

(soft music) - [Narrator] As part of his winning strategy, Isaiah sourced a high quality, specialty coffee from a small grower in South America.

(upbeat music) - [Isaiah] Lucy is a small holder female farmer from San Augustine, Colombia.

(soft music) We've been buying all of her Pink Bourbon, which is a special variety, for the last six years.

If we're gonna win, we wanted to win with a farm that really represented us, and so Lucy was gracious enough to grow the coffee (soft music) and then let us transport it three hours over the Andes Mountains to a rising star producer named Diego Bermuda, where he processed her coffee in a very special way to elevate it to a whole nother level and another dimension.

- [Narrator] Specialty coffee is the highest grade of coffee and differs significantly from the standard supermarket options.

- [Isaiah] Our competition style coffees are those very expensive coffees.

We sell probably 97% of those on our website all over the US and all over the world, and I would say only like maybe 3% of those in Omaha.

And when you're trying to work closely with the farmers, making sure that they're making more of a livable wage, you're paying a higher premium, but in Omaha's market, you know, being able to charge that premium, it can be a tricky thing to navigate.

- [Narrator] Since winning national and international titles, business has picked up.

(soft music) - [Isaiah] Growing pains are painful, but winning, you know, pushes you into a whole nother level, but you can't plan for that on the business side of it.

You got a large oat vanilla latte.

(crowd chatter) Yeah, I'm wearing more hats now than I ever have.

Jason, who roasts for us and helps me with all these competitions, he's wearing even more hats, and so it's definitely a juggling act.

- [Narrator] Jason Burkum has worked with Isaiah since the early days of Archetype Coffee.

He's also a Grammy Award-winning artist who prefers roasting coffee.

- [Jason] Coffee roasting kind of scratches the same itch as a lot of things that when you're making music for people or any kind of art, I mean, you put something out in the world, you kind of see what people do with it and hopefully there's a reaction.

(coffee beans tinkling) - [Narrator] Isaiah and Jason share a common goal: the pursuit of the perfect coffee taste and roast.

- [Jason] I think, as both Isaiah and I have always had this idea of, you know, what's the perfect coffee taste like and what's the perfect roast for any coffee that we buy?

- [Isaiah] We have these coffees that taste like flowers and fruit juice as opposed to just a good strong cup of coffee.

People have always treated coffee kind of as like a wake me up drug.

You know, you just want something that you know what that coffee cup is.

We're all set.

Thanks, man, have a good day.

When you're competing on the world stage, it's like you're supposed to bring what's cutting edge, and so it's been a tricky dance, navigating and bridging that gap between where our consumers are and where we would like to push our industry.

We're trying to be recognized just like a culinary art, like food and wine and craft cocktails.

For Archetype, our goal is, you know, we wanna be one of the best roasters in the world.

- [Narrator] Coming from the fourth-best barista on planet Earth.

- Oh, yeah.

- [Narrator] Chances are, Isaiah and Jason will realize their dream as they continue to embrace the joy of creating something extraordinary, one cup at a time.

(soft music)