Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Mike McGinness on October 16, 2010 at 12:13pm

My recommendation is don't. Most you have to put the dishes in looking virtually clean anyway, unlike a home dishwasher than will sort of scrub food off. Actually faster to just wash, rinse, sanitize and put on drying rack ready for immediate use rather than have to wait for a dishwasher to cycle. Actually pulling the dishwasher out of our one of three coffeehouses that had one. Our locale you have to have a three compartment dish sink even if you have a dishwasher (in case it breaks so they say) so why waste the $$$ every single month on a dishwasher. Spend it on great coffee instead...

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Kim Anderson on October 16, 2010 at 1:56pm

Thanks for the info. We have a super small space so we thought about trying to minimize but I think we are required to have a 3 compartment sink as well. Thanks a bunch!

Mike McGinness said:

My recommendation is don't. Most you have to put the dishes in looking virtually clean anyway, unlike a home dishwasher than will sort of scrub food off. Actually faster to just wash, rinse, sanitize and put on drying rack ready for immediate use rather than have to wait for a dishwasher to cycle. Actually pulling the dishwasher out of our one of three coffeehouses that had one. Our locale you have to have a three compartment dish sink even if you have a dishwasher (in case it breaks so they say) so why waste the $$$ every single month on a dishwasher. Spend it on great coffee instead...

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Jay Caragay on October 16, 2010 at 11:06pm

For eleven years, my company has never used a dishwasher. However, I certainly am thinking that the underbar glass washers from Perlick (and similar) might be very useful for the busy coffee bar. Just place the cups upside down and they rotate through the cycle. Simple, easy, quick - but expensive.

Best bet is to discuss this with your equipment person.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Anthony Rue on October 17, 2010 at 5:05am

Here's a counter-opinion: if you have designed a business model that emphasizes in-house service over to-go drinks, seriously consider a dishwasher. We allowed ourselves to be talked out of installing one in the design phase, and it is the one single mistake that we made. Unfortunately, the cost to retrofit our space (both in design/storage/workflow disruption and water/electric mods) to add a dishwasher after-the-fact is prohibitive.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Brady on October 17, 2010 at 5:24am

Perhaps a reasonable approach would be to design your dish area as though you'll have one, including all hookups, but hold off on putting it in?

If you're like many shops, you may well find that the ebb and flow of your day allows 5 minutes here and there for a staff member to do a batch of dishes. Or you could build that into your shift changes, overlapping a person at each change for the sole purpose of doing dishes.

For bigger-ticket items, I think its nice to be sure that you'll actually need them before you drop the cash.

Hope that helps. Good luck.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by olivier dutil on October 17, 2010 at 6:34am

talk with a ecolab representative. they have awsome deal on lease and when leasing you dont have to worry about maintenance... something break.. they mostly fix it in less than 3 hours... I am head chef of a restorant and as soon as i tasted to lease. every where i go , i get them on a lease.


olivier

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Mike McGinness on October 17, 2010 at 10:38am

I'll offer a counter counter opionion. Of our three locations one does in fact do well over 50% in porcelain. The challenge is keeping up with porcelain demand. As already stated generally speaking a dishwasher isn't faster than manual washing. One year lease on dishwasher @~$170 month could buy over 300 additional ACF cups & saucers. Design space with readily accessible storage for backup porcelain.


Anthony Rue said:

Here's a counter-opinion: if you have designed a business model that emphasizes in-house service over to-go drinks, seriously consider a dishwasher. We allowed ourselves to be talked out of installing one in the design phase, and it is the one single mistake that we made. Unfortunately, the cost to retrofit our space (both in design/storage/workflow disruption and water/electric mods) to add a dishwasher after-the-fact is prohibitive.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Jacob Casella on October 17, 2010 at 11:04am

I second talking to Ecolab, I am at a high-volume shop with a lot of dishes and I'd be screwed without a machine. If you think you might need one eventually, try to leave the option.

Worth noting that dishwashers aren't perfect, I still need someone to hand scrub the lipstick off the outside and latte residue off the inside of many mugs, but the machine still speeds things up incredibly.

Find what fits your space-- the machines and detergent are expensive. A quick google search turns up http://www.barglasswasherworld.com/ , which I'm going to peruse now.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by olivier dutil on October 17, 2010 at 3:43pm

well i dont know where you get you 170$ there. i rent mine for less then 100 $ a month if you think that a dishwasher cost around 5600$ i will take almost 5 years to pay it but dont forget i\you will still have to pay for maintence wicth can be pricy


Mike McGinness said:

I'll offer a counter counter opionion. Of our three locations one does in fact do well over 50% in porcelain. The challenge is keeping up with porcelain demand. As already stated generally speaking a dishwasher isn't faster than manual washing. One year lease on dishwasher @~$170 month could buy over 300 additional ACF cups & saucers. Design space with readily accessible storage for backup porcelain.


Anthony Rue said:

Here's a counter-opinion: if you have designed a business model that emphasizes in-house service over to-go drinks, seriously consider a dishwasher. We allowed ourselves to be talked out of installing one in the design phase, and it is the one single mistake that we made. Unfortunately, the cost to retrofit our space (both in design/storage/workflow disruption and water/electric mods) to add a dishwasher after-the-fact is prohibitive.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Dav on October 20, 2010 at 3:49am

Hi All,

I have a question regarding the dishwasher which maybe slightly off at a tangent. We will be selling coffee in porcelain cups and also serving food like cakes, muffins and paninis. Now my question is : Should we get a dishwasher or a glasswasher? My understanding is that they work in slightly different ways and have different running costs.

Cheers

Dav

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by olivier dutil on October 20, 2010 at 7:58am

no matter wath you get you will have to scrub the coffee cup . a ommercial diswasher do is cycle in 90 second... so we should call it a comercial sanitazer and not a dishwasher.. so everything that go in the dishwasher must be almost clean. So dont forget to include a pre rince sink in you set up. and class washer dont really cut the grease since it washing a cold temp. so not really usefull for anything else them glass .

Dav said:

Hi All,

I have a question regarding the dishwasher which maybe slightly off at a tangent. We will be selling coffee in porcelain cups and also serving food like cakes, muffins and paninis. Now my question is : Should we get a dishwasher or a glasswasher? My understanding is that they work in slightly different ways and have different running costs.

Cheers

Dav

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Jason Shipley on October 20, 2010 at 11:33am

We put an Electrolux dishwasher in our new space and it was certainly money well spent. For me it comes down to helping control labor costs by making cleanup easier. Its much more efficient than using a hand sink from a "Green" standpoint. Standard cycle is 90 seconds and uses only .94 gallons of water. It has a built in booster water heater so we were able to buy a smaller hot water heater, not only saving $$ but valuable floor space.

• ▶ Reply

▶ Reply to Discussion