Refurbished Commercial Beverage Equipment

Whatever the signature drink needs, then the ice. A cafe lives and dies on the espresso machine and the grinder, so that is the first and largest line on the list. A bar lives on ice, glassware and the cold cabinet before it needs a blender.

After the hero machine, buy the thing that stops service when it fails. In practice that is the ice machine for a bar and the grinder for a cafe. Garnish tools, juicers and blenders can usually be added once the trade has told you what people actually order.

Largely yes, with one caveat: these are machines with water, pumps and seals in them, so the parts that matter are the ones you cannot see. A blender or a juicer is simple and the wear items are cheap. An espresso machine or a dispenser with a chilling circuit is a machine where service history matters.

The question to ask is the same across the category: what was replaced during the refurbishment, not what was checked, and are parts for that exact model still available in Australia. A well-supported brand is a far safer buy than an unfamiliar import at the same money.

A great deal, and it is the thing most buyers underestimate. Any machine that heats or chills water will scale up if the water is hard, and scale is what eventually ends an espresso machine, an ice machine, a dispenser and a steamer alike. Filtration is not an accessory in this category.

Find out about the water where the machine is going, and put a filter in from day one rather than after the first service call. On a used machine, ask about the water where it last worked, because a machine from a hard-water area with no filter has had a harder life than its age suggests.

Some of it, and the requirement for each unit is on its product page. Espresso machines are often the heaviest electrical load on a cafe counter and frequently need a dedicated circuit, sometimes a 15 amp outlet, which takes a wider earth pin and will not accept a standard plug until an electrician fits one.

Plumbing matters too. Plumbed-in machines need a water connection and usually a drain, and a counter built without either is an expensive thing to open up afterwards. Sort power points, water and waste into the joinery drawings before the counter is built, not after the machines arrive.

Yes, and most fit-outs do. The sensible split is to buy new where failure stops trade and parts matter most, and refurbished where the machine is simple and replaceable. A blender, a juicer and an urn are easy refurbished buys; a bar's only ice machine is where many operators prefer new.

Compare the two side by side before deciding on any given machine, since the gap varies by category. The new ranges sit at commercial coffee machines, commercial juicers and commercial bar blenders.

Work from the peak hour, not the day. A counter that serves most of its drinks in two short bursts needs capacity for the burst, and a machine sized to the daily average will fall behind every morning. Count the drinks in the busiest hour and size for that.

Then think about recovery rather than output. A machine that produces well but takes time to come back between drinks will bottleneck a queue, which is why group count matters on an espresso machine and why ice storage matters as much as ice production. Tell us the peak and we will match it against stock.

Seals, gaskets and anything that touches water. On blenders and juicers it is the blade assembly, the drive coupling and the seal under the jug. On espresso machines it is group gaskets, shower screens and the steam valve. On dispensers it is the pumps, the taps and the seals in them.

All of it is cheap and routine, provided parts for the model exist. Build a small stock of the wear parts for whatever you buy, because the one that fails will fail at the start of a shift. Ask us about parts availability for the exact model you are looking at.

Yes, and this is where used machines are either a bargain or a problem. Milk, juice and syrup residue is harder on a machine than kitchen grease is, because it gets into the parts you cannot reach and it sours. A machine that was cleaned down daily is in a different condition from one that was rinsed.

Each machine has its own routine: backflushing and group cleaning on espresso, stripping and sanitising on juicers and dispensers, and descaling on anything that heats water. Factor the chemicals and the time into the running cost. Dishwashing chemicals covers the glassware side of the same counter.