[Report] The Aroma of Fresh Coffee 365 Days a Year... Twosome Place Beans Roasted by Robots

A Visit to Twosome Place's Awesome Pairing Plant

Coffee Bean Production Automated; Annual Output Capacity up to 2,600 Tons

"Focus on Maintaining Uniform Coffee Quality Across All Stores"... Ongoing Equipment Advancement

On the morning of July 22, upon entering the 'Awesome Pairing Plant,' Twosome Place's coffee and dessert specialty production facility in Eumseong, Chungbuk, the rich aroma of coffee beans was the first thing to greet visitors. This facility, which began operations in July 2022 and is now in its fifth year, serves as the production base where all beans delivered to Twosome Place's approximately 1,740 stores nationwide are roasted. For the first time among Korean café franchises, both coffee roasting and dessert production systems have been established in a single building spanning 6,000 pyeong (approximately 19,300 square meters).

On this day, Twosome Place revealed its Awesome Pairing Plant coffee roasting production system to the media for the first time. Entering the production facility was no simple task. After donning a sanitary gown, cap, and mask, staff had to use a roller for 30 seconds to remove any foreign substances from their bodies. This was followed by thoroughly washing hands with water and then sanitizing with alcohol, before finally passing through an air-based foreign substance removal chamber to access the factory. Given that even the smallest impurity is not allowed to enter the coffee roasting process, these steps are all essential.

On the 22nd, imported green coffee beans were piled up inside Awesome Pairing Plant, a coffee and dessert specialty production facility of Twosome Place in Eumseong, Chungbuk. Photo by Hyunjin Jung

Inside the factory, there were hardly any staff members visible. This is because all processes are automated. Notable features included shelving stocked with raw beans in the spacious facility, massive machines towering over twice or three times the height of a person, and robots busily in motion. Only ten employees manage coffee production within the facility, of whom two are Q-graders, certified coffee tasters. The factory can roast up to 10 tons of beans per day, with the average being 7 to 8 tons daily. Annually, its maximum capacity is 2,600 tons, while last year it produced 1,900 tons. If last year’s output is converted into the standard 18g of beans used per Twosome Place iced Americano, this equates to enough for around 290,000 cups every day.

The coffee bean roasting process consists of seven total stages. First, the raw beans arriving at Busan Port are moved to a storage warehouse. Beans scheduled for imminent production are taken out and automatically fed into a machine that removes impurities. The cleaned beans are then stored in two 20-ton silos, after which they are automatically weighed according to each blend’s recipe and transferred to two 120kg capacity roasters for roasting. During roasting, the burner furnaces heat the bean roasters, raising the overall temperature in the plant; the interior is kept at around 30°C throughout the year. Roasted beans are then transferred via dedicated tubes—with minimal damage—for packaging.

On the 22nd, inside the roasting facility of Awesome Pairing Plant, a coffee and dessert specialty production facility of Twosome Place in Eumseong, Chungbuk. Provided by Twosome Place

On the 22nd, raw coffee beans and roasted coffee beans placed for explanation in front of the roaster inside Awesome Pairing Plant, a coffee and dessert specialty production facility of Twosome Place in Eumseong, Chungbuk. Photo by Hyunjin Jung

Automation occurs in every aspect. In the initial stage of receiving raw beans, high-weight bags (about 50 to 70 kilograms each) are handled by machinery rather than human hands. Machines also perform the automatic weighing, blending, and feeding of cleaned beans by origin, following product-specific recipes. Packaging of roasted beans is handled by robots. Whereas in the past, staff manually filled packaging with beans, now robots are responsible for this work, and two spider-like Delta robots package 8kg of product into each box.

Kim Junghoon, Coffee Production Team Manager at Twosome Place’s Awesome Pairing Plant, commented, "Our focus is not simply on increasing the quantity of beans produced, but on consistently maintaining the same coffee flavor at every store nationwide, even as production volume grows. You can think of this plant as a core hub for stabilizing coffee quality."

Twosome Place currently blends green beans delivered from five origins—Colombia, Brazil, Guatemala, Ethiopia, and Papua New Guinea—to provide three bean lineups: Blackground, Aromanote, and Decaffeinated. As of the first half of this year, Blackground accounted for 78.4% of sales, the highest percentage. Decaffeinated coffee sales also grew by 210% year-on-year compared to 2023.

On the 22nd, an employee is checking packaged coffee beans in front of the packaging equipment inside Awesome Pairing Plant, a coffee and dessert specialized production facility of Twosome Place in Eumseong, Chungbuk. Provided by Twosome Place

Photo on the 22nd shows a Delta robot installed in the packaging process inside the Awesome Pairing Plant, a coffee and dessert specialized production facility of Twosome Place in Eumseong, Chungbuk. Courtesy of Twosome Place

Although all processes at this facility are automated, there are still areas where human intervention is necessary. Kim explained, "During the operational phase after the plant’s launch, there have been errors with automated equipment. It is vital to monitor and regularly maintain the equipment to ensure proper operation, and this is a responsibility for staff." He added, "In the past, employees would directly feed green beans into machines and manually pack roasted beans into boxes. Now, their work has evolved to managing, controlling, and servicing the robots and automation systems."

The Awesome Pairing Plant is also upgrading its automation equipment. Inside the factory, an industrial robot vacuum cleaner, officially introduced a month ago after nearly a year of testing, was busily at work. This has improved efficiency in cleaning dust and particles in the facility. As the roasting plant keeps temperatures at around 30°C throughout the year, staff are testing cooling vests fitted with fans to cope with the heat. Additionally, there is a trial operation of an artificial intelligence (AI) camera-equipped forklift, which automatically stops if a person approaches.

Twosome Place aims to manage coffee quality uniformly and systematically based on the Awesome Pairing Plant. Last year, the company’s most-sold coffee product was the Americano, with 49 million cups sold, or 140 cups per minute. In response to the evolving demand in today’s coffee market, where the 'modisumer' and 'wellness' trends coexist and taste preferences are diversifying, the company plans to launch new fruit-infused and decaffeinated menu items in the second half of this year.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.