SCAA 2006
By early 2006, The Aerobie AeroPress was available for sale in limited numbers with very few retailers carrying it. Demand outstripped production, leading to purchase waiting lists. After all, for $30, what was there to lose.
Adler was friends with the owners of Baratza, and they gave him space in their double booth at the 2006 SCAA trade show to demonstrate the AeroPress. This is where interest in the coffee tube exploded. Every day it seemed people were lined up 3 deep to check it out.
The most notable event was an AeroPress vs Espresso “shoot out” with Adler going up against the then-owner of Intelligentsia Coffee, Doug Zell. Several qualified coffee tasters were the blind judges. Guess who won? Adler and his AeroPress.
That further elevated the AeroPress’ mystique. Get the coffee zealots excited, and they will go out of their way to spread the word. Everyone online was talking about the coffee tube, and even working hard to develop new brewing methods with it.
Adler probably sold 20,000 units right there, based on that one shoot out with Zell. He got a raft of new wholesale orders from resellers, cafes and roasters who started selling the brewer on their websites. Stumptown Coffee was a prominent early seller.
Adler was active in the promotion. For instance, he took part in every online discussion about the brewer, from the beginning. For years, if you posed a question about the AeroPress in CoffeeGeek’s forums, Alan would answer it within hours. That AeroPress thread became our longest forum thread ever with over 4,500 posts.
It may have taken a year, but the AeroPress went from an unknown entity to something everyone wanted to own, almost overnight. It truly became an overnight sensation.
In a 2009 poll of CoffeeGeek’s (then) 46,000 members, over half of respondents said they owned an AeroPress. Barely 4 years after its introduction. Today, pretty much everyone I know into specialty coffee owns at least one AeroPress.
| 
