ZURIGA

Great that you’re here! And nice that you brought your bikes with you. We still have an old box bike at home that’s over 10 years old – it rides wonderfully 'leaned back’, like a truck I suppose. But I always look a little enviously at my friends with their agile mulis. Without exception, they are happy with their purchase. All the better that you’re here now.

We build espresso machines here in our own factory in Zurich. Not only do we assemble them ourselves, but unlike many manufacturers, we also have our own design and engineering teams – all under one roof, in the middle of the city.

When I moved into the apartment I shared with my girlfriend, the first thing we bought was a sofa – and then an espresso machine. And I wasn’t happy with this espresso machine. I opened it up and was amazed. The technology had obviously been left behind in the 1980s, the metal housing was rickety and most of the components were made of plastic. It was actually clear: "This should be better, more careful and more technological".

I don’t come from an entrepreneurial family, my friends are teachers, doctors or work for the fire department – so none of them are entrepreneurs. And yet I was fascinated by entrepreneurship. The fact that you can develop a product from a vague idea, a product that someone wants in the end and actually pays for with real money: I found that fascinating. And when an engineering colleague quit his job at the time to found a sustainable shirt start-up, I was ready. I’m going to try that now too.

In a nutshell? I scraped together my savings, developed a prototype together with designers and engineers and offered this prototype in a crowdfunding campaign. The 20 machines were sold out within three minutes. Today, eight years later, we are a good 30 people, have developed more machines and grinders and have our own stores in Munich and Zurich. We don’t see growth as a goal, but as a consequence of interesting projects. And we need these interesting projects so that we can get really good people on board.

We moved in here in 2018 as 'pioneer tenants’, the SBB people were still everywhere on the site, real industrial charm. The toilets were in the building next door and you had to wear a high-visibility vest on the way there – because railroad wagon chassis weighing several tons were also transported here. It was freezing cold in winter and scorching hot in summer. We have now been here in the renovated part of the building for two years. The architects have been able to preserve the atmosphere. And we no longer need woolly socks in winter …

Proximity is important to us, it is one of our three core values. However, "cultural proximity" is primarily important to us. We have to try things out, we have to be able to fail – and then learn from it. If we discover a quality problem with a housing in the morning, we want to discuss it on the phone as soon as possible and, if necessary, drive to our production partner in the afternoon. If we don’t have a common understanding of quality – or have to go to lunch twice for cultural reasons - then we are too late.

Interestingly, cultural proximity usually overlaps with geographical proximity. We are Swiss Made certified, which means we source the majority of our products from Switzerland. Individual components – especially the classic espresso machine parts – are produced by our partners in Lombardy and Piedmont. And then, of course, there are also components that we source from the Far East. We have a die-cast aluminum part from Taiwan and we also source the electronic components from the major manufacturers in Asia.

Personally, I am not a critic of globalization – on the contrary. It makes perfect sense for goods to be produced where people can do it best, where the conditions are good. Compliance with standards is important to me. So if a bicycle frame from Vietnam is simply cheaper because the workers there are not well protected, then you shouldn’t buy frames from there. Or even better: work towards ensuring that people are better protected. I suspect that your eu 90% project has taught you a lot about the supply chains in the bicycle business – if you can use this knowledge to offer an affordable electric cargo bike in the next few years, then you will have won all the way.

You said that very aptly. I have nothing to add to that.

Yes, we often discuss the fundamental questions – even over lunch together. Three or four years ago, we formulated purpose, mission and vision very openly, almost "ethereally", in the sense of "we want to inspire people and companies to change". That was intellectually interesting, but it made us lose our grip on the ground. We now have a policy paper. We keep it as profane as possible. "What distinguishes ZURIGA products from the competition?", "What does a ZURIGA product need for us to include it in our portfolio?". "Will we continue to produce ourselves and in the city?". But also "Why does ZURIGA have to be profitable?" or "Should ZURIGA grow?".
Simple questions, but not so easy to answer. These fundamental questions should only change slightly over the years – but they can be questioned at any time. We then derive the corporate goals from this.

Yes, that’s the logic that runs through almost all areas when projects get bigger.

We like the mixture of "easy-going"and "really serious". We are considerate of private life – we have fathers, paragliders and passionate surfers – and at the same time we demand a lot from ourselves. Technologically (e.g. in terms of energy efficiency and temperature stability) we are so far ahead that the competition buys our machines as soon as they are launched and places them in their laboratories. And we combine this technology with careful design and handcrafted production. This assembly also demands everything from us. It’s enough if a single screw is fitted incorrectly – then we have a disappointed and rather angry customer in Geneva, Hamburg or Vienna.

We sell exclusively online and through our own stores in Zurich and Munich. This means we don’t have to charge expensive retail margins on our products. Nowhere else can you get so much machine, so much technology for your money.

We have our own stores in Munich and Zurich, where we take the time to answer all your questions and serve espresso until your fingers shake. And yet most people buy without ever having been in a ZURIGA store. Our biggest and most successful advertising channel is actually satisfied owners. At the same time, we are also expanding the good old telephone. People want to be able to call quickly if something doesn’t work with the machine. And they don’t want to talk to a chatbot …

We are bootstrapped, so we have no external investors. So far, this has turned out to be a stroke of luck. I often talk to people from the VC world (VC = venture capital, editor’s note) and I think that this way of thinking makes sense in many places. For us, we have learned in recent years that we should not grow by more than 30%. The system is starting to wobble, processes are not keeping up, the overview is getting lost. We don’t build software, our devices consist of more than 300 parts, which we source from over 30 production partners. We therefore have largely inelastic production – we plan our production capacities for the long term accordingly. On the other hand, demand is currently high, which means that we are currently waiting more than five months for the ZURIGA. This is not ideal, but surprisingly, demand is not abating.

I have fond memories of the days when we at ZURIGA used to discuss things over lunch and make decisions straight away. In the meantime, everything has become bigger and more professional. And yet we still try to take a lot of it with us into the present day and, above all, into the times to come.

Thank you for visiting and sharing. I look forward to continuing to follow you. And I look forward to seeing you again. Just please leave one of your bikes here!