SCA Chicago 2024: Chicago. Pt. 3

Editor’s note: Don’t forget to check out the rest of our SCA diary posts:

FRIDAY 4/12/2024: OFFICIAL SCA DAY 2

The Parking Ramp: Part 1

Oh my god, it begins. And it begins in pure confusion. In an effort to be more responsible, I pre-purchased my parking pass online. Huge mistake. Here is a list of the (nearly) comedic series of errors that occurred:

The address on the emailed parking ticket took me to a locked gate where no cars were parking. All roads lead away from the McCormick Center.
I wing it and get back on the highway. Quite a ways south, I see a sign. Parking ramp C. That’s me.
This modern ramp has eliminated all humans from the ticket booths. Very efficient. Also, it is not very helpful when it turns out that there is no cell signal. The cell signal is fairly important to those of us who bought our tickets online. We need to call up a QR code to scan.
This is where I start to spiral. Cars have begun lining up behind me. I can’t open the gate. I have no phone service and no human to talk to. I leave my car at the gate and jog up the gate, desperately hoping for a few bars. When I get them, I screenshot my code.
The scanner won’t read my code. WTF.
I pull a ticket to get the gate open, but there is no way I’m paying this twice. To be continued

My brilliant wife recommended I bring a roller suitcase with me. I did not think it was necessary, but I deferred to her judgment. I was wrong. It comes in handy, bringing some of the samples, a bit of lunch, and a change of clothes into the venue. It is a 15-minute walk from the parking ramp to the media room. I point this out because it is one more example of how my life is better because Trina has decided to continue partnering with me.*

The SCA Convention Floor: The Hustle Begins

My notes get scattered at this point. The lobby for the convention is one of the biggest rooms I’ve ever seen. The patio off the back overlooks the lakeshore pedestrian path and the endless blue of Lake Michigan. If not for the distant smokestacks along the Indiana border to the south—just visible on a bluebird day—you’d think you were looking out at another ocean.

At 10:00 AM, the convention floor opens, and the buzz is palpable. I’ve been through this rodeo before. I avoid the first wave of attendees looking to swipe the best swag off the vendor tables. I’m not here to bring anything home (and yet somehow I do). I’m here to connect with coffee people and give away swag. My coffee Santa sack is filled to the brim with coffee samples from R!WC Industry Partners, 5-panel Coffee People caps, and beanies.

L-R: Coffee samples at the Roastar Booth. I meet the team from Mostra. Charles shows off Tekwani Design’s entry into the SCA Packaging Design awards.

I do need a coffee. First stop, Roaster Village. It’s at the back of the room, and—what the eff? Is that? No. You gotta be kidding me. My first one-on-one connection on the floor is with Aya and Mike from Mostra Coffee. Mike has been a guest on Coffee People, and Mostra has been supporting Roast! West Coast since the beginning. There is a Mostra about 15 miles from my house. Of course, they need some swag. “You know, we could have done this back in San Diego?” I say.

I swing by the Roastar booth to drop off coffee. They're in full swing. Chicago is kind of like home turf, and I keep moving. Little Waves is brewing up coffee at one of the roaster stations. Last summer, I had an espresso and mug of their coffee at Cafe Domestique in Madison, WI. I've regretted not buying a bag ever since. I've had dreams about that coffee. They are my first stop.

My second stop is to say Hello to Charles and Hannah at Tekwani Design. I met them at SCA 2023 in Portland, and I daresay we've become friends. In fact, I'll run into a lot of people over the next few days who I've met at other coffee conventions.

This thing I'm trying to do with the Roast! West Coast slate of podcasts and this newsletter isn't exactly a conventional job. I don't meet anyone at the water cooler or connect over a Slack channel. Slack is a thing, right? Like MySpace for offices? I've been out of the game for a while.

The point is that the people I meet at conventions, coffee cuppings, or even at the next table in the cafe become colleagues of sorts. We have a shared passion for a nuanced industry that offers opportunity to a wide range of humanity. Over the next few days, I'll meet coffee people from many U.S. states and various countries in Africa, Europe, and Asia. Some of them will end up on a future show. Some will end up in my phone contact list. Some will become friends. This, to me, is what coffee—at its best—can do. Coffee connects humans.

For seven hours, I work the floor, shaking hands, meeting people, and ogling new coffee tech. I drink an excessive quantity of coffee in the form of pour over samples, espresso shots, and an excellent flat white from the Oatly booth.It is all preamble to the chaos to come.

L: A hand holds a white coffee sample pack with a dinosaur on it up in front of a blurred blue lake. Down below people walk on a pedestrian path. R: A photo through the windshield covered in rain drops of brake lights on other cars. The Chicago skyline downtown is in the background. — How are these from the same day? L: MAMU Coffee over Lake Michigan. R: Sitting in traffic during a storm looking at the Chicago skyline. I don’t condone using your phone in traffic! I was at a full stop.

The Parking Ramp: Part 2

I attempt to scan my original parking lot QR code at the machine in the ramp lobby. I'm met with a "Server Offline" error message.
I press the Help button and a far off, metallic voice directs me to go to the exit and call again.
At the gate to exit, the disembodied voice tells me to insert the ticket I pulled in the morning into the machine. Then she asks for the numbers on the ticket.
"The ticket is in the machine," I reply.
"I need them to let you out," they say.
" Right…but you just had me put it in the machine…"
" I know, but I need those numbers."

And around we go.

I am finally freed into Chicago's rush hour traffic. The sky is unleashing the fury of a broken showerhead. The sun breaks through periodically to tease a dry future. The five-mile drive home takes an hour. Finding a parking spot takes another 90 minutes. At one point, I make a perfect driver-side parallel park into a spot in one motion. I'm euphoric at both my skill and my freedom from the endless circling. Then I see the Permit Only sign. SONUVA…

Friday at SCA ends with me enjoying a whiskey in front of the new Netflix show Ripley. Have you seen it? It is in black and white—beautifully filmed in Italy. A bit slow off the jump, tho.

*My wife and I have been together since I turned 21. This is our 21st year together. She has been the constant for this half of my life. She makes my life better and is the best travel partner. I'm already missing her on this trip.

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