Elemental engaged Tool to develop an in-store brewer that serves hot coffee and snap-chilled coffee from a single, familiar footprint. We began with Discovery: studying café workflows and counter constraints, interviewing baristas, and tearing down incumbent brewers from BUNN and Curtis. Those insights shaped early usability, keeping choices simple with clear Hot/Cold actions, and an industrial design that blends into a café environment while accommodating service access, cleaning, and ventilation.

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Mechanically, we balanced target chill time and batch volume against condenser power and size, exploring coil geometries for surface area and cleanability and planning airflow for units sitting flush to a wall. We mapped every screen and state for a straightforward control experience, then built a Gen-0 prototype on a proven brewer platform with simple electronics to validate layout, thermal path, and overlapping brew-and-chill operation. This phase focused on function first, Arduino-style controls, pragmatic skins, and fast 3D-printed parts, so Elemental could test the core experience before committing to full GUI and production tooling.

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The result is a production-minded concept that fits standard café counters, dispenses hot or snap-chilled coffee on demand, and reduces waste by eliminating long cold-brew lead times. With a clear plan for UL samples, structural packaging, and vendor handoff, the Hot-Cold Brewer positioned Elemental to deliver “hot or cold, same brew” at scale, which advances a category-defining vision while staying grounded in café realities.