The espresso machine died during our busiest Saturday rush
Last Saturday around 10:30 AM, our La Marzocco just shut off mid-pull. No warning, no error code, nothing. We had a line out the door for the farmers market crowd, and I stood there with steam wand in one hand and a dead machine in front of me. I called our repair guy, but he couldn't get there until Monday. So I did what I could: I grabbed the backup drip brewer, put up a sign saying espresso was down, and started making pour-overs with the hot water kettle in the back. We sold maybe 15 pour-overs in two hours, which was better than nothing, but I lost at least 80 people who just walked out when they heard no lattes. The repair turned out to be a $40 solenoid valve that took the guy 20 minutes to swap. Has anyone else had a major machine fail at the worst possible moment, and how do you talk to customers about it without sounding like you're making excuses?