COMANDANTE® was born from a need and a vision for performance and precision.
In 2005, Bernd Braune and his family founded a roastery just outside Munich, Germany. With the goal of achieving a delicious cup of coffee, the family frequently traveled to meet coffee producers and buy coffee directly from them, also becoming involved in the "Cup of Excellence" as both judges and board members.
Despite the existence of some electric solutions, these were large, heavy, and expensive machines that were not aimed at a home user, nor at someone who traveled as much as the Bernd family did.
The idea of making travel grinders was then the next logical step—a high-performance and mobile machine. The grinder had to be the best on the market; after all, the best quality coffee is found on plantations, and in the pursuit of securing procurement contracts, a quality grinder is indispensable for discovering new and extraordinary profiles.
A passionate German engineer had worked on specialty coffee grinding for over a decade and was fascinated by achieving a high-quality cup, which was possible if everything was done perfectly. The next step was to seek a strategic alliance with industry leaders. But none saw a market for a high-quality grinder, so he took the task into his own hands.
The clean and original design was completed by a team of friends and family, designed by Bernd Uwe Braune, Raphael Braune, and Gerhard Scherbinski-von Volkman.
We sought the highest quality at every step; the combination of conical burrs and a steel alloy were the most challenging aspects of creating a great hand grinder. Conical burrs for hand grinders have been produced for over 100 years. Historically, the implementation of burrs has traditionally been made of iron, while the most common market solutions are ceramic, and self-service machines tend to use the standard conical version. For the past 15 years, Bernd worked on finding the right recipe to create the perfect burrs for hand grinders.
The production of COMANDANTE® grinders began in 2013, with special implementations made of both stainless steel and titanium. Bernd and his son Raphael loved their product, and their C40 and C20 grinders became inseparable travel companions. It was essentially the first high-quality portable grinder on the market.
Once you make something and use it continuously, you discover new ideas. But not only that, new materials and technologies come to market. So, inspired by the legendary quality and performance of the German automotive industry, COMANDANTE® continuously seeks improvements.
This is how the COMANDANTE Mk2 arrived shortly after, with some adaptations made to certain components and the addition of BB4 burrs. Another great grinder, but Bernd knew that better grinding quality was possible. A paradigm shift needed to occur to fulfill the vision. It was at this moment that Bernd cut ties with all his suppliers, as well as with existing manufacturing techniques, to disappear and concentrate on his work, which he carried out in the back of the Braune family's roastery.
To make a long story short, new product development methods, new CNC systems, 3D creation, as well as simulation techniques, new steps in material science, and particle analysis in laboratories were needed.
The result: Nitro Blade, a new generation of high-performance grinders, which take hand grinding to a new, unprecedented level of quality.
The COMANDANTE® C40 mk3 with Nitro Blade, with its completely redesigned internal machinery, was launched in 2016. Bernd and his engineering team managed to reformulate the grinder's engineering, making a huge leap forward in usability, workflow, and most importantly, grinding performance.
The performance of the Nitro Blade and the repeatable results when brewing a cup of coffee made the grinder very popular in many parts of the world, from expeditions to coffee farms to international competitions, to the kitchens of international baristas around the world. We have watched in amazement as the COMANDANTE® C40 Mk3 Nitro Blade has reached the hands of multiple National and Global champions.
The C40 Mk3 was produced for 5 years, until the end of summer 2021. Since then, Bernd has not stopped looking for new improvements, constantly achieving small enhancements. These refinements were not visibly obvious at first, until the COMANDANTE® C40 Mk4 Nitro Blade was launched in the fall of 2021.
Today, COMANDANTE® has a team highly focused on all aspects of the business; family and friends are truly the core of the company. The highest possible quality products are achieved with top-tier design and manufacturing capabilities that guarantee innovation.
And of course, there's Bernd, our leader in our mission to achieve a perfect cup.
