1583

News of coffee reaches England for the first time: "A very good drink they call Chaube that is almost as black as ink".

1637

Coffee is brewed for the first time in England by a Greek student at Oxford University.

1650

England's first coffee house, Jacob's, opens in Oxford, starting a nationwide craze.

1675

Charles II tries unsuccessfully to ban coffee houses, calling them seditious meeting places.

1867

The seeds of NESTLÉ are sown when Henri Nestlé starts a company providing nutrition for infants.

1938

NESTLÉ invents freeze-dried coffee, originally as a way to store a surplus of coffee in Brazil.

2008

NESCAFÉ coffee solutions help improve your workplace.

The first espresso machine was invented in 1901 by Luigi Bezzera, an Italian businessman who wanted his workers to spend less time on their coffee breaks! The machine used pressurised steam to force water through coffee and brew it more quickly than usual - although with a somewhat bitter taste. Since then, the coffee machine has come a long way and the espresso has formed the backbone of today's hot beverage dispense and vending options.

The first beverage vending machine dates back even further, to the 1st century BC when Hero of Alexandria, a Greek mathematician /inventor, created a machine that would dispense holy water in return for a coin in Egyptian temples. Despite this early start, it was many years before the idea made any further progress - 1946, in fact, before coffee vending machines came into general usage in the US.

Today, coffee is the most popular vended hot beverage, accounting for six out of ten purchases from dispensing machines. Getting a cup of coffee from a vending machine comparable to the quality available on the high street has been a challenge, but one that we have solved!