[Report] Visiting Ediya’s ‘Dream Factory’ Producing 6,000 Tons of Coffee Beans Annually

Large-scale 4,000-pyeong Facility in Pyeongtaek... Four-Stage Green Coffee Bean Foreign Matter Sorting
Efficiency Increased with Fully Automated Process from Green Bean Input to Packaging

Exterior of Ediya Coffee's 'Dream Factory' in Pyeongtaek-si, Gyeonggi-do.

[Asia Economy Reporter Moon Hyewon] On the 23rd, at the cutting-edge coffee bean production facility ‘Dream Factory’ of Ediya Coffee in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province, the Taegeukgi flag and the phrase ‘Long live Korean coffee’ hanging at the entrance caught the eye. Dream Factory, which produces 6,000 tons of roasted coffee beans annually along with beanist stick coffee and powder products for franchise stores, embodies Chairman Moon Chang-gi’s grand ambition that "Ediya Coffee is the pride of Korean coffee."

Dream Factory, which opened in April 2020 with an investment of 40 billion KRW, boasts a scale of about 13,200 square meters (approximately 4,000 pyeong). It has introduced the latest equipment from world-renowned roasting machine manufacturers B?hler of Switzerland and Probat of Germany, and from the initial input of green beans, it carries out a fully automated process through four stages of foreign substance sorting, roasting, and packaging, enhancing work efficiency and quality stability. This facility simultaneously produces roasted beans for franchise supply, stick coffee, mix coffee, and powder products.

Although Dream Factory restricted factory visits, tours, and experiences immediately after opening due to COVID-19, with the advent of the with-Corona era, visitors can now tour the roasting room inside Dream Factory and attend various coffee-related classes in the coffee education room. However, since strict product quality control is required, visitors must thoroughly wash their hands with hand sanitizer before entering the roasting room. Wearing dustproof suits, dustproof hats and shoes, and masks is also mandatory.

'Roasting Room' of Ediya Coffee Dream Factory in Pyeongtaek-si, Gyeonggi-do.

The sorting and roasting of green beans is a part that Ediya Coffee pays particular attention to. Since the drying process of green beans is mostly natural drying, various foreign substances such as soil and stones can be mixed in.

The green beans freely fall from the 12-meter-high preprocessing facility called the sorting tower and go through a four-stage sorting process: foreign substance sorting, metal sorting, density sorting, and final color sorting. On this day, the foreign substance container filtered during the sorting process was densely filled with metal beads, soil, and stones. In the second preprocessing stage, a magnetic drum rotates to filter out metal substances mixed among the green beans, and in the third stage, heavy foreign substances like stones are removed through air pressure and reverse rotation belts. In the final fourth stage, the color sorter blows away beans that are too large or too small defects, neatly gathering only the green beans that meet the standards. Ediya Coffee states that defective beans can produce unpredictable tastes and aromas during roasting, so sorting the beans is the most important process that determines the uniform taste and quality of the coffee.

In the roasting room of Ediya Coffee Dream Factory, the 'Destoner' device sorts the weight of green beans and filters out foreign substances.

Roasting green coffee beans using a semi-hot air roasting machine in the roasting room of Ediya Coffee Dream Factory.

After preprocessing, the green beans are transported pneumatically to the pre-roasting green bean storage silo, where the blending ratio is adjusted through a weighing scale at the bottom of the silo to attempt various roasting profiles.

Dream Factory uses roasting equipment from B?hler and Probat, employing two different methods (hot air and semi-hot air systems) for roasting. The roasted beans are transported to the storage silo via a turbo conveyor system that minimizes friction and breakage inside the pipes to prevent damage. At this time, smoke generated during roasting and the coffee’s unique aroma are removed using an afterburner and palladium-coated catalyst at the bottom of the silo to minimize external exposure.

Ediya Coffee Dream Factory device manufacturing stick coffee.

The packaging of coffee bean products is fully automated from filling to shipping box packaging. The facility is equipped with filling and packaging machines capable of simultaneously mass-producing products of different specifications and purposes, from film packaging machines producing beans for franchise supply to large filling machines used for raw materials such as drip bags, capsule coffee, cold brew, and cup coffee.

During the packaging process, only products that pass strict quality inspections through weight sorters and X-ray equipment are shipped.

Products produced at Ediya Coffee Dream Factory are packed in boxes and being transported.

Products that have passed quality inspection in the outer packaging room are boxed by a boxing machine and then loaded onto pallets by robots before being transported to the Ediya Dream Logistics Center in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province, for supply to stores nationwide.

At the press briefing held that day, Chairman Moon Chang-gi said, "Dream Factory is Ediya’s dream workshop equipped with the best, fail-safe system in Korea," and expressed his ambition, "We will make it possible for people around the world to come here and taste Ediya’s unique coffee."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.