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Academia del Caffé is a family of boutique coffee bars and full menu cafes dedicated to bringing authentic Italian café culture and cuisine to Philadelphia's City Center.

Since opening their first café on 15th Street in 2003, Trieste native Massimo Taurisano has been quietly building a network of Academia locations.
His approach:

• The heart of any Italian café - an espresso program aimed at delivering a perfect shot on par with the best cafes of Italy, featuring serious baristas, the best Italian espresso equipment, and Italy's finest artisan espresso blends.
• A menu program that is American in its convenience, innovation and pricing, yet still reflects the fresh, simple bella cucina values of the typical family-owned cafés in Italy.
• A modern interior design sensibility that features Italian materials and products throughout the café interiors to create an authentic European atmosphere for Academia customers.

 

Taurisano moved to the U.S. from Italy in 1996 and has a background of an engineering degree in italy and two master degrees in the USA, but after graduating from the executive program at Penn's Wharton Business School in 2004, he felt called to develop a line of business that would allow him to combine his business interests with his passion: the coffee culture of Italy, translated into something fresh for Philadelphia, his new hometown.

Taurisano owns and operates both the local Philadelphia Academia del Caffé chain and Philadelphia Coffee Works, a wholesale coffee and equipment sales and service business serving the tri-state area.

Anecdote:

David Letterman, who - like many comedians - often found the task of producing a constant stream of humor rather exhausting, occasionally sought enlightenment in unlikely places. Asked by a clerk in a pastry shop what he wanted in his coffee one day, Letterman indicated a balloon-filling machine behind the counter and replied: "Helium!"