The madness behind American-Italian Ferrari 308 that’s the world’s most expensive espresso machine

One Italian man’s dream has just become a reality with the sweet smell of coffee brewed from an espresso machine, which doubles as a Ferrari 308.

Locals have been pulling up in the masses, espresso in hand, to wave the red flag for the latest flagship supercars in Maranello for years.

Now, one San Francisco-based company is bringing together the best of cars and coffee.

How? Well, his self-roasted coffee is literally brewed from an espresso machine built into the trunk of a Ferrari 308. And it doesn’t just sit there; its mechanisms are intertwined with the V8 engine.

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From magazine admiration to a V8 dream

For generations, companies around the globe have been mastering the craft of coffee making. Nothing beats a freshly-poured coffee, and enjoying a fresh cup of joe in a convertible sports car is what dreams are made of.

Nutty, blonde, crisp, the choices are endless.

But what about triple-roasted beans, picked from Colombia and Costa Rica, brewed with Italian heritage, and topped with the scent of burnt asphalt from the scorching tires of a Ferrari 308?

Well, that’s the vibe rocked by Graffeo.

But there’s much more horsepower in this coffee.

Opened as a brewer in 1935 by Italian Giovanni Graffeo, the company has proudly distributed coffee for generations, and is now being pioneered by 81-year-old Luciano.

But thanks to a passion for Ferrari, new co-owner Walter Haas has now created the world’s most expensive espresso machine.

“When I was going through the offices, I was finding stacks and stacks of car magazines. Hundreds of them,” Haas told supercarblondie.com.

“So I asked, ‘What’s this all about?’ and Luciano casually said, ‘I used to drive Ferraris and Alfa Romeo’ and all this other stuff.

“Long story short, I was talking with my creative team and we were just saying, wouldn’t it be funny if we bought a Ferrari and pulled espresso shots from the trunk?”

So they went through Luciano’s list of his most beloved cars, and found a local shop selling his favourite Ferrari 308.

The 1984 classic sports car, in its famed dripping Rosso red, was delivered from LA, and was soon given to a ‘mad scientist’ at Porsche modding experts Church of the Air Cooled.

Soon after, the espresso machine was intertwined with the V8 engine and the electric circuit.

The Ferrari 308 is still a fully functioning master of the road, too, just with a trunk-turned-café at the rear.

It comes stocked with a water tank in the front trunk and pumps that run through the car to keep the machine primed and ready for the next mug.

“We can literally pull up with this car, pop the trunk, and pull a shot,” Haas explained.

Although it’s unlikely that Graffeo will be putting it on the track at its 158mph top speed, it has already become a hit sensation.

The Ferrari 308 Cafe is not just a gimmick

The journey to get to this point for Graffeo isn’t quite as simple as you might think, as the company is steeped in nearly a century of coffee expertise.

To this day, San Francisco’s oldest artisan coffee roastery has a signature ‘fluid bed’ roasting method that stays true to its heritage and sets it apart from its competitors.

The coffee is already used at Michelin-starred restaurants, too.

“I’ve offered thousands of free samples to people in my time here. We win nine out of 10 times, to the point where people will often say this is the best coffee they’ve ever had,” the Co-Owner said.

Now the Ferrari 308 is taking it on the road.

Namely, a VIP area at NASCAR saw them have run-ins with Richard “The King” Petty and San Francisco 49ers stars.

The supercar cafe has also been flush with booking requests for weddings, car meets, and social collabs.

Recently, the Ferrari espresso machine also hit up Monterey Car Week, where it turned heads amid a number of new supercar reveals.

The wild new business venture has been a hit with fans, and with Luciano himself, as Haas revealed that he was stunned at his first interaction with the Ferrari 308.

“We’re an Italian-American brand, and the authenticity is that Luchiano himself is a mega car enthusiast,” he said.

“And I’ll tell you, there’s like one of the videos on [Instagram] where it’s him looking at the car and assessing it. I have never seen him happier.”

All the gears and bright ideas

Strictly speaking, we have seen cars be at one with coffee machines before, with the world of EVs now making it easy to run a Nespresso in the back of a Cybertruck.

Supercar Blondie also got to check out the DS X E-TENSE concept car, which was not only asymmetrical, but it also had a working coffee machine built in.

As for the future of the Ferrari espresso machine, the proud brand is trying not to get carried away with the hype.

“We’re getting crazy ideas, now. What if you had a Vespa with the grinder? You know what I mean? And then you have the Ferrari with the espresso machine, and then you have something else with the ice or something, and you drive them all together,” Haas said.

“But I think they have to be rooted in something authentic, and I think that is part of why this worked, because it actually is connected to our company’s heritage. So much of our company is about Luciano and his point of view and what makes the world’s best coffee.”

Haas also anticipates this trend taking off and being replicated, so he hopes to ride the wave in the most on-brand way, leaning into Italian vehicles driven by the Graffeo owner, instead of rolling up with a Nissan Skyline and matcha powder.

What is on the bucket list is a cafe?

Haas said the plan was to give the Ferrari 308 a new home with a cafe, making the roaster a hotspot for tourism and expert coffee craftsmanship.

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