CULTURAL ENGINEERING  ·  PLACEMAKING  ·  COFFEE STRATEGY  ·  DESTINATION DEVELOPMENT

MATTS W.
JOHANSSON

Matts Johansson builds markets for things people haven't noticed yet.

In the early 1990s, no one in Sweden drank espresso. He opened the country's first espresso bars, trained a generation of baristas, and was part of organising the World Barista Championship. Today Gothenburg is recognised internationally as one of Europe's leading coffee cities. The café he sold in 1995 became the blueprint for Espresso House, now Scandinavia's largest chain.

He did the same thing with places. Victoriapassagen in central Gothenburg was abandoned and dangerous. He moved in. It became one of the city's most visited addresses. Magasinsgatan was a backstreet. He built a roastery, a bakery, and cafés there. It became the food and design quarter. Floda was a commuter suburb with a contaminated, derelict tannery. He turned it into Garveriet, a zero-waste food destination. The New York Times, BBC, and The Independent all came to write about it. The Swedish prime minister visited.

He did the same thing with sourcing. When he built da Matteo's roastery in 2007, he went directly to farms in Africa, cutting out importers and traders, working face to face with producers to source single-origin beans at a time when almost no Scandinavian roaster did this. That direct-trade model is now standard in Nordic specialty coffee. He was doing it first.

da Matteo was named Sweden's Best Café by White Guide and one of the five best cafés in the world by Travel PR. It was named Nordics Best Roaster in 2025. But the pattern matters more than any single business: Johansson identifies something that has value but no visibility, builds the infrastructure to make it visible, and moves on.

At IKEA in the 1980s, his initiative to sell hot dogs and ice cream at the checkout caught Ingvar Kamprad's attention. It is now in every IKEA store on earth. He was part of organising the World Barista Championship as a Board Director representing SCA Europe, co-authoring the scoring system still in use today. He has served as WBC head judge, chaired SCA Sweden, and directed the Nordic Barista Cup. He has written three books on coffee and food.

He is currently based in Gothenburg and available for advisory work in cultural positioning, destination development, and coffee sector strategy.

mattswj@icloud.com  ·  +46 73-612 43 29

"Without Sweden, and without Johansson, specialty coffee wouldn't be what it is today."

Fresh Cup Magazine
Matts W. Johansson

"The meeting is still at the core of everything I do. The craft and the product are just hygiene factors. What matters is that people feel acknowledged."

Matts W. Johansson — Göteborgs-Posten
What I do

STRATEGIC
ADVISORY

Matts works with governments, investors, property developers, and trade organisations on projects where coffee, food, place, and economic development intersect. His value is not advice from the outside. It is thirty years of having built, operated, failed, and succeeded in exactly the areas his clients are trying to enter.

Coffee Sector Strategy

National and regional coffee positioning. Market entry to the Nordic and European specialty segment. Quality standards, competition frameworks, direct sourcing, and industry institution building.

Cultural Engineering & Placemaking

Turning overlooked sites into cultural and commercial destinations. Documented track record of entering low-value locations and building venues that redefine their surroundings.

Food Systems & Sustainability

Circular food production, zero-waste operations, local sourcing infrastructure, aquaponics, and farm-to-table systems. Built and operated at full scale, not as a concept on paper.

Destination Development

Building food and coffee destinations that attract international press, visitors, and investment. From a single venue to a regional brand identity. The Garveriet model applied elsewhere.

Talks and private sessions

Keynotes and closed room sessions for leadership teams working with culture as leverage, not decoration.

Who it is for

  • Cities and public actors
  • Property owners and place makers
  • Trade organisations and export initiatives
  • Brands in coffee, food, and hospitality
  • Investors with a long horizon
Contact →
The Background

BACKGROUND

Matts Johansson was born in 1959 in Norrköping, a Swedish industrial town. At sixteen he left home for the Swedish Navy's officer training programme, where he spent four years learning leadership, logistics, and cooking. The military gave him discipline, structure, and a professional foundation in the kitchen.

After completing his service he moved to Stockholm, where he worked his way through the restaurant industry. He was recruited as kitchen chef at Hard Rock Café Stockholm during its Swedish launch, overseeing a staff of roughly seventy people. From there he was hired as restaurant manager at IKEA in Linköping, where he ran large-scale food operations and developed the initiative to sell hot dogs and ice cream at the checkout. The concept caught Ingvar Kamprad's attention. It became a permanent fixture and is now standard in every IKEA store worldwide.

He left IKEA and travelled the world. He worked in kitchens and restaurants in Australia, the United States, and elsewhere, picking up ideas about how food and hospitality could work differently. By the time he arrived in Gothenburg in the early 1990s, he had seen how cafés functioned in cities all over the world.

What he found in Gothenburg was roughly thirty cafés in the city centre, all serving the same burnt brewed coffee. He decided to change that. Not by importing a concept, but by building something from scratch: a place where the coffee was excellent, the space had character, and people could meet and be seen.

That conviction has driven every venture since. Whether it was an espresso bar, a roastery, a sourdough bakery, or a zero-waste food destination built on contaminated land, the starting point was always the same: find something with unrealised value, build the infrastructure to reveal it, and create a place where people want to be.

Track Record

THIRTY
YEARS

1975
Swedish Navy
Officer training programme at age 16. Four-year education in leadership, logistics, and provisioning. Trained as cook. One year active service.
~1983
Hard Rock Café Stockholm
Part of the Swedish opening team. Hired as kitchen chef, overseeing roughly 70 staff in one of Stockholm's highest-volume restaurants.
~1985
IKEA — Restaurant Manager
Recruited to run the restaurant at IKEA Linköping. Developed the initiative to sell hot dogs and ice cream at the checkout. Kamprad noticed. Now a worldwide IKEA standard.
~1988
Travelled the World
Worked in restaurants and kitchens in Australia, the United States, and beyond. Arrived in Gothenburg in the early 1990s.
1993
Café Java, Gothenburg
Opens one of Sweden's first dedicated espresso bars. Imports a lever machine from Italy. Among the first in the city to serve espresso and latte. Sold in 1995 — the new owners founded Espresso House.
1995
Caffè Espresso & Victoriapassagen
Opens in a derelict, drug-affected arcade in central Gothenburg. Brings it back as a destination. Co-founds Bar Centro, an Italian-style espresso bar.
1996
SM Cappuccino Champion
Wins the Swedish Cappuccino Championship. Among the first competitive barista achievements in the country.
1999
Italy — Livorno
Sells cafés and moves to Italy. Two years studying espresso production, visiting roasteries and machine factories.
2000
Espressoboken
Co-authors Espressoboken with Petter Bjerke (Cordia Förlag). Becomes the reference text for Swedish baristas and café professionals for years to come.
2000
World Barista Championship
Present at the first WBC in Monte Carlo. Joins the Board of Directors representing SCA Europe. Co-authors the scoring system and operational procedures still used today. Becomes certified WBC judge.
2001
SCA Sweden & Beige
Elected chairman of Svenska Specialkaffeföreningen. Launches the Beige project with Arla to promote latte art and barista culture nationally.
~2001
Espressospecialisten
Establishes consulting practice in espresso equipment, barista training, and café concept development. Trains an estimated 1,000+ café and roastery staff across Sweden.
2003
da Matteo — Founded
Founded in Marstrand. Named "at Matteo" after what Italians called him. Soon expands to Gothenburg, taking over the Victoriapassagen location.
2007
Vallgatan Roastery
Opens da Matteo Vallgatan with in-house roastery. One of Sweden's first specialty micro-roasteries. Builds direct sourcing from farms in East Africa. Open production visible to guests.
2007
Nordic Barista Cup & WBC Head Judge
Directs the Nordic Barista Cup in Gothenburg. Raises SEK 70,000 for a school project in Nicaragua. Serves as head judge at WBC World Finals in Tokyo.
2008
Bar Italia
Publishes Bar Italia with photographer Tomas Tengby (Norstedts). A photographic portrait of Italian café culture.
2010
Magasinsgatan
Takes over Magasinsgatan 17A. Gathers roastery, sourdough bakery, and café under one roof. The street becomes Gothenburg's food and design quarter.
2013
Top 5 in the World
da Matteo named one of the five best cafés in the world by Travel PR. Covered by Cool Hunting, Sprudge, Barista Magazine, and international food press.
2014
Nordic Roaster Award
da Matteo wins the Nordic Roaster competition. Recognition as one of the leading specialty roasteries in Northern Europe.
2015
Sweden's Best Café
da Matteo named Sweden's Best Café by White Guide. Matts brings World of Coffee (SCA's annual trade fair) to Gothenburg, competing against 60 cities. Named Årets Säljare (Salesperson of the Year).
2016
Jernbruket, Floda
Opens restaurant in a former ironworks building. Wood-fired kitchen, local producers, seasonal ingredients, microbrewery.
2017
Fel, fel, rätt
Publishes Fel, fel, rätt: En debattbok om mat. A provocation about what's wrong with how Sweden produces and consumes food.
2018
Garveriet, Floda
Converts an 1860s tannery on contaminated land into a zero-waste food destination. Restaurant, bakery, conference centre, aquaponics, solar energy, biological greywater treatment.
2019
White Guide Breakthrough of the Year
Garveriet named Årets Banbrytare by White Guide. Prime Minister Stefan Löfven visits. EU research delegations study the model.
2020
New York Times — 52 Places to Go
Garveriet featured in the NYT's annual list. BBC writes about Swedish fika culture with Matts as authority. The Independent features Garveriet as part of "Europe's most sustainable city." Global Future Design Award.
2020
Feskeriet Fish Shop
Opens artisan fish shop in Floda. A new experiment in local food retail and meeting places.
2021—
Senior Advisor & Consulting
Exits da Matteo. Transitions to strategic advisory across coffee, food, placemaking, and destination development.
2025
Nordics Best Roaster
da Matteo, the company he founded, voted Nordics Best Roaster at Nordic Coffee Fest. First among 26 roasteries.
What People Say

IN THEIR
OWN WORDS

"Without Sweden, and without Johansson, specialty coffee wouldn't be what it is today."

Fresh Cup Magazine (US)

"Sweden's godfather of craft coffee."

Cool Hunting (US)

"If it weren't for Matts, I wouldn't be in coffee."

Patrik Rolf — Founder, April Coffee Roasters, as quoted in Coffee Magazine (South Africa)
Featured in
New York Times BBC The Independent National Geographic Lonely Planet Fresh Cup Cool Hunting Sprudge Barista Magazine Irish Independent
Publications

THREE
BOOKS

✎
Coming Soon

Espressoboken, Bar Italia, Fel fel rätt, and more. Full bibliography with excerpts and press coverage.

LET'S TALK

For strategic advisory, keynote bookings, and project development inquiries.

mattswj@icloud.com
+46 73-612 43 29