The full example
Everything below is fictional. The venues are described rather than named, and the achievements are the kind of thing a real barista does — written the way they should appear on a CV, not inflated.
Barista CV — example
Header
[Full Name] [Town, UK] · [phone] · [email]
Professional summary
Barista with three years on bar in speciality and high-street coffee, used to dialling in a single-origin at open and holding the shot through a 400-cup day. Confident texturing milk to order, keeping waste within target and running the counter solo on quieter shifts. Looking for a role in a shop that roasts or buys with some care.
Core skills
Espresso dial-in · Grinder adjustment · Dose, yield and time checks Milk texturing and latte art · Brew methods (V60, batch, AeroPress) Waste tracking · Counter service at speed · Order accuracy Allergen and milk-alternative handling · Machine cleaning and backflush EPOS (Square, Lightspeed) · Cash handling and cash-up
Experience
Barista — speciality coffee shop, Sheffield Feb 2024 – present · Dialled in the house espresso at open and re-checked dose, yield and time through the day as the grind moved. · Worked bar through a morning rush of roughly 400 cups, keeping drinks moving with one other barista on the counter. · Tracked milk and coffee waste on the daily sheet and raised a repeated over-pour at the team meeting. · Talked customers through the two single-origins on offer without holding up the queue. Barista — high-street chain café, Sheffield Mar 2023 – Jan 2024 · Held drink build times to the company standard during peak trading. · Handled milk alternatives and allergen requests, keeping separate jugs and checking the order back before it went out. · Opened and closed the store, including machine clean-down and backflush. Café Assistant — hotel lobby café, Doncaster Jul 2022 – Feb 2023 · Served hotel residents and passing trade from a two-group machine. · Kept the counter, pastry case and seating area turned around all day.
Education and certifications
SCA Barista Skills — Foundation — 2024 Level 2 Food Safety and Hygiene for Catering — 2023 Level 2 Award in Allergen Awareness — 2023 Latte art workshop (roastery-run) — 2024 GCSEs including English and Maths — 2022
Additional
Languages: English (native), Italian (basic) Availability: early opens, weekdays and weekends
Templates that suit this example
- Floor — Certificates sit near the top and the layout stays practical — the safest choice for counter roles, including a first job.
- Modern Rail — A side rail for brew methods and coffee training, leaving the main column for what you did on bar. Suits speciality shops.
- Essential — One column, standard headings — plain and easy to read when you are applying across a chain.
Want this structure with your own experience in it?
Build your barista CVWhy each section is written that way
Professional summary
- Why it matters.
- A shop owner is deciding in three lines whether you can be put on bar unsupervised. Speed and consistency are the answer they are looking for, in that order.
- A strong version.
- Names the kind of coffee you have worked with, the volume you are used to, and whether you dial in yourself. Three or four sentences.
- Common mistake.
- Writing about a love of coffee without a single detail that shows craft. "Passionate about coffee" is the default; "dials in at open and re-checks through the day" is evidence.
Core skills
- Why it matters.
- This is where a speciality shop finds out whether you speak the language of the bar — dose, yield, grind — and where a chain finds out whether you can hold a build time.
- A strong version.
- Concrete, checkable things: dial-in, grinder adjustment, the brew methods you have actually run, milk texturing, waste tracking, allergen handling.
- Common mistake.
- Skill bars and star ratings for "latte art". Say what you can make and where you learned it instead — a rating out of five is not checkable.
Experience
- Why it matters.
- Volume and kit vary enormously between a two-group hotel machine and a three-group speciality bar on a Saturday. The detail under the title is what places you.
- A strong version.
- Cups or covers at peak, how many were on bar with you, the machine and grinder set-up, and the parts of the day you owned — open, dial-in, close.
- Common mistake.
- Listing duties: "made coffee, served customers, cleaned equipment". Every barista did that. Say what you were trusted to get right on your own.
Coffee training and certifications
- Why it matters.
- Coffee knowledge is the part of this job that is easiest to claim and hardest to verify, so anything formal carries weight — an SCA module, a roastery course, in-house training.
- A strong version.
- Name the module and the year. Food safety and allergen awareness belong here too, because a café cannot put you on the counter without them.
- Common mistake.
- Listing latte art as a qualification, or leaving off food safety because it feels less interesting than coffee. A manager needs the second one first.
If your experience looks different
Most people are not the candidate in the example. Three common situations, and what to change for each.
No experience — your first barista job
Your summary. Say plainly that this would be your first coffee job. Shops train baristas all the time; what they are checking is whether you will handle an early open and a queue without coming apart.
What to emphasise. Early availability, any counter or till work, and anything that shows you can hold a standard when it is busy. If you have practised at home or done a one-day course, say so — it is more than most first applicants offer.
Bullets you could adapt
- ·Opened a retail unit at 7am three mornings a week alongside full-time study.
- ·Served a lunchtime counter queue of up to 60 customers with one colleague.
- ·Completed a one-day introduction to espresso at a local roastery.
Certifications. Level 2 Food Safety and Hygiene first — it takes an afternoon online, costs very little, and a café needs it before you touch the counter.
Some experience — going for head barista or supervisor
Your summary. Name the step you are taking. "Barista with three years on bar, looking for a first head barista role" gives the reader the right yardstick.
What to emphasise. The things a head barista owns: dialling in for the whole team, training new starters, ordering, waste targets, keeping the machine serviced.
Bullets you could adapt
- ·Dialled in both grinders at open and set the day’s recipe for the rest of the team.
- ·Trained three new baristas on extraction, milk texturing and the close-down.
- ·Placed the weekly coffee and milk order against sales and the waste sheet.
Certifications. SCA Barista Skills Intermediate if you can get it funded, plus Level 3 Food Safety if you will be supervising.
Moving into coffee from another industry
Your summary. Name the transferable spine — speed, standards, customers at close range — and state the move directly. Do not apologise for it.
What to emphasise. Pace and volume from your previous work, accuracy with money and orders, and genuine early availability. Put recent coffee or food safety training above older unrelated roles.
Bullets you could adapt
- ·Handled up to 100 customer interactions a shift in a high-footfall retail role.
- ·Worked to a fixed service-time target through sustained peak periods.
- ·Completed Level 2 Food Safety and an introductory espresso course before applying.
Certifications. Food safety and allergen awareness first, then any hands-on espresso training — together they close most of the gap to a trained starter.
Next steps
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