New Zealand's billion-dollar coffee scene as we know it today is largely due to a group of 80s and 90s Kiwi roasters and businessmen.

These members of the industry's unofficial coffee "hall of fame" include Craig Miller (Miller's Coffee), David Burton (Burton Hollis), Michael Allpress (Allpress), and Derek Townsend (Karajoz).

And in Wellington, where coffee roasting thrived early on, there was Chris Dillon (Supreme), Geoff Marsland (Havana), Steve Gianoutsos (Mojo) and Jeff Kennedy (Caffe L'Affare and Prefab).

KEVIN STENT/STUFF Wellington coffee pioneer Jeff Kennedy, with the Rocket, regarded as the best domestic espresso machine in the world

Most were Kiwis who had travelled widely and decided to have a go at recreating the coffee they'd enjoyed in Europe.

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They were self-taught, they were all about the beans, and there was fierce but friendly rivalry between the roasters. Stuff talks to three of them.

KENT BLECHYDEN/STUFF Jeff Kennedy, with partner Bridget Dunn, of Prefab cafe, wanted to replicate what he'd drunk in Europe.

Jeff Kennedy

It's widely acknowledged that New Zealand coffee is among the best in the world. But its ability to break free of tradition and its focus on quality are features that are purely its own, Jeff Kennedy believes.

"You know how the Italians think they own the pizza? If you don't make pizza dough the way they make it they think you're committing a huge crime? Well, in New Zealand we committed every crime in the book, because after a while we refuted a lot of what the Italians thought were how to make coffees."

For instance he says, most Italians will only use a single shot of coffee, but Kiwis used double shots, strengthening the taste. There was pushback initially because Kiwis were unused to it. Now it's the norm.

Of his fellow roasters, Kennedy says, "We all became very good friends. We had a unique way of sharing information and competing like you have no idea to make the best coffee.

"The money subsequently was thrown at us for doing it But it wasn't really about money in the beginning, it was about trying to get a handle on making the best coffee."

ANDY JACKSON/STUFF Kennedy says the focus for him and other roasters was always on quality.

Kennedy founded Caffe L'Affare, one of Wellington's places to be in the 90s and the roaster of a top supermarket coffee brand.

He later sold it and started another cafe, Prefab, as well as Acme porcelain coffee and tea cup business. At one stage, he also bought out an Italian coffee machine business, now Rocket Espresso.

He still roasts and sees traces of the coffee movement in the craft beer and, more recently, craft bread-making movements.

One of New Zealand's biggest innovations is arguably the flat white, now found in cafes around the world. At least three people, one of them Australian, have laid claim to inventing it. Kennedy could too but declines to do so.

As far as he's concerned, New Zealand invented it "because we were sick and tired of making big fluffy tops on the top of cappuccinos. So we simplified it because you can't mess around with that when you're trying to make 500 coffees a day or whatever."

SUPPLIED David Burton, scion of New Zealand coffee bean importing.

David Burton

Burton and his brother John have been called godfathers of the New Zealand coffee trade. It's certainly in their blood.

David, the co-founder of Burton Hollis, the Columbus Cafe chain and a world-class barista judge, now spends his days running Jack's Coffee, as well as heading up the New Zealand Specialty Coffee Association.

Burton's grandfather and father were tea importers and Burton himself became a tea taster for Choysa for about 10 years before he fell into the coffee trade, particularly roasting. John is involved in importing beans and the Dilmah tea business in New Zealand.

Columbus was started in the mid-90s after David Burton and his partners saw the likes of Starbucks overseas and decided they could do better. The chain now has 70 outlets.

New roasters continue to come on the market and there's been a wave of established coffee companies sold in recent times.

Are we over-catered for? Burton admits there are a "phenomenal" number of cafes opening and closing.

"Sometimes you might think yes but then you only have to go to Melbourne and see how many cafes and coffee machines they have over there and you're just blown away by it all."

"You're always going to have people buying companies. You don't see a lot of it but just recently there's been quite a few."

Burton Hollis was sold in 2006 to Bell Tea.which is now in the hands of Dutch giant JDE (Jacobs Douwe Egberts).

Cerebos Gregg, which snapped up Caffe L'Affare and Robert Harris some years ago, sold the instant coffee and food part of the business to Kraft Heinz last year.

More recently Starbucks' New Zealand licence was sold by Restaurant Brands after 20 years to a group of Kiwi investors. Coffee chain and supermarket brand Mojo recently sold Kiwi-based Cooks Global Foods to fulfil its US expansion dream.

"There's a lot going on and when you think it's settled, it changes," Burton says.

Monique Ford Craig Miller at the launch of his book,Coffee Houses of Wellington 1939 to 1979, which looks at the first wave of coffee in New Zealand.

Craig Miller

Every day Craig Miller turns up to his small roastery and cafe near Auckland's Karangahape Rd.

Miller's operation is not large but he is influential, particularly as a trainer and barista judge. He's also penned a book on coffee houses in his home town, Wellington, from the late 30s to late 70s, where coffee houses were the meeting places of artists and thinkers.

Miller recalls the days when getting an espresso machine was so difficult that a keen cafe would have to try and buy one secondhand from Italian and Greek migrants in Australia.

He sees cafes as being an important social alternative of the male-dominated Kiwi pub scene. And he particularly pays tribute to Jeff Kennedy for his focus on hospitality in the cafe scene.

Today New Zealand cafes have become so good they're taking their brands "like coals to Newcastle" overseas, and he notes wryly that international brands like Starbucks have failed to be really embraced here.

Why? "We gained a lot of understanding around service, around coffee machines, so all of those businesses understand the value that the espresso machine brings to the business.

"Whereas Starbucks only saw it as a piece of equipment relative to a brand, which was about franchising, marketing and flavoured drinks."