Hello, fans of the Coffee People podcast. Welcome to the new (but still the same) newsletter from Roast! West Coast. We've migrated from our old platform to this new version. There are a few things to clean up here or there. You'll see some changes and new fun things, but hopefully the transition is painless! The Coffee People podcast will return next week with a new interview with our new friends at Rusty Dog Coffee in Madison, WI.
Even more fun than working on the back end of a newsletter is traveling to coffee shops and roasters.
The Littlefoot creature figures prominently on the packaging.
LITTLEFOOT COFFEE ROASTERS, GRANDVILLE, MI
We got our start in 2017 and have been roasting exceptional coffee grown by exceptional people ever since. Every batch is lovingly roasted to bring out the best in each bean, and our seasonal menu of offerings keeps things fresh. We ethically source our coffee, work directly with farmers whenever we can, and always pay fair trade pricing. Thanks for believing in Littlefoot Coffee Roasters. • littlefootcoffee.com
I passed two other coffee shops to get to Littlefoot Coffee Roasters. One was big and flashy. The other—cute and convenient. I passed because something about the name Littlefoot stuck in my craw, and I had to see for myself just how little the foot was.
Just kidding. There were no feet on display. But I did go because I like the name. Sometimes that is all it takes. To get there, you drive through downtown Grandville, turn left at the fancy coffee place with all the seating and signage, drive into a business park that leans industrial, and when you get to the railroad tracks, turn left. They are at the back.
It isn't as complex as it sounds, and the trip is worth it because Littlefoot is all about the details—wallpaper, glassware, cabin vibe, and the Littlefoot creature found in the nooks and crannies.
I was there early to order a shot and a drip from Alex and Rosie, who were already prepping for a long day that would culminate in a Maker's Market, DJ, and live music. They have the space for it. The entry and order space is also the roasting facility. Next to that is a seating area and an open space. Hanging coffee bags at the back creates a faux backdrop for musicians and performers. Finally, the cabin room is a casual lounge (with AC!).
Whenever I needed a break from staring at the computer, I'd wander from room to room, taking in the details—some quirky, some classic coffee shop. The vibe changed as I moved and again when the garage doors were rolled up before the market started. Most of the customers seemed known—if not by name, by face—by Alex and Rosie, even though the retail portion of the business is still new. It felt like a home for this coffee community that, for a small portion of a day, I was part of.
The Coffee People podcast is presented by Roastar. They are a coffee packaging company that believes in treating small businesses just like the big ones and have the tools to serve them booth.
Our newest collaboration coffee is being released this week with The Pinery Coffee Company in Wausau, WI. We'll be meeting there on Thursday, August 28th, at 10:00 AM to share the first batches of the coffee, give away some swag, and record a live episode of the Coffee People podcast. We're donating our proceeds from the coffee to the Ice Age Trail Alliance in Wisconsin.
The IATA mission is to conserve, create, maintain, and promote the Ice Age National Scenic Trail. The trail is part of the National Park System and stretches 1200 miles throughout my home state. Head to iceagetrail.org for interactive maps, event listings, ways to help, and more trail information you could ever consume!
The partner links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or a brand we don't strongly recommend.
Hello, fans of the Coffee People podcast. We’re enjoying a brief interlude on the interviews this week. We still have two more episodes of our extended Season 14 to release. Our conversations with the Lizzotte brothers of True Love Coffee Co. (San Juan Capistrano, CA) and Ben Saur of 10 Speed Coffee Bar (Hood River, OR). They’ll be dropping over the next couple of weeks. Until then, some notes on where we’ve been.
We’ve been traveling extensively this year, and with each new town comes a new coffee shop (or three) to explore. Our Bean Journal photo folder has gotten bloated. Check back regularly to see the new shops. We won’t be e-blasting them out to you because, frankly, that would be really annoying. They will be posted in the Bean Journal on our homepage.
SIOUX FALLS, SD
We stopped by two shops in the Downtown of Sioux Falls, South Dakota recently—Coffea Roasterie and The Breaks—albeit, not in that order.
The garage door was rolled up when I arrived, not long after the shop opened. There were already customers inside and outside enjoying the beginnings of a lovely summer day in the Midwest. The wildfire smoke from Canada was just beginning to waft in, creating shimmery horizons. The air was dewy and humid, and I was grateful for the breeze pushing the bold Pride flag back and forth. It didn’t wave so much as roll and casually flop back and forth in a sleepy Welcome-vibe.
I felt at home less than a step inside. The baristas were friendly. The confines are comfortable and lived in. Windowsills have become dioramas, the merch screamed 2000s skate, and there was a lived-in yet organized feel to the space. It was just about perfect—oh! They have beer. It’s a little early, but I love a coffee shop you can get lost in until the time bleeds into Midwest Happy Hour.* I’m not sure if South Dakota is considered Midwest or Plains, but I’d put Sioux Falls right on the dividing line.
I ordered a shot and a drip, my go-to coffee order in any new place. Both were solid. The shot was flavorful but not overwhelming (or over-extracted). The drip I saved for later. It was still quite pleasant, having cooled quite a bit.
A menu board leaning up against the coffee bar said, “We are glad you are here.” I believed it.
*3:00 PM Central Standard Time unless it is Saturday, Sunday, or a holiday, or a sunny day in the summer, or you’re on a boat, or a ski hill, or at a wedding on a Thursday or Friday—then it is earlier.
You’ve got a corner coffee shop in a brick building anchoring a historic downtown Main St.? * Sign me up. One of three locations, this version of Coffee Roasterie is light and airy with a counter bar that feels classy without being pretentious. I ordered and took a seat at the bar between someone reading the morning paper** and a woman asking for a matcha drink like the one she liked somewhere else. Bless you, Barista, for your patience knows no boundaries.
You’ll never guess what I ordered…
Just kidding. It was a shot and a drip. In this case, the espresso was a washed Ethiopia Guji Suke Quto with tasting notes of Peach, Jasmine, and Juicy. It was all of those things, and the Guatemala drip was the perfect balancing act.
The register line never really slowed down. There was an energy inside and out of the cafe that I wasn’t expecting when I arrived in Sioux Falls late the night before. Perhaps it was the orange slice moon (thanks wildfire smoke) or an effort to get a jump on the weekend that had the streets humming that morning, or maybe, just maybe, it is always like that in Sioux Falls. Where other towns we passed through in the Dakotas had boarded-up windows and For Lease signs, Sioux Falls had art galleries, a vintage movie theatre, hip boutiques, and by my count, five places to get coffee open on a Friday morning.
I sat and watched the counter flow while filling out postcards for a while. Never did I hear a cross word or a complaint emanate from the baristas, and fewer complaints from the customers. I ordered a chai latte to go, which was reportedly less spicy and a bit on the mild side, and bid downtown adieu. Next stop, The Falls.
The Falls of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, USA.
*Phillips is like a Main St. you’d find yourself on in most Midwestern cities.
**They don’t have morning and evening papers in many places anymore, but I still enjoy the turn of phrase.
It’s part of our mission at R!WC to uplift small businesses. It is hard to run a business of any size, but small businesses have a special place in our hearts. For a coffee shop or roaster to survive in an era of competition, tariffs, rising costs, fickle customer buying trends, and staffing challenges (to name a few), small coffee roasters have to be hustlers. They have to be grinders. They have to do the work.
Despite the challenges, I rarely see one small business try to take down another. Instead, they uplift each other. Is your coffee shop out of lids, milk, or toilet paper? Borrow some of ours. Planning an event? We’ll repost it on our feeds!
Why do they do this?
Because running a business is hard. Game recognize game.* The R!WC Collaboration** series lives in that vein of one business trying to give another a hand. The coffees we’re developing with our collab partners take both of our individual desires, blend them with our overlapping stories, and represent the hustle and grit it takes to grind it out day after day.
We all want coffee that tastes great and doesn’t hurt anyone. Our collab partners are sourcing ethical coffees that they then roast in small batches. Each collab is a limited edition of about 200. When they are gone, they are gone. Because of that, you’ll see some greater than regular offering sizes so you can really dial in the coffee on your home set-up.
Roastar, Inc., provides the packages, continuing their support of not only the Roast! West Coast effort, but the same small businesses we’re partnering with, visiting, and exploring the world through coffee with.
Buy collab coffees at the links below, or click into the stories to learn how and why these are the partners we’ve come to work with, and details on the coffees we’re putting out.
*It feels super weird to type that out. **Expect this list to get longer.
ICE AGE TRAIL EDITION: R!WC X THE PINERY COFFEE CO.
Coming soon!
Thanks for reading this newsletter. Please share this post because it is cool to do. Thanks.
Editor’s note: Music is an essential component of my coffee drinking experience. This is what I’m listening to with my cup of coffee this month. Each side is 45 minutes long, just like the blank Memorex tapes I used to buy as a kid, and about the time it takes to enjoy a leisurely cup of coffee…or two.
There is something about being in it on a long road trip. The quibbles over snacks and stops, the stresses of packing, the grime of a third day at camp, when the right road and the right song sweep away all the excess to create a sort of sublime flow. You can drive and drive and drive as the plains stretch beyond forever, only to be broken by a mountain range whose jagged peaks could make a man cry.*
For me, that was the endlessness of Montana and the soundtrack you’ll find below. The songs build and burst. I felt connected to the scenic byways and the four corner townships between East Glacier and Helena and Billings through the momentary expulsion of each song. We were there and then gone, no mark on the earth left behind.
Looking back at the songs, I’m struck by unexpected melancholic theme that is pervasive throughout. It wasn’t intentional. Rather, a reflection of the pleasantness that comes with taking in everything that comes around that sweeping Montana curve.
Friday night, boys and girls I see Drunk and running around like ants They all just want to be heard and seen Speaking their minds and taking their stance Some are happy, and some are mean Some are just looking for quick romance They want to be part of the popular scene So they dress the part and take their chance • Band: The Brudi Brothers • Song: Me More Cowboy Than You
*Other genders, too, but I’m speaking from personal experience, here.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. Follow them on Instagram..
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. The links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
Guest: Laura Lawson Visconti, Drink Coffee Do Stuff Role: CoFounder & Art Director Based: Lake Tahoe and Truckee, CA + Reno, NV Online: www.drinkcoffeedostuff.com • @drinkcoffee_dostuff • lauralawsonvisconti.com What they drink: A light roast cortado…until they get jittery. The interview with Nick Visconti:
I’ve been trying to get Laura onto the podcast for almost two years! I’m glad it worked out that we got to do our chat in person. The cafe where I was sitting was a great reflection of the vision that Laura and her partners at Drink Coffee Do Stuff are putting forth—growing communities. It is a challenge for any business to grow and remain true to its original vision, but DCDS is trying to do just that by committing to taking on opportunities that align with its ethos, not just those that are readily available.
By her admission, Laura started as a "Starbucks Matcha girl…" Many specialty coffee drinkers, roasters, cafe owners, and appreciators got their start down the rabbit hole at a Starbucks. Whatever your thoughts are on the current iteration of the company as they try to reclaim their specialty bonafides, the specialty coffee community wouldn't exist without them kicking the world off the instant coffee cliff.
Laura was one of the first influencers before that became a real thing, much less a real career goal for the youths. She got her coffee start because she was ordering aesthetically beautiful drinks in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2010. Instagram launched in 2010, which makes me feel old. Do the kids still Instagram? Either way, she’s a photographer. View her work online here and here.
Laura has a degenerative eye disease called Retinitis Pigmentosa, or RP for short. It involves a reduction of the peripheral vision that progresses over time. The vision slowly dissipates into a point, potentially leading to full blindness. It was a major life turning point that started in a dark place and was leading—literally—to a dark place, but so much good has come from addressing the diagnosis. It forced her to think way outside the box about her career and the life she leads with her family.
I love a good A-frame sign. Street signage creates a real functional impact and value at a very low cost.
For non-action sports stars (or semi-stars), the term "stoked" means excited or thrilled with an emphasis on the passionate enthusiasm.
Boundaries! Setting them, keeping them, and being on the same page is challenging in any long-term relationship. Being in a business together creates even more navigable backwaters to get slogged down on. According to Laura, some of the ways they've managed is to focus on what they do best for the business and let their partners do the same, and to create separate work and personal life carveouts in their time.
BTW: I don't always show up to a show unshowered, but I came right from camp. If you can camp in the Lake Tahoe region, you should, but beware of bears, for real. There was a bear, let's call her Cinnamon,* in our neighbor's campsite at Fallen Leaf Lake Campground just a few weeks ago.
She claims not to be a coffee person, but without creativity and marketing, no one would know that coffee is an important part of our community. Laura is a Coffee person
*You're not supposed to name the bears, or you might forget they are bears and get attached.
COFFEE OUTSIDE
I’ve been drinking a lot of coffee outside this summer. Stay tuned to our socials for updates. Find the Coffee People Podcast & Roast! West Coast on: Bluesky • Instagram • Facebook • Youtube
@roastwestcoast on InstagramSince our visit DCDS has announced another new cafe in Reno. Photo on the right courtesy of www.drinkcoffeedostuff.com
DRINK COFFEE DO STUFF is a specialty coffee company built with the belief that extraordinary coffee leads to an extraordinary life. The mantra began in the Swiss Alps in 2012 during founder Nick Visconti’s pro snowboard days and continues today at our Lake Tahoe headquarters. As specialty coffees grow at elevations similar to that of our roastery, all our coffees are sourced from the mountains and roasted in the mountains. The hallmark of our coffee roasting style is maximizing sweetness and revealing origin characteristic. High altitude roasting at 6,000ft in Lake Tahoe provides us unique advantages to achieve this consistently making all our coffees more sweet, less bitter. • www.drinkcoffeedostuff.com
OTHER BRANDS WE USE & HAVE PARTNERED WITH*
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
• Coffee Cycle Roasting (Pacific Beach/Ocean Beach, San Diego, CA) NEW!
Guest: Samir Benouar, Milka Coffee Based: Sacramento, CA Online: www.milkacoffee.com • @milkacoffee The original interview:
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
Has the internet replaced IRL social groups? Discuss.
Just kidding. I know that it has. Sitting in the original Milka cafe, a historic home with plenty of emotional warmth to go around, I’m reminded that in the brief moments between screen-time, the local coffee shop can be that.
I’m on the road and missing the familiar faces from my home shop even if I don’t know their names or stories. Thankfully, it doesn’t take long at a new shop like Milka to feel that bit of connection that makes me think…maybe this isn’t a simulation!
The Founder of Milka Coffee, Samir Benouar, is a repeat guest on the Coffee People podcast. He didn’t disappoint. We had already covered his coffee origin story in the first virtual sit-down, so for our IRL meeting, we were able to focus more on current coffee events, managing a growing business and growing family, and how the current economy is impacting his business. Plus, I got a history lesson on Samir’s lineage as they’ve grown along with the Sacramento community.
The relationship between barista and regular creates a comfortable familiarity that uplifts a community. The cafe becomes a hub or a social connecting point for so many people.
I’m nicer than I let on…
There is always the pressure to grow. The reality is that growth in one area of life skews the other. When Samir had a child, he had to confront some conflicting emotions that came with supporting both aspects of his life.
If you’ve been making money just by putting up a shingle. This economic time is going to be rough.
Robots are not coming for the baristas jobs. I think human interaction is a key component to the coffee shop experience. I went to the Bot Bar. At first it was weird. The robot barista waved at me as I rode up on my bike, and beckoned me inside.
As I looked at the menu, a voice said, “Let me know if I can help you with anything.”
It was not an enthusiastic, robotic voice. It was an employee sitting on the floor behind the robot barista. “I was wondering if there would be any humans working here,” I replied.
“The robot needs a babysitter. Sometimes the arms get stuck,” they said.
Named after our great grandmother Milka Radonich (a former Sacramento small business owner) Milka Coffee Roasters is all about family, friends and the cities we live and play in. For our flagship coffee shop founder and Coffee Roaster Samir Benouar drew inspiration from his years spent reading, writing and working behind espresso machines in New York, San Francisco and his hometown Sacramento. When you chat with Samir or enjoy one of our creations it's clear that our dedication to coffee reaches beyond roasting to the settings and ways in which coffee is made and enjoyed. • milkacoffee.com
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
• Coffee Cycle Roasting (Pacific Beach/Ocean Beach, San Diego, CA) NEW!
MAREA COFFEE RELEASES ON THE ROAD EDITION COFFEE WITH ROAST! WEST COAST.
On The Road is a single origin coffee from Finca Muxbal in Chiapas, Mexico, and is available now on www.mareacoffee.com.
Tuesday, July 21st, 2025
Solana Beach, CA—Marea Coffee has partnered with the Roast! West Coast coffee network for On The Road—one in a series of small business roaster collabs meant to uplift the community aspect of coffee, promote cooperation among businesses, and offer customers a great daily coffee.
The road can be a hectic place. Adventure awaits around every corner. Reaching for a streaming mug of coffee and watching the sun reflect off the water is one of our favorite ways to slow down.
On The Road Edition is a collaborative coffee effort between the team at small-batch coffee roaster Marea Coffee and Ryan Woldt, the founder of the Roast! West Coast newsletter and host of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. Marea Coffee has long been a supporter of R!WC's effort to share the stories of the people in the coffee industry.
Likewise, Marea's focus on providing high-quality, accessible coffees sourced directly spoke to Woldt's desire to collaborate with brands that look to serve the needs of their community, particularly those who drink coffee outdoors. This coffee was developed to pair perfectly with an early morning dawn patrol checking waves, or out of a thermos on top of a mountain, or with friends around the campfire.
Marea's Joe Bettinger has been inviting me to join him on a Mexico coffee exploration for a long time, and this feels like the first step in that direction. He sourced several coffees he thought I'd be interested in, and this was the clear standout. I did my taste-testing at Carlsbad State Beach, just down the street, and it was easy to imagine someone on the Mexico coast doing the same. Coffee connects us across borders! Marea's other collaborations, like the one with local muralist Skye Walker, inspired confidence that the opportunity to collaborate shouldn't be passed up.
• Ryan Woldt
DESCRIPTION OF ON THE ROAD EDITION:
On The Road is a medium blend crafted from a single-origin coffee grown on Rainforest Alliance-certified Finca Muxbal in Chiapas, Mexico. The coffee is what we refer to as a daily driver. It's going to be accessible to an audience with a wide variety of taste preferences and smooth and consistent enough to drink every morning. Marea developed a coffee with a profile that balances dark chocolate with notes of apricot, green apple, and honey.
We’re stoked to collaborate with our friends, Ryan Woldt from Roast! West Coast and Jorge Gallardo from Finca Muxbal, in bringing coffee direct from the farm to your cup.
• Greyson Adams, Marea Coffee
Jorge Gallardo is the sixth generation of the family to operate Finca Muxbal since 1959. Part coffee farm, part ecological preserve, the farm’s name comes from the Mayan language native to the Chiapas region near the border of Guatemala. Muxbal translates to “place surrounded by clouds”—appropriate for a place located at 1,560 meters above sea level (5,118 ft.)
Coffee drinkers can order the On The Road Edition collaboration coffee blend at www.mareacoffee.com, or if they are in the SoCal area they can look for a bag at Seaside Market in Cardiff, CA.
When asked where he most liked to enjoy On The Road Edition coffee, Woldt said, "At the beach after a long bike ride or in the morning before a hike at camp—somewhere where I feel I've put in the work and earned it."
Roastar, Inc., a coffee packaging company based in Wausau, WI, provided the recycled packaging. The gusseted bag's all-HDPE film is store drop-off recyclable (#2) and has excellent moisture and oxygen barriers. On the Road is offered in a larger-than-normal size, allowing customers to fine-tune this coffee on their home brewing setup.
Recyclable packaging provide by Roastar, Inc., a long-time supporter of R!WC and small businesses.
Marea Coffee was born in San Diego, California. The company was created from the idea that everyone should be able to enjoy fresh, affordable cafe-quality coffee at home. Marea uses coffee to connect people through collaboration. Every bean they produce is hand-roasted in small batches to ensure customers receive the freshest and highest-quality coffee they can deliver. Their motto is to never settle and always enjoy the ritual of drinking coffee.
Ryan Woldt is the founder of Roast! West Coast, a coffee newsletter that is the home of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. He fell in love with the community and stories of coffee while dreaming of being allowed to pull an espresso at Coffee Cycle Roasting in San Diego, CA. With R!WC, he shares the stories of coffee professionals as they explore the entrepreneurship, creativity, passion, science, and innovation found in the expansive world of coffee.
IMPORTANT LINKS
TO BUY: https://mareacoffee.com/collections/shop/products/roast-west-coast-collab
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. and their successes with the new Roastar Design Lab.
Help keep us caffeinated by buying one of our collab coffees. Thanks for all your support.
Thanks for reading Roast! West Coast. Cool people share. Please be cool.
Roast! West Coast Collabs with Coffee Cycle Roasting in San Diego, CA.
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COFFEE CYCLE ROASTING DEVELOPS THE COFFEE SENSEI EDITION BLEND COFFEE WITH ROAST! WEST COAST.
Coffee Sensei is a blend of Sumatra and Colombia beans, and available now on www.coffeecycleroasting.com.
Thursday, July 17th, 2025
San Diego, CA—Coffee Cycle Roasting has partnered with the Roast! West Coast coffee network for Coffee Sensei—one in a series of small business roaster collabs meant to uplift the community aspect of coffee and promote cooperation among roasters.
Editor’s note: The audio above is from one of our earlier Coffee Smarter Episodes featuring Chris O’Brien, Coffee Sensei.
Your order will be roasted fresh on the Monday following your order! Coffees are shipped ASAP after roasting to ensure you receive the freshest possible roast.
Coffee Sensei is a collaborative effort between Coffee Cycle Roasting, helmed by Chris O'Brien, and Ryan Woldt, the founder of the Roast! West Coast newsletter and host of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. These two friends have been collaborating since the early days of Chris' Pacific Beach cafe opening, where Ryan was his first barista employee, business advisor, and creative influence.
Chris isn’t just Ryan’s Coffee Sensei. He shares his knowledge widely.
Since the beginning of the Coffee Smarter podcast, Chris has appeared as an expert on the show, whom Ryan affectionately refers to as his "Coffee Sensei." This coffee serves as a tribute to this long-standing creative and collaborative partnership.
"When I asked Chris if he'd teach me coffee, I didn't realize he knew what he was doing. Turns out I stumbled onto one of the great coffee minds in our community," said Ryan Woldt. "He was opening his first cafe and offered a trade—come work as a part-time Coffee Cycle barista, and I'll teach you on the job while learning how to manage employees. I couldn't turn it down. Very quickly, one morning a week turned into two, three, and sometimes even more. I spent a full year stoking my fire for coffee and the coffee community. That experience has directly led to my efforts with the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts."
When asked about the collaboration, Chris ruminated, "My relationship with Ryan over the years has had an incredible impact on the way I run my business and manage staff. More importantly, Ryan is possibly my greatest success! We started working together, and Ryan was a die-hard' diner coffee' drinker. He wouldn't believe me when I told him what different tasting notes could be present in coffee. Now, he has judged roasting competitions and promotes specialty coffee's growth and appreciation at a national and even international level. I like to think I really helped get him started on that path."
DESCRIPTION OF COFFEE SENSEI:
Coffee Sensei is a medium blend crafted from two coffee origins that were featured prominently on the Coffee Cycle menu in its early days—Colombia and Sumatra. The Colombia is a coffee that brings balance to the blend, with tasting notes of milk chocolate and caramel. The Sumatra adds a savory roundness and full body to make the cup truly satisfying. The Ethiopia Natural finishes the blend by contributing a hint of gentle acidity and sweetness.
These coffees create a blend where the disparate parts complement and enhance each other, much like Ryan and Chris's collaborative efforts. Fans of delicious coffee can order the Coffee Sensei Edition coffee blend at www.coffeecycleroasting.com.
When asked about future collaboration plans, the coffee roaster replied, "Hopefully, we go for a bike ride and end up drinking coffee somewhere in San Diego the next time he's [Ryan] in town!"
Roastar, Inc., a coffee packaging company based in Wausau, WI, provided the recycled packaging. The gusseted bag's all-HDPE film is store drop-off recyclable (#2) and has excellent moisture and oxygen barriers. Coffee Sensei is offered in a larger-than-normal size, allowing customers to fine-tune this coffee on their home brewing setup. Roastar packages are produced in Wisconsin.
The gusseted packaging was provide by Roastar, Inc., a Wisconsin-based packaging company, and presenting sponsor of Coffee Smarter and Coffee People.
Coffee Cycle Roasting is a roaster and cafe with locations in the Ocean Beach and Pacific Beach neighborhoods of San Diego, CA. Founder Chris O'Brien is a veteran coffee professional who honed his skills at Phoenix Roasters in the Midwest and then spent the better part of a decade serving the neighboring community at the original Bird Rock Coffee Roasters before launching Coffee Cycle. The core of the Coffee Cycle Roasting business is the community surrounding the shops that find themselves engaged in conversation over a cup of coffee day after day. They also offer wholesale and white-label coffee services for other local businesses and host numerous events at both locations.
Ryan Woldt is the founder of Roast! West Coast, a coffee newsletter that is the home of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. He fell in love with the community and stories of coffee while dreaming of being allowed to pull an espresso at Coffee Cycle Roasting. With R!WC, he shares the stories of coffee professionals as they explore the entrepreneurship, creativity, passion, science, and innovation found in the expansive world of coffee.
The Pacific Beach location of Coffee Cycle is where it all began.
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. and our friend Nick Schmitt who is YouTube coffee famous.
Guest: Jillian Quint, Deltina Coffee Roasters Based: Oceano and San Luis Obispo, CA Online: www.deltinacoffeeroasters.com • @deltinacoffee What they order: Oat milk cappuccino
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
The second location of Deltina Coffee Roasters has a different vibe from the original roasting facility. It is located across from Cal-Poly, where Jillian attended university (and, dare I say, possibly partied a time or two nearby). It is designed to be the kind of cafe that encourages lollygagging…er…I mean studying.
The ceilings are high and white. There is seating for casual lounging, solo studying, and long tables for groups. Soft pop music wafted over the patrons—loud enough to hear but not so loud you couldn’t pop on a pair of headphones. I arrived early and returned to my car to grab a laptop because it felt like the kind of environment conducive to getting a few pages written.
It is a happy, open space at a time when we need more happy spaces. At least I do. I arrived at the cafe fresh from visiting one of my own. I was camping along the California coast, which always takes a pleasant emotional toll on me. My heart and brain are arguing over the value of gratitude versus melancholy. The heavy waves were as hypnotic as the tall, waving grasses leading off into the woods high up on the hillsides.
If I arrived raw from my brush with nature, Jillian showed up with a refreshing openness and willingness to share. We cover a lot in a short period and then some. We spoke for another hour off-camera. She is thoughtful, well-spoken, and willing to engage even when the conversation veers off the rails.*
Jillian Quint and Ryan Woldt during the recording of Coffee People.
Thanks for reading Roast! West Coast! This post is public so feel free to share it.
Deltina Coffee’s new location is a happy, open space.
The business was originally named Quintessa before being rebranded as Deltina Coffee Roasters. The name is a nod to one of the original names considered for the Oceano community, culled from a list dating back to 1892. Deltina is a reference where to the river delta formed between Pismo Beach and Oceano. A river delta creates an important ecological triangle where a faster-moving body of water meets a slower-moving one, like the river leading into an ocean or lake. That connecting point often forms a triangular shape mimicking the letter d or delta in the Greek alphabet. The cafe is also a place where two (or more) people meet, although the speeds at which they engage may not be as relevant.
Building community in a small town offers many challenges. None is greater than having the community begin to trust you. Communing with the businesses nearby was the first start for the Quints to make inroads into both Oceano and SLOE. The second key component was providing a product and service of a caliber that their new customers appreciate.
I clearly don’t understand how kids and/or parenting work, but I endorse Jillian’s point that adding a business to the family is like adding a child. It requires constant attention and nurturing to create foundational growth. The smart decisions for the business are not always smart decisions for the persons running the business. There is the straightforward profit/loss survival that works in tandem, or in direct opposition, with the emotional needs of the owners, employees, and customers.
Like it or not, the impacts on hospitality from the COVID-19 pandemic era are still with us. That time impacted how businesses are run and what tools are available to business owners and shifted the collective consumer audience’s decision-making when making buying choices. I don’t see that going away even if, as a community, we are not requiring masks or arguing about local and national pandemic policy. Many coffee shops, in particular, learned how to do more with less. Customers became much more aware of the supply chain impacts affecting local businesses. Both became more discerning with how and where they were spending their money.
According to Jillian, trusting your business (and life) partner is the key. It is the fundamental step in having real conversations about the business. Jillian and Jack have different working styles but work at maintaining bigger shared goals. One challenge is retaining awareness that those goals will evolve over time and creating space to make sure they are still on the same page.
Small businesses evolve. They install new syrup recipes, updating pos system, add to the roasting options, updating designs. There is a continuum of details that get shaped over time. Growth is part of that, but not the only goal. Sometimes, growth is about refining the space and processes that already exist.
*Most of my conversations quickly go off the rails!
IN CASE YOU MISSSED IT
Listen to our interview with Jillian’s husband and Deltina Coffee Roasters CoFounder Jack Quint on Spotify.
Deltina specializes in small-batch, organic specialty coffees. Our beans are mindfully sourced from traditional, sustainable farms located all over the world. All coffees are roasted on-site in small batches, allowing for consistent and precise flavor. • deltinacoffeeroasters.com
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. and our friend Nick Schmitt who is YouTube coffee famous.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
We finally got all our bikes in a row. Coffee Sensei is a nod to my coffee origin story as the first barista hired at Coffee Cycle Roasting. The conversations between Chris and I on the slow mornings in the first days directly led to Roast! West Coast.
The coffee is a blend of Colombia, Ethiopia, and Sumatra (Indonesia) coffees. Each have a special place in the timeline of our friendship and me falling down the specialty coffee rabbit-hole. There is a special Easter egg on the package as nod to the very first time Chris made me drink Ethiopia coffees. Like many others, it changed my life for the better.
Coffee Sensei is a medium blend crafted from two coffee origins that were featured prominently on the Coffee Cycle menu in its early days—Colombia and Sumatra. The Colombia is a coffee that brings balance to the blend, with tasting notes of milk chocolate and caramel. The Sumatra adds a savory roundness and full body to make the cup truly satisfying. The Ethiopia Natural finishes the blend by contributing a hint of gentle acidity and sweetness.
Guest: Chadwick Harman, Regent Coffee Based: Los Angeles, CA Online: www.regentcoffee.com • @regentcoffee What he orders: A cortado, and occasionally, a spicy latte.
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
NOTES FROM THE SHOW
Los Angeles turned out to be an unusual place to try to buy people coffee. I posted up at Regent Coffee for several hours, and almost no one would let me buy them a cup of coffee. At one point, I made a little markerboard sign that said, “Free Coffee for Nice People.”
More than one person looked at it and said, paraphrasing, “I’m not a nice person,” and walked through the door to buy their own coffee. I’d argue that wanting to buy your own coffee and support the local coffee shop makes you a nice person. Right?
Regardless, a bearded man offering to buy you a drink doesn’t go very far on York BLVD! It was the first of many lessons I learned from the tour. I managed to make a few new friends, including a pleasant actor who did let me buy their coffee and a cute dog. Still felt like a win.
The menu board at Regent Coffee on York BLVD.
Shout out to Regent Coffee Founder and Owner Leon Nie for recommending I chat with Chadwick from the Regent Coffee leadership team. Chadwick is a coffee person and also a creative. He’s a producer, writer, and filmmaker whose skills in people and production management happen to pair very well with coffee roaster operations.
The coffee shop–as a concept–is a messy, loud place. So is this show. With this tour, I’m breaking free from the booth,** getting myself into the mix with the people, and challenging myself with technical skills I’ve long been afraid to take on. Chadwick and I chatted on a bench in front of the shop next to a fairly York Boulevard.
Chadwick learned to make coffee at a very young age because if the coffee wasn’t made on Christmas morning, he couldn’t open presents. Young Chadwick took matters into his own hands.
Coffee shops and bars are community hubs. The people who frequent them care about the other people who spend time in those walls. The why doesn’t seem to be as important as the willingness to connect.
What jobs are available to young people now? Please don’t say Influencer! I didn’t particularly want to be working as a teenager instead of hanging out with my friends or watching movies, but in retrospect, I learned many essential life skills. More than basic chores and handling money, I also learned how to talk to people, read a situation, and manage stressful interactions.
Trusting is a skill. As a manager, trusting employees is an even bigger challenge, but not trusting them is a reflection of your willingness to trust your own hiring decisions and ability to train. Creating systems and repetition builds trust over time.
The relationship between baristas and their customers is weirdly intimate. Regent’s customers are bringing baby clothes in for Chadwick’s growing family. He shares bits and pieces of himself with the customers who come through the doors as they do with him. The back and forth creates a bridge of sorts where the line between human and business is blurred.
Advice for Coffee People: Don’t be a gatekeeper. Chadwick aims to offer people space to enjoy what they enjoy in coffee, and to do so the way they want it. We all have access (in theory) to the equipment and beans that make good coffee. The coffee shop has to be the place where you feel something in a way that can’t be replicated at home.
The barrel-aged coffee was ridiculously good. I say that as someone with a long history of not being an appreciator of flavored coffee. This wasn’t the same as the packs found at the discount markets during the holidays. The intention shines through.
Using specialty grade, single-origin coffee beans that pair perfectly with whiskey aromas. We use our own American oak barrels and whiskey to precisely control the seasoning and aging of the beans. This ensures the ideal strength of the whiskey tone, adding a subtle, long-lasting note that enhances, without overpowering, the coffee profile. Try our barrel-aged cold brew for a unique experience. • regentcoffee.com
He’s made some stuff. Like this film festival short.
I’ve also dabbled in making shorts. We’re working on one right now with our friends at Field Theory Media and Black Rabbit Service. Slowly working on it anyway. Interested in helping us produce a film that touches on coffee and needs a new title? Check it out here.
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. Check out their Design Lab. Create your own custom packaging for your brand, event, or just because it’s fun.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
Hello, fans of the Coffee People podcast. Welcome to the new (but still the same) newsletter from Roast! West Coast. We've migrated from our old platform to this new version. There are a few things to clean up here or there. You'll see some changes and new fun things, but hopefully the transition is painless! The Coffee People podcast will return next week with a new interview with our new friends at Rusty Dog Coffee in Madison, WI.
Even more fun than working on the back end of a newsletter is traveling to coffee shops and roasters.
The Littlefoot creature figures prominently on the packaging.
LITTLEFOOT COFFEE ROASTERS, GRANDVILLE, MI
We got our start in 2017 and have been roasting exceptional coffee grown by exceptional people ever since. Every batch is lovingly roasted to bring out the best in each bean, and our seasonal menu of offerings keeps things fresh. We ethically source our coffee, work directly with farmers whenever we can, and always pay fair trade pricing. Thanks for believing in Littlefoot Coffee Roasters. • littlefootcoffee.com
I passed two other coffee shops to get to Littlefoot Coffee Roasters. One was big and flashy. The other—cute and convenient. I passed because something about the name Littlefoot stuck in my craw, and I had to see for myself just how little the foot was.
Just kidding. There were no feet on display. But I did go because I like the name. Sometimes that is all it takes. To get there, you drive through downtown Grandville, turn left at the fancy coffee place with all the seating and signage, drive into a business park that leans industrial, and when you get to the railroad tracks, turn left. They are at the back.
It isn't as complex as it sounds, and the trip is worth it because Littlefoot is all about the details—wallpaper, glassware, cabin vibe, and the Littlefoot creature found in the nooks and crannies.
I was there early to order a shot and a drip from Alex and Rosie, who were already prepping for a long day that would culminate in a Maker's Market, DJ, and live music. They have the space for it. The entry and order space is also the roasting facility. Next to that is a seating area and an open space. Hanging coffee bags at the back creates a faux backdrop for musicians and performers. Finally, the cabin room is a casual lounge (with AC!).
Whenever I needed a break from staring at the computer, I'd wander from room to room, taking in the details—some quirky, some classic coffee shop. The vibe changed as I moved and again when the garage doors were rolled up before the market started. Most of the customers seemed known—if not by name, by face—by Alex and Rosie, even though the retail portion of the business is still new. It felt like a home for this coffee community that, for a small portion of a day, I was part of.
The Coffee People podcast is presented by Roastar. They are a coffee packaging company that believes in treating small businesses just like the big ones and have the tools to serve them booth.
Our newest collaboration coffee is being released this week with The Pinery Coffee Company in Wausau, WI. We'll be meeting there on Thursday, August 28th, at 10:00 AM to share the first batches of the coffee, give away some swag, and record a live episode of the Coffee People podcast. We're donating our proceeds from the coffee to the Ice Age Trail Alliance in Wisconsin.
The IATA mission is to conserve, create, maintain, and promote the Ice Age National Scenic Trail. The trail is part of the National Park System and stretches 1200 miles throughout my home state. Head to iceagetrail.org for interactive maps, event listings, ways to help, and more trail information you could ever consume!
The partner links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or a brand we don't strongly recommend.
Hello, fans of the Coffee People podcast. We’re enjoying a brief interlude on the interviews this week. We still have two more episodes of our extended Season 14 to release. Our conversations with the Lizzotte brothers of True Love Coffee Co. (San Juan Capistrano, CA) and Ben Saur of 10 Speed Coffee Bar (Hood River, OR). They’ll be dropping over the next couple of weeks. Until then, some notes on where we’ve been.
We’ve been traveling extensively this year, and with each new town comes a new coffee shop (or three) to explore. Our Bean Journal photo folder has gotten bloated. Check back regularly to see the new shops. We won’t be e-blasting them out to you because, frankly, that would be really annoying. They will be posted in the Bean Journal on our homepage.
SIOUX FALLS, SD
We stopped by two shops in the Downtown of Sioux Falls, South Dakota recently—Coffea Roasterie and The Breaks—albeit, not in that order.
The garage door was rolled up when I arrived, not long after the shop opened. There were already customers inside and outside enjoying the beginnings of a lovely summer day in the Midwest. The wildfire smoke from Canada was just beginning to waft in, creating shimmery horizons. The air was dewy and humid, and I was grateful for the breeze pushing the bold Pride flag back and forth. It didn’t wave so much as roll and casually flop back and forth in a sleepy Welcome-vibe.
I felt at home less than a step inside. The baristas were friendly. The confines are comfortable and lived in. Windowsills have become dioramas, the merch screamed 2000s skate, and there was a lived-in yet organized feel to the space. It was just about perfect—oh! They have beer. It’s a little early, but I love a coffee shop you can get lost in until the time bleeds into Midwest Happy Hour.* I’m not sure if South Dakota is considered Midwest or Plains, but I’d put Sioux Falls right on the dividing line.
I ordered a shot and a drip, my go-to coffee order in any new place. Both were solid. The shot was flavorful but not overwhelming (or over-extracted). The drip I saved for later. It was still quite pleasant, having cooled quite a bit.
A menu board leaning up against the coffee bar said, “We are glad you are here.” I believed it.
*3:00 PM Central Standard Time unless it is Saturday, Sunday, or a holiday, or a sunny day in the summer, or you’re on a boat, or a ski hill, or at a wedding on a Thursday or Friday—then it is earlier.
You’ve got a corner coffee shop in a brick building anchoring a historic downtown Main St.? * Sign me up. One of three locations, this version of Coffee Roasterie is light and airy with a counter bar that feels classy without being pretentious. I ordered and took a seat at the bar between someone reading the morning paper** and a woman asking for a matcha drink like the one she liked somewhere else. Bless you, Barista, for your patience knows no boundaries.
You’ll never guess what I ordered…
Just kidding. It was a shot and a drip. In this case, the espresso was a washed Ethiopia Guji Suke Quto with tasting notes of Peach, Jasmine, and Juicy. It was all of those things, and the Guatemala drip was the perfect balancing act.
The register line never really slowed down. There was an energy inside and out of the cafe that I wasn’t expecting when I arrived in Sioux Falls late the night before. Perhaps it was the orange slice moon (thanks wildfire smoke) or an effort to get a jump on the weekend that had the streets humming that morning, or maybe, just maybe, it is always like that in Sioux Falls. Where other towns we passed through in the Dakotas had boarded-up windows and For Lease signs, Sioux Falls had art galleries, a vintage movie theatre, hip boutiques, and by my count, five places to get coffee open on a Friday morning.
I sat and watched the counter flow while filling out postcards for a while. Never did I hear a cross word or a complaint emanate from the baristas, and fewer complaints from the customers. I ordered a chai latte to go, which was reportedly less spicy and a bit on the mild side, and bid downtown adieu. Next stop, The Falls.
The Falls of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, USA.
*Phillips is like a Main St. you’d find yourself on in most Midwestern cities.
**They don’t have morning and evening papers in many places anymore, but I still enjoy the turn of phrase.
It’s part of our mission at R!WC to uplift small businesses. It is hard to run a business of any size, but small businesses have a special place in our hearts. For a coffee shop or roaster to survive in an era of competition, tariffs, rising costs, fickle customer buying trends, and staffing challenges (to name a few), small coffee roasters have to be hustlers. They have to be grinders. They have to do the work.
Despite the challenges, I rarely see one small business try to take down another. Instead, they uplift each other. Is your coffee shop out of lids, milk, or toilet paper? Borrow some of ours. Planning an event? We’ll repost it on our feeds!
Why do they do this?
Because running a business is hard. Game recognize game.* The R!WC Collaboration** series lives in that vein of one business trying to give another a hand. The coffees we’re developing with our collab partners take both of our individual desires, blend them with our overlapping stories, and represent the hustle and grit it takes to grind it out day after day.
We all want coffee that tastes great and doesn’t hurt anyone. Our collab partners are sourcing ethical coffees that they then roast in small batches. Each collab is a limited edition of about 200. When they are gone, they are gone. Because of that, you’ll see some greater than regular offering sizes so you can really dial in the coffee on your home set-up.
Roastar, Inc., provides the packages, continuing their support of not only the Roast! West Coast effort, but the same small businesses we’re partnering with, visiting, and exploring the world through coffee with.
Buy collab coffees at the links below, or click into the stories to learn how and why these are the partners we’ve come to work with, and details on the coffees we’re putting out.
*It feels super weird to type that out. **Expect this list to get longer.
ICE AGE TRAIL EDITION: R!WC X THE PINERY COFFEE CO.
Coming soon!
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Editor’s note: Music is an essential component of my coffee drinking experience. This is what I’m listening to with my cup of coffee this month. Each side is 45 minutes long, just like the blank Memorex tapes I used to buy as a kid, and about the time it takes to enjoy a leisurely cup of coffee…or two.
There is something about being in it on a long road trip. The quibbles over snacks and stops, the stresses of packing, the grime of a third day at camp, when the right road and the right song sweep away all the excess to create a sort of sublime flow. You can drive and drive and drive as the plains stretch beyond forever, only to be broken by a mountain range whose jagged peaks could make a man cry.*
For me, that was the endlessness of Montana and the soundtrack you’ll find below. The songs build and burst. I felt connected to the scenic byways and the four corner townships between East Glacier and Helena and Billings through the momentary expulsion of each song. We were there and then gone, no mark on the earth left behind.
Looking back at the songs, I’m struck by unexpected melancholic theme that is pervasive throughout. It wasn’t intentional. Rather, a reflection of the pleasantness that comes with taking in everything that comes around that sweeping Montana curve.
Friday night, boys and girls I see Drunk and running around like ants They all just want to be heard and seen Speaking their minds and taking their stance Some are happy, and some are mean Some are just looking for quick romance They want to be part of the popular scene So they dress the part and take their chance • Band: The Brudi Brothers • Song: Me More Cowboy Than You
*Other genders, too, but I’m speaking from personal experience, here.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. Follow them on Instagram..
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. The links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
Guest: Laura Lawson Visconti, Drink Coffee Do Stuff Role: CoFounder & Art Director Based: Lake Tahoe and Truckee, CA + Reno, NV Online: www.drinkcoffeedostuff.com • @drinkcoffee_dostuff • lauralawsonvisconti.com What they drink: A light roast cortado…until they get jittery. The interview with Nick Visconti:
I’ve been trying to get Laura onto the podcast for almost two years! I’m glad it worked out that we got to do our chat in person. The cafe where I was sitting was a great reflection of the vision that Laura and her partners at Drink Coffee Do Stuff are putting forth—growing communities. It is a challenge for any business to grow and remain true to its original vision, but DCDS is trying to do just that by committing to taking on opportunities that align with its ethos, not just those that are readily available.
By her admission, Laura started as a "Starbucks Matcha girl…" Many specialty coffee drinkers, roasters, cafe owners, and appreciators got their start down the rabbit hole at a Starbucks. Whatever your thoughts are on the current iteration of the company as they try to reclaim their specialty bonafides, the specialty coffee community wouldn't exist without them kicking the world off the instant coffee cliff.
Laura was one of the first influencers before that became a real thing, much less a real career goal for the youths. She got her coffee start because she was ordering aesthetically beautiful drinks in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2010. Instagram launched in 2010, which makes me feel old. Do the kids still Instagram? Either way, she’s a photographer. View her work online here and here.
Laura has a degenerative eye disease called Retinitis Pigmentosa, or RP for short. It involves a reduction of the peripheral vision that progresses over time. The vision slowly dissipates into a point, potentially leading to full blindness. It was a major life turning point that started in a dark place and was leading—literally—to a dark place, but so much good has come from addressing the diagnosis. It forced her to think way outside the box about her career and the life she leads with her family.
I love a good A-frame sign. Street signage creates a real functional impact and value at a very low cost.
For non-action sports stars (or semi-stars), the term "stoked" means excited or thrilled with an emphasis on the passionate enthusiasm.
Boundaries! Setting them, keeping them, and being on the same page is challenging in any long-term relationship. Being in a business together creates even more navigable backwaters to get slogged down on. According to Laura, some of the ways they've managed is to focus on what they do best for the business and let their partners do the same, and to create separate work and personal life carveouts in their time.
BTW: I don't always show up to a show unshowered, but I came right from camp. If you can camp in the Lake Tahoe region, you should, but beware of bears, for real. There was a bear, let's call her Cinnamon,* in our neighbor's campsite at Fallen Leaf Lake Campground just a few weeks ago.
She claims not to be a coffee person, but without creativity and marketing, no one would know that coffee is an important part of our community. Laura is a Coffee person
*You're not supposed to name the bears, or you might forget they are bears and get attached.
COFFEE OUTSIDE
I’ve been drinking a lot of coffee outside this summer. Stay tuned to our socials for updates. Find the Coffee People Podcast & Roast! West Coast on: Bluesky • Instagram • Facebook • Youtube
@roastwestcoast on InstagramSince our visit DCDS has announced another new cafe in Reno. Photo on the right courtesy of www.drinkcoffeedostuff.com
DRINK COFFEE DO STUFF is a specialty coffee company built with the belief that extraordinary coffee leads to an extraordinary life. The mantra began in the Swiss Alps in 2012 during founder Nick Visconti’s pro snowboard days and continues today at our Lake Tahoe headquarters. As specialty coffees grow at elevations similar to that of our roastery, all our coffees are sourced from the mountains and roasted in the mountains. The hallmark of our coffee roasting style is maximizing sweetness and revealing origin characteristic. High altitude roasting at 6,000ft in Lake Tahoe provides us unique advantages to achieve this consistently making all our coffees more sweet, less bitter. • www.drinkcoffeedostuff.com
OTHER BRANDS WE USE & HAVE PARTNERED WITH*
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
• Coffee Cycle Roasting (Pacific Beach/Ocean Beach, San Diego, CA) NEW!
Guest: Samir Benouar, Milka Coffee Based: Sacramento, CA Online: www.milkacoffee.com • @milkacoffee The original interview:
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
Has the internet replaced IRL social groups? Discuss.
Just kidding. I know that it has. Sitting in the original Milka cafe, a historic home with plenty of emotional warmth to go around, I’m reminded that in the brief moments between screen-time, the local coffee shop can be that.
I’m on the road and missing the familiar faces from my home shop even if I don’t know their names or stories. Thankfully, it doesn’t take long at a new shop like Milka to feel that bit of connection that makes me think…maybe this isn’t a simulation!
The Founder of Milka Coffee, Samir Benouar, is a repeat guest on the Coffee People podcast. He didn’t disappoint. We had already covered his coffee origin story in the first virtual sit-down, so for our IRL meeting, we were able to focus more on current coffee events, managing a growing business and growing family, and how the current economy is impacting his business. Plus, I got a history lesson on Samir’s lineage as they’ve grown along with the Sacramento community.
The relationship between barista and regular creates a comfortable familiarity that uplifts a community. The cafe becomes a hub or a social connecting point for so many people.
I’m nicer than I let on…
There is always the pressure to grow. The reality is that growth in one area of life skews the other. When Samir had a child, he had to confront some conflicting emotions that came with supporting both aspects of his life.
If you’ve been making money just by putting up a shingle. This economic time is going to be rough.
Robots are not coming for the baristas jobs. I think human interaction is a key component to the coffee shop experience. I went to the Bot Bar. At first it was weird. The robot barista waved at me as I rode up on my bike, and beckoned me inside.
As I looked at the menu, a voice said, “Let me know if I can help you with anything.”
It was not an enthusiastic, robotic voice. It was an employee sitting on the floor behind the robot barista. “I was wondering if there would be any humans working here,” I replied.
“The robot needs a babysitter. Sometimes the arms get stuck,” they said.
Named after our great grandmother Milka Radonich (a former Sacramento small business owner) Milka Coffee Roasters is all about family, friends and the cities we live and play in. For our flagship coffee shop founder and Coffee Roaster Samir Benouar drew inspiration from his years spent reading, writing and working behind espresso machines in New York, San Francisco and his hometown Sacramento. When you chat with Samir or enjoy one of our creations it's clear that our dedication to coffee reaches beyond roasting to the settings and ways in which coffee is made and enjoyed. • milkacoffee.com
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
• Coffee Cycle Roasting (Pacific Beach/Ocean Beach, San Diego, CA) NEW!
MAREA COFFEE RELEASES ON THE ROAD EDITION COFFEE WITH ROAST! WEST COAST.
On The Road is a single origin coffee from Finca Muxbal in Chiapas, Mexico, and is available now on www.mareacoffee.com.
Tuesday, July 21st, 2025
Solana Beach, CA—Marea Coffee has partnered with the Roast! West Coast coffee network for On The Road—one in a series of small business roaster collabs meant to uplift the community aspect of coffee, promote cooperation among businesses, and offer customers a great daily coffee.
The road can be a hectic place. Adventure awaits around every corner. Reaching for a streaming mug of coffee and watching the sun reflect off the water is one of our favorite ways to slow down.
On The Road Edition is a collaborative coffee effort between the team at small-batch coffee roaster Marea Coffee and Ryan Woldt, the founder of the Roast! West Coast newsletter and host of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. Marea Coffee has long been a supporter of R!WC's effort to share the stories of the people in the coffee industry.
Likewise, Marea's focus on providing high-quality, accessible coffees sourced directly spoke to Woldt's desire to collaborate with brands that look to serve the needs of their community, particularly those who drink coffee outdoors. This coffee was developed to pair perfectly with an early morning dawn patrol checking waves, or out of a thermos on top of a mountain, or with friends around the campfire.
Marea's Joe Bettinger has been inviting me to join him on a Mexico coffee exploration for a long time, and this feels like the first step in that direction. He sourced several coffees he thought I'd be interested in, and this was the clear standout. I did my taste-testing at Carlsbad State Beach, just down the street, and it was easy to imagine someone on the Mexico coast doing the same. Coffee connects us across borders! Marea's other collaborations, like the one with local muralist Skye Walker, inspired confidence that the opportunity to collaborate shouldn't be passed up.
• Ryan Woldt
DESCRIPTION OF ON THE ROAD EDITION:
On The Road is a medium blend crafted from a single-origin coffee grown on Rainforest Alliance-certified Finca Muxbal in Chiapas, Mexico. The coffee is what we refer to as a daily driver. It's going to be accessible to an audience with a wide variety of taste preferences and smooth and consistent enough to drink every morning. Marea developed a coffee with a profile that balances dark chocolate with notes of apricot, green apple, and honey.
We’re stoked to collaborate with our friends, Ryan Woldt from Roast! West Coast and Jorge Gallardo from Finca Muxbal, in bringing coffee direct from the farm to your cup.
• Greyson Adams, Marea Coffee
Jorge Gallardo is the sixth generation of the family to operate Finca Muxbal since 1959. Part coffee farm, part ecological preserve, the farm’s name comes from the Mayan language native to the Chiapas region near the border of Guatemala. Muxbal translates to “place surrounded by clouds”—appropriate for a place located at 1,560 meters above sea level (5,118 ft.)
Coffee drinkers can order the On The Road Edition collaboration coffee blend at www.mareacoffee.com, or if they are in the SoCal area they can look for a bag at Seaside Market in Cardiff, CA.
When asked where he most liked to enjoy On The Road Edition coffee, Woldt said, "At the beach after a long bike ride or in the morning before a hike at camp—somewhere where I feel I've put in the work and earned it."
Roastar, Inc., a coffee packaging company based in Wausau, WI, provided the recycled packaging. The gusseted bag's all-HDPE film is store drop-off recyclable (#2) and has excellent moisture and oxygen barriers. On the Road is offered in a larger-than-normal size, allowing customers to fine-tune this coffee on their home brewing setup.
Recyclable packaging provide by Roastar, Inc., a long-time supporter of R!WC and small businesses.
Marea Coffee was born in San Diego, California. The company was created from the idea that everyone should be able to enjoy fresh, affordable cafe-quality coffee at home. Marea uses coffee to connect people through collaboration. Every bean they produce is hand-roasted in small batches to ensure customers receive the freshest and highest-quality coffee they can deliver. Their motto is to never settle and always enjoy the ritual of drinking coffee.
Ryan Woldt is the founder of Roast! West Coast, a coffee newsletter that is the home of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. He fell in love with the community and stories of coffee while dreaming of being allowed to pull an espresso at Coffee Cycle Roasting in San Diego, CA. With R!WC, he shares the stories of coffee professionals as they explore the entrepreneurship, creativity, passion, science, and innovation found in the expansive world of coffee.
IMPORTANT LINKS
TO BUY: https://mareacoffee.com/collections/shop/products/roast-west-coast-collab
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. and their successes with the new Roastar Design Lab.
Help keep us caffeinated by buying one of our collab coffees. Thanks for all your support.
Thanks for reading Roast! West Coast. Cool people share. Please be cool.
Roast! West Coast Collabs with Coffee Cycle Roasting in San Diego, CA.
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COFFEE CYCLE ROASTING DEVELOPS THE COFFEE SENSEI EDITION BLEND COFFEE WITH ROAST! WEST COAST.
Coffee Sensei is a blend of Sumatra and Colombia beans, and available now on www.coffeecycleroasting.com.
Thursday, July 17th, 2025
San Diego, CA—Coffee Cycle Roasting has partnered with the Roast! West Coast coffee network for Coffee Sensei—one in a series of small business roaster collabs meant to uplift the community aspect of coffee and promote cooperation among roasters.
Editor’s note: The audio above is from one of our earlier Coffee Smarter Episodes featuring Chris O’Brien, Coffee Sensei.
Your order will be roasted fresh on the Monday following your order! Coffees are shipped ASAP after roasting to ensure you receive the freshest possible roast.
Coffee Sensei is a collaborative effort between Coffee Cycle Roasting, helmed by Chris O'Brien, and Ryan Woldt, the founder of the Roast! West Coast newsletter and host of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. These two friends have been collaborating since the early days of Chris' Pacific Beach cafe opening, where Ryan was his first barista employee, business advisor, and creative influence.
Chris isn’t just Ryan’s Coffee Sensei. He shares his knowledge widely.
Since the beginning of the Coffee Smarter podcast, Chris has appeared as an expert on the show, whom Ryan affectionately refers to as his "Coffee Sensei." This coffee serves as a tribute to this long-standing creative and collaborative partnership.
"When I asked Chris if he'd teach me coffee, I didn't realize he knew what he was doing. Turns out I stumbled onto one of the great coffee minds in our community," said Ryan Woldt. "He was opening his first cafe and offered a trade—come work as a part-time Coffee Cycle barista, and I'll teach you on the job while learning how to manage employees. I couldn't turn it down. Very quickly, one morning a week turned into two, three, and sometimes even more. I spent a full year stoking my fire for coffee and the coffee community. That experience has directly led to my efforts with the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts."
When asked about the collaboration, Chris ruminated, "My relationship with Ryan over the years has had an incredible impact on the way I run my business and manage staff. More importantly, Ryan is possibly my greatest success! We started working together, and Ryan was a die-hard' diner coffee' drinker. He wouldn't believe me when I told him what different tasting notes could be present in coffee. Now, he has judged roasting competitions and promotes specialty coffee's growth and appreciation at a national and even international level. I like to think I really helped get him started on that path."
DESCRIPTION OF COFFEE SENSEI:
Coffee Sensei is a medium blend crafted from two coffee origins that were featured prominently on the Coffee Cycle menu in its early days—Colombia and Sumatra. The Colombia is a coffee that brings balance to the blend, with tasting notes of milk chocolate and caramel. The Sumatra adds a savory roundness and full body to make the cup truly satisfying. The Ethiopia Natural finishes the blend by contributing a hint of gentle acidity and sweetness.
These coffees create a blend where the disparate parts complement and enhance each other, much like Ryan and Chris's collaborative efforts. Fans of delicious coffee can order the Coffee Sensei Edition coffee blend at www.coffeecycleroasting.com.
When asked about future collaboration plans, the coffee roaster replied, "Hopefully, we go for a bike ride and end up drinking coffee somewhere in San Diego the next time he's [Ryan] in town!"
Roastar, Inc., a coffee packaging company based in Wausau, WI, provided the recycled packaging. The gusseted bag's all-HDPE film is store drop-off recyclable (#2) and has excellent moisture and oxygen barriers. Coffee Sensei is offered in a larger-than-normal size, allowing customers to fine-tune this coffee on their home brewing setup. Roastar packages are produced in Wisconsin.
The gusseted packaging was provide by Roastar, Inc., a Wisconsin-based packaging company, and presenting sponsor of Coffee Smarter and Coffee People.
Coffee Cycle Roasting is a roaster and cafe with locations in the Ocean Beach and Pacific Beach neighborhoods of San Diego, CA. Founder Chris O'Brien is a veteran coffee professional who honed his skills at Phoenix Roasters in the Midwest and then spent the better part of a decade serving the neighboring community at the original Bird Rock Coffee Roasters before launching Coffee Cycle. The core of the Coffee Cycle Roasting business is the community surrounding the shops that find themselves engaged in conversation over a cup of coffee day after day. They also offer wholesale and white-label coffee services for other local businesses and host numerous events at both locations.
Ryan Woldt is the founder of Roast! West Coast, a coffee newsletter that is the home of the Coffee People and Coffee Smarter podcasts. He fell in love with the community and stories of coffee while dreaming of being allowed to pull an espresso at Coffee Cycle Roasting. With R!WC, he shares the stories of coffee professionals as they explore the entrepreneurship, creativity, passion, science, and innovation found in the expansive world of coffee.
The Pacific Beach location of Coffee Cycle is where it all began.
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. and our friend Nick Schmitt who is YouTube coffee famous.
Guest: Jillian Quint, Deltina Coffee Roasters Based: Oceano and San Luis Obispo, CA Online: www.deltinacoffeeroasters.com • @deltinacoffee What they order: Oat milk cappuccino
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
The second location of Deltina Coffee Roasters has a different vibe from the original roasting facility. It is located across from Cal-Poly, where Jillian attended university (and, dare I say, possibly partied a time or two nearby). It is designed to be the kind of cafe that encourages lollygagging…er…I mean studying.
The ceilings are high and white. There is seating for casual lounging, solo studying, and long tables for groups. Soft pop music wafted over the patrons—loud enough to hear but not so loud you couldn’t pop on a pair of headphones. I arrived early and returned to my car to grab a laptop because it felt like the kind of environment conducive to getting a few pages written.
It is a happy, open space at a time when we need more happy spaces. At least I do. I arrived at the cafe fresh from visiting one of my own. I was camping along the California coast, which always takes a pleasant emotional toll on me. My heart and brain are arguing over the value of gratitude versus melancholy. The heavy waves were as hypnotic as the tall, waving grasses leading off into the woods high up on the hillsides.
If I arrived raw from my brush with nature, Jillian showed up with a refreshing openness and willingness to share. We cover a lot in a short period and then some. We spoke for another hour off-camera. She is thoughtful, well-spoken, and willing to engage even when the conversation veers off the rails.*
Jillian Quint and Ryan Woldt during the recording of Coffee People.
Thanks for reading Roast! West Coast! This post is public so feel free to share it.
Deltina Coffee’s new location is a happy, open space.
The business was originally named Quintessa before being rebranded as Deltina Coffee Roasters. The name is a nod to one of the original names considered for the Oceano community, culled from a list dating back to 1892. Deltina is a reference where to the river delta formed between Pismo Beach and Oceano. A river delta creates an important ecological triangle where a faster-moving body of water meets a slower-moving one, like the river leading into an ocean or lake. That connecting point often forms a triangular shape mimicking the letter d or delta in the Greek alphabet. The cafe is also a place where two (or more) people meet, although the speeds at which they engage may not be as relevant.
Building community in a small town offers many challenges. None is greater than having the community begin to trust you. Communing with the businesses nearby was the first start for the Quints to make inroads into both Oceano and SLOE. The second key component was providing a product and service of a caliber that their new customers appreciate.
I clearly don’t understand how kids and/or parenting work, but I endorse Jillian’s point that adding a business to the family is like adding a child. It requires constant attention and nurturing to create foundational growth. The smart decisions for the business are not always smart decisions for the persons running the business. There is the straightforward profit/loss survival that works in tandem, or in direct opposition, with the emotional needs of the owners, employees, and customers.
Like it or not, the impacts on hospitality from the COVID-19 pandemic era are still with us. That time impacted how businesses are run and what tools are available to business owners and shifted the collective consumer audience’s decision-making when making buying choices. I don’t see that going away even if, as a community, we are not requiring masks or arguing about local and national pandemic policy. Many coffee shops, in particular, learned how to do more with less. Customers became much more aware of the supply chain impacts affecting local businesses. Both became more discerning with how and where they were spending their money.
According to Jillian, trusting your business (and life) partner is the key. It is the fundamental step in having real conversations about the business. Jillian and Jack have different working styles but work at maintaining bigger shared goals. One challenge is retaining awareness that those goals will evolve over time and creating space to make sure they are still on the same page.
Small businesses evolve. They install new syrup recipes, updating pos system, add to the roasting options, updating designs. There is a continuum of details that get shaped over time. Growth is part of that, but not the only goal. Sometimes, growth is about refining the space and processes that already exist.
*Most of my conversations quickly go off the rails!
IN CASE YOU MISSSED IT
Listen to our interview with Jillian’s husband and Deltina Coffee Roasters CoFounder Jack Quint on Spotify.
Deltina specializes in small-batch, organic specialty coffees. Our beans are mindfully sourced from traditional, sustainable farms located all over the world. All coffees are roasted on-site in small batches, allowing for consistent and precise flavor. • deltinacoffeeroasters.com
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. and our friend Nick Schmitt who is YouTube coffee famous.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
We finally got all our bikes in a row. Coffee Sensei is a nod to my coffee origin story as the first barista hired at Coffee Cycle Roasting. The conversations between Chris and I on the slow mornings in the first days directly led to Roast! West Coast.
The coffee is a blend of Colombia, Ethiopia, and Sumatra (Indonesia) coffees. Each have a special place in the timeline of our friendship and me falling down the specialty coffee rabbit-hole. There is a special Easter egg on the package as nod to the very first time Chris made me drink Ethiopia coffees. Like many others, it changed my life for the better.
Coffee Sensei is a medium blend crafted from two coffee origins that were featured prominently on the Coffee Cycle menu in its early days—Colombia and Sumatra. The Colombia is a coffee that brings balance to the blend, with tasting notes of milk chocolate and caramel. The Sumatra adds a savory roundness and full body to make the cup truly satisfying. The Ethiopia Natural finishes the blend by contributing a hint of gentle acidity and sweetness.
Guest: Chadwick Harman, Regent Coffee Based: Los Angeles, CA Online: www.regentcoffee.com • @regentcoffee What he orders: A cortado, and occasionally, a spicy latte.
The Coffee People Podcast took off in early June on our first-ever* Free Coffee Tour. We visited coffee shops and roasters along a meandering route from San Diego to Portland, OR, as we traveled to Coffeefest. At each stop, we recorded an episode of Coffee People and (tried) to buy people a cup of coffee. Thank you for watching and enjoying good coffee. Don't forget to tip your baristas!
NOTES FROM THE SHOW
Los Angeles turned out to be an unusual place to try to buy people coffee. I posted up at Regent Coffee for several hours, and almost no one would let me buy them a cup of coffee. At one point, I made a little markerboard sign that said, “Free Coffee for Nice People.”
More than one person looked at it and said, paraphrasing, “I’m not a nice person,” and walked through the door to buy their own coffee. I’d argue that wanting to buy your own coffee and support the local coffee shop makes you a nice person. Right?
Regardless, a bearded man offering to buy you a drink doesn’t go very far on York BLVD! It was the first of many lessons I learned from the tour. I managed to make a few new friends, including a pleasant actor who did let me buy their coffee and a cute dog. Still felt like a win.
The menu board at Regent Coffee on York BLVD.
Shout out to Regent Coffee Founder and Owner Leon Nie for recommending I chat with Chadwick from the Regent Coffee leadership team. Chadwick is a coffee person and also a creative. He’s a producer, writer, and filmmaker whose skills in people and production management happen to pair very well with coffee roaster operations.
The coffee shop–as a concept–is a messy, loud place. So is this show. With this tour, I’m breaking free from the booth,** getting myself into the mix with the people, and challenging myself with technical skills I’ve long been afraid to take on. Chadwick and I chatted on a bench in front of the shop next to a fairly York Boulevard.
Chadwick learned to make coffee at a very young age because if the coffee wasn’t made on Christmas morning, he couldn’t open presents. Young Chadwick took matters into his own hands.
Coffee shops and bars are community hubs. The people who frequent them care about the other people who spend time in those walls. The why doesn’t seem to be as important as the willingness to connect.
What jobs are available to young people now? Please don’t say Influencer! I didn’t particularly want to be working as a teenager instead of hanging out with my friends or watching movies, but in retrospect, I learned many essential life skills. More than basic chores and handling money, I also learned how to talk to people, read a situation, and manage stressful interactions.
Trusting is a skill. As a manager, trusting employees is an even bigger challenge, but not trusting them is a reflection of your willingness to trust your own hiring decisions and ability to train. Creating systems and repetition builds trust over time.
The relationship between baristas and their customers is weirdly intimate. Regent’s customers are bringing baby clothes in for Chadwick’s growing family. He shares bits and pieces of himself with the customers who come through the doors as they do with him. The back and forth creates a bridge of sorts where the line between human and business is blurred.
Advice for Coffee People: Don’t be a gatekeeper. Chadwick aims to offer people space to enjoy what they enjoy in coffee, and to do so the way they want it. We all have access (in theory) to the equipment and beans that make good coffee. The coffee shop has to be the place where you feel something in a way that can’t be replicated at home.
The barrel-aged coffee was ridiculously good. I say that as someone with a long history of not being an appreciator of flavored coffee. This wasn’t the same as the packs found at the discount markets during the holidays. The intention shines through.
Using specialty grade, single-origin coffee beans that pair perfectly with whiskey aromas. We use our own American oak barrels and whiskey to precisely control the seasoning and aging of the beans. This ensures the ideal strength of the whiskey tone, adding a subtle, long-lasting note that enhances, without overpowering, the coffee profile. Try our barrel-aged cold brew for a unique experience. • regentcoffee.com
He’s made some stuff. Like this film festival short.
I’ve also dabbled in making shorts. We’re working on one right now with our friends at Field Theory Media and Black Rabbit Service. Slowly working on it anyway. Interested in helping us produce a film that touches on coffee and needs a new title? Check it out here.
Please use these links. You’ll be getting a great gear AND supporting Roast! West Coast. Some links below enable us to generate some affiliate revenue. As always, we don’t partner with brands we don’t use, coffee we don’t drink, or strongly recommend.
Shout out to our Presenting Sponsor Roastar, Inc. Check out their Design Lab. Create your own custom packaging for your brand, event, or just because it’s fun.
We meet cool people. We collab on great coffees. FYI: we’re not generally allowed to touch the roasting machines. The experts do that! Current Collabs:
