From the desk of the Roaster In Chief:
One of the disadvantages of being a small roasting operation is that I don't get the price breaks on raw coffee that some of the larger companies negotiate. Everything is smaller scale, label and packaging costs and in these online days, shipping costs. It would be tempting to offset that with buying the cheapest raw coffee beans out there to pad the bottom line. But I won't do that - I buy my raw materials and pay the price I pay because I can see something of the farms that produce them and the people who work very hard to make a living for their family and community, For me "Brazil" is not a single origin.
Whilst technically coffee is a commodity, it is an agricultural product. Variations in climate, seasonal patterns or any other number of factors can change the raw bean in subtle ways and thus in the cup. Which is why the larger coffee suppliers supply to wholesale as a blend, which they alter as needed to maintain the same "standard taste". Which is fine if you like drinking the exact same coffee, day in day out, week in week out.
I also roast in small batches to avoid building up a stockpile which could sit around for a year before ending up on the store shelves. Notice how some bags of coffee have a "best before" label but no roast date ?
Every batch I roast, I will sample before packaging. Due to the roasting process, just like cooking a steak, there may be variations in the final taste even for the same bean. I recently threw out a batch because although it looked good on paper and nothing obvious in my process had changed, I felt the coffee was unworthy of passing along.
Long story short - I do everything I can to bring the best out of the coffee I sell. If I haven't met those expectations, I would ask you to contact me so that I can make it right - either replacement or alternative or refund.
Thank you for your business.
Stuart
