Growing and Evolving

When we start a coffee business, the hope is to grow and evolve over time.  Sometimes, a buisness can grow too fast and out-pace the buisness’s evolution.   But often, evolution and change lead to growth.   

My experience with @startupsandiego a few weeks ago got me thinking about the origin story for Bird Rock Coffee Roasters and I came across this picture featuring two integral team members Cassidy and Bryn from the very early days.  This picture was taken in 2007 about 8 or 9 months after opening our coffee shop on La Jolla Blvd which was about five years from BRCR’s birth.

At first I didn't take in the whole picture but then I began to notice a few things: the huge stack of coffee cups next to the register, the way-to-many Monin syrups against the back wall, the over-roasted espresso in the hopper, massive list of menu items  (and the prices  — under $3 for a latte!) all super un-hip in the world of Specialty Coffee.

What was I thinking??

Well, I was thinking that in order to survive we needed to get the Starbucks customers from the well-established Starbucks across the street at a time when Starbucks was pillaging it’s way into every city, town and village in the USA.   The way to do that, I surmised, was to offer those customer the “same” thing they were getting at Starbucks and then woo them long-term with beautiful single origin beans roasted to perfection.   

We grew at a pretty good clip during that first year but not for the reasons I assumed we would.  You see, we were not very good at being Starbucks.  Our sweet drinks were just sweet, not interesting, our blended drinks were inconsistent at best and usually watery messes, and our processes and work flow left much to be desired.

While we were not good at the Starbucks stuff, we were very good at our core business: brewing great coffee, sourcing great coffee, and roasting the coffee how it was supposed to be roasted.    Soon after this picture was taken we evolved by elimination.  We started to eliminate everything that was outside of BRCRs original mission.

Soon, the flavorings were trashed ( Except for artisan/local chocolate for a mocha, and two other ingredients for popular  “Sugar Daddy” and “Trophy Wife” (drinks people liked saying out loud perhaps more than the actual drinks themselves.)    And by the end of Year One, we evolved to be much more in line with typical “Third Wave” coffee shops in the Bay Area of the early 2000.   Pour-over coffee became a real draw for us and our espresso became far more palatable as a straight shot.  And, yes, our growth rate increased dramatically.    

We never stopped evolving or remodeling or trying to make things even better for our employees, our customers, and certainly our farming partners who were the cornerstone of our business model.   We got through these awkward early days because we never stopped evolving while while focusing on who we were and what we were about.

Getting into the coffee buisness is relatively easy and usually a lot cheaper than building out a restaurant.  But, a coffee business is notoriously difficult to sustain.  So, it is a scary thing to start a coffee business and sometimes even scarier to change when things might not be going as planned, “What if I make things worse?”

But that is really why Patton Coffee Consulting exists.  We want to be a resource for you that can make things a little easier and take some of the fear our of going forward.  Our goal with this project is to offer some help and/or guidance on your coffee journey.  If you want to improve as a coffee roaster, excel as a coffee taster, or if you just want to sit down and bounce some ideas around, reach out and let us know.  We are here help.