Kevin approached us during the chaos of 2020, in our nearly empty cafe. We usually turn away most sales professionals that walk in our doors, but for whatever reason, we decided to hear him out that day. He told us his company would both educate us and had equipment for us to use. Our journey into the specialty-coffee world had often kindled the desire to take up roasting someday, but the cost of entry and the lack of education deterred us, especially during the pandemic. Yet, here was this company offering to remove all those barriers so we could entertain what we thought was a far-off pipedream. Our objectives were to learn, expand and save. We wanted to absorb as much knowledge as we could from their classes so we could distinguish ourselves through well sourced and roasted coffee. Additionally, it was hard to compete with coffee shops that did their own roasting as they were able to save so much money by producing their own roasted coffee. Being able to roast ourselves, gave us an edge because we would begin gaining 20% or more profit on all of our coffee. Roasting coffee was made very accessible to us. Between upfront education and continued support, roasting was able to become an integral part of our company’s identity. First Crack has helped us exponentially increase the quality of our coffee and our customer response has been overwhelmingly enthusiastic about the changes. When people buy coffee from us now, they’re buying a piece of us to take home with them. More than ever before, people feel like they’re a part of our story and our culture: one of curiosity and community.
