Read on to see Part 2 of the recent interview from CanvasRebel, an online pursuit of storytelling to share the perspectives of creatives and entrepreneurs.
PART 2:
Tony , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
Photo Credit: Jonathan Cooper
My wife and I love coffee, we always have. 20 years ago I used to frequent the coffee shop that she was a barista at, to “get my daily coffee”. When dating, we would get coffee with our dessert, never wine. It is a comfort we have always shared. We both became passionate teachers, fueled by coffee, and really loved our life. Well, everything except for the pay. 2 kids in daycare, student loans, a mortgage and we would see our paychecks gone as quickly as they came in. We relished the once a month date night where we could treat ourselves to a meal out at a restaurant.
I began roasting coffee as a hobby after seeing on Youtube that you can roast coffee in a popcorn air popper. It was fascinating! We quickly found that others were interested in this Homemade coffee experiment, so we began sharing with others, then our church, then a co-working space, before realizing that this is something that we really would like to do!
Photo Credit: Jonathan Cooper
So, based in the Enderly Park neighborhood where we lived, we formed Enderly Coffee Company: a coffee roasting company seeking to make a positive impact on its neighborhood and world. We are a wholesale roaster focusing on supporting businesses with coffee consultation, equipment, training, planning, etc. all while sourcing and roasting some really great specialty coffee. I knocked on doors, a LOT of doors, looking for anyone interested in trying our coffee (both residential & commercial). I set up a coffee bar on a folding table at events, a LOT of events, looking to tell anyone interested about our company.
So over the past 11 years we have provided homes & businesses with a local, caffeinated product that is ethically sourced and from an ethically run company. We are proud that we have grown one of Charlotte’s premiere coffee roasting companies by being authentically us, all by bootstrapping. Since launching, we have launched a cafe in our neighborhood, grown our local distribution around our region, and gone from a backyard hobby to selling through more than 650 grocery stores up and down the east coast. But what we are most proud of is the way we have done it. We treat our staff really well, pay them well, create benefits for them, etc. We have built direct relationships with a few farmers and have grown our purchasing from them consistently over the years, paying a fair price and providing sustainability to their community as well as ours.
My wife and I still love coffee, we always will. 20 years later we now own a coffee shop & roasting company, have 4 kids, and are so very thankful everyday for the comfort the coffee still provides. At our age we may not get coffee with our dessert anymore (there is no way we would ever fall asleep), but we are so very grateful that households around America are finding the same comfort we have always gotten from this simple product.
