37: Rich’s Coffee Manifesto- His Principles and What Drives Him

Intro:
Hey, you’re drinking house coffee – unfiltered conversations brewed at the intersection of real estate life and coffee shop service. We’re Maggie and Rich – local business owners and friends sharing stories and welcoming you to pull up a chair with us. The door’s always open. Let us pour you a cup.

Maggie:
Hello friends, welcome back welcome to what is it episode 30 of season 2. Yeah episode 37 and total if you’ve been counting total numbers. Yeah. We’re excited to be back today hot on the heels of eclectic Grandpa. Yeah. Today, that was fun. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, what have you been listening to Hey, I’m glad you asked so there’s this song. you know, do you ever like listen to a lyric and you’re like I feel called out. He sure, you know. So there’s this lyrics on the song is trying to do but sure. Yeah. I’ll tell you the name of the artist and everything, but the lyric I’ll tell you first is. You could give an aspirin the headache of its life Wow. And I’m just like yeah. that is That’s me. Thanks week. It does. The songs called turn by the Wombats and it’s just a really good song. is the whole nature of the song in general like yeah, the course goes I like the way your brain works and it’s just it’s just a song about. like thoughts and and stuff and cool. Like wow. Yeah, that is That’s definitely me this week. So if you haven’t heard it, you should just listen to it. I’ll have to check it out long week long week. Happy Friday. Yeah, thanks. Yeah, me too. But what have you been listening to? Well something I heard something I found myself listening to lately kind of revisit. I forgot this guy existed and actually I was curious to know if you knew about him, Matt d’avella. Oh, yeah. Have you heard of him? Oh, yeah. Minimalist Love on YouTube videos. I wondered I was like, huh? I wonder if Maggie knows this guy I do. Yeah, so he was the reason I know like an atomic habits style of Life. Yeah, minimalism that resonates that sounds right. His videos are super creative. Yeah. So he doesn’t put out a lot these days because he’s got a kid and family doing all kinds of stuff. He’s like, he’s living the minimalist life, right and all so it was interesting because I did watch a few of the more recent videos and he was talking about how he basically got burnt out on the whole process because what happened was he got super popular? And then he hired a bunch of Staff heard. It’s a team and then it was basically became less doing what he enjoyed doing. And doing it the way he enjoyed doing it to become a like pressure to perform pressure to put out these things. He wasn’t in control full control of the creative process anymore because he was managing people more than like doing the editing and he was talking about you know, editing is the tedious part that you hire people to do, but then he was like, but actually the editing was the part. I would enjoyed that made it where I could really feel like I was putting myself into it. And so, you know, he fired the staff and stepped back from things and some of his more recent videos, too are like more features his wife more. But it just reminded me of like this minimalist thing and I just made me think of you because of how I felt like a resonated with where you yeah come from. So yeah, I I dig his videos. That’s a validate. Yeah. The reason I even know about him. The first place is maybe I would have found it by now just being in being on YouTube, but Cotton Cloud podcast, I reference frequently Chris Baca and Matt were our Pals. Of course. So they’ve been on each other’s pod had been on each other podcast. There’s probably pretty sure there’s a if there’s not a cat in Cloud episode with Matt on it, then there’s a Chris Baca real Chris Baka YouTube video with Matt in its that makes either way because Chris for a long time how his own kind of YouTube channel and that’s probably where they connected and that YouTube space and just minimalism sure in those values and things like that. Chris is kind of Chris is kind of that zone as well. So yeah, so I don’t know even know how I got on that but I just I found it recently and maybe it was on I think it was a suggested video on YouTube after watching something else. He’s video titles are like a tiny bit clickbait, right? But they’re like actually like worth watching. so that’s why he’s building the business here like I tried cold showers for 30 days. Yeah, I tried building up at 4 a.m. For 30 days. Yeah, I watch both of us all these like something like with coffee. He tried for 30 days. He does all these right, um videos, right? So it was a coffee it was and that was a little bit more where the crossover was too. He was kind of into that specialty coffee space for for a minute. So for years ago, yeah. So cool. Yeah, he’s so yeah, he has heard that recently and then I really like you want to hear your thoughts this up and he always has like good they’re entertaining. They’re these they’re like, they’re very Informative but in entertaining anyway like the way he sort of semi Acts. in in them like a sit down, but then he’ll do these like This b-roll. That’s like really funny. Yeah. Which there’s a lot of talent that’s that’s why he has you know, the viewership that yes, shut up cool. So easy to take for granted but like the best video if you if you pay attention to the best videos, there’s so much like b-roll happening. Yes. Yes. I’m not good to be real. That’s why I make 0 videos. And non-existent real content. I’ve been trying to take more videos of myself staging because it’s it’s pretty difficult to stop what you’re doing set up the camera and like Do what you’re doing, but I know it will be helpful in in the grand scheme of things. So. in a house, I just staged recently which and this episode is about you today. We’re not gonna like I’m not going anywhere take like take it over but and the house I just staged recently was over 4500 square feet. It was the largest house I’ve ever stayed. That’s intense. It was a child. So it was but it was so much fun and I have a new team member. So I want to give a shout out to Kristen who is on my team now. So me and Joe and Kristen are now part of the welcome home coat team. That’s awesome. Welcome home team. Welcome home Cole the welcome home. Coexisting is joined in more of a real estate role. She will be working. She has a real estate license and she is going to take on some of the buyers agent responsibilities so that it can free up my time a little bit more to focus on listing houses and the staging part of my business. That’s cool. Yeah. So you you work for a firm? Um, I am I am a contract. So like I guess I have my license with a firm, but I’m I’m not employed by a firm. But other people who do your job who are employed by a friend know everyone would be everyone who’s a real estate independent is an independent contractor, okay. So you’re engaged with this firm, but now you have your own team. Yes of people helping you do the work that you do this. I’m still at Gambler Realty, right? But I’m now like the welcome home team at gabler Realty cool. Yeah. Just so the people can understand. Yes, just so it’s easier to understand sick. That’s yeah, it’s been it’s been real. Yeah, does she listen to the podcast? I don’t know. She better start. You better Kristen gosh, okay. Sometimes and he like well text me and he’ll get a kick out of what we’ve said. Yeah, that’s fine. I know I get those texts sometimes too from Palace. Yeah. So today’s episode on the menu. It’s the manifesto on the menu dude. Yeah, fresh off of listening to the last episode we did where it was, you know coffee. Yeah focused and we had TJ in the studio with us, which shout out to him for making that work doing the three-way audio is a little gnarly. So if you notice that we we missed a week in the mix there. Yes, that’s an audio issues. But we figured yeah, we’re getting back into the swing of things with us season 2. So thanks for looking out for that and hopefully finding it and so we talked coffee. Yeah, we went back and forth. We had a healthy dialogue banter great dancer and you don’t even hear the first 15 minutes the bench that we cut out. So I mean, yeah, you know, it was hot and so I just listened to that this morning a little refresher and I’m excited because because I realized in that episode that’s that it’s it’s it’s time it’s time to dig in. It’s time for the people who understand where I’m coming from. Okay, we’re here fully. All right, we have some character assassination that went on but I was able I think to defend myself and kind of reclaim my good name. And you know the people know I’m not a coffee snob hopefully. You are a coffee, but I’m a principal person Technic. I’m not sure technically or whatever technical about coffee. All I meant to say all I said was that there are technical standards. Taste is subjective. But there are technical. Objective standards and those things it’s a both in both those things. I just a perfect example. It’s like the difference between Gourmet cheese and cheese. Whiz. That yeah, that’s an example. They’re both cheese or are they don’t actually know if she’s pasteurized process cheese products. Yeah, but it’s yummy. It’s yummy. All right, so you can have a taste for both right you can have a taste for Gourmet sharp extra sharp. Cheese or whatever else a town stuff or you can spray any straight into the straight in your mouth right from the button on some Reds. Yeah, that’s a way to think about coffee. That was kind of very simplistic way. So but here’s the deal. All right. Let me give a little backstory here today. You’re gonna hear my Manifesto are gonna read the whole thing. I’m gonna read the manifesto. Okay, and you guys are gonna have to bear with us because it’s a little wordy I admit but we’re gonna we’re gonna we’re gonna read the manifesto and then we’re gonna talk through the manifesto, okay? We’re gonna we’re gonna basically read through it and then we’re gonna break it apart. We’re gonna talk through it together. Okay. So here’s why I have a Manifesto. There was a time early last year not quite a year ago. Call April when I was in talks with Fisher Ferry General Store you all know by now if you’ve listened to pass up so that I spent seven months last year managing the cafe over at a different business was working just just a general working like working the food side of that business and helping with the coffee component and helping not just coffee. I mean I was I was the manager I was to be the manager of like the cafe side of things which included a coffee bar right that we made a story called coffee bar, but there was other things in the mix, so as I was in conversation with the owner of that business to figure out what that would look like because at first it wasn’t for me to just be a manager over there was for a story to potentially buy the cafe. Part portion of the business and like rent that space and make it a full-on, you know storied Cafe kind of thing. So that was like what we were discussing and that took that what that could look like took a lot of forms in terms of our conversation over those several months because we started talking in March. I didn’t start working there until June so through those three months. Well, I guess April May we were mostly talking and in that time early April early April we went to the specialty coffee Expo in Portland last year as we do and I’m going to this here. No, I don’t think so money and it’s in Chicago and it’s just like give me a whole thing. We can’t take all of her anymore like this. We’re not going we’re not going to need him their pants by now, but Yeah, we were able to take all last year. So we just we can make it work one last time at least at least out there when it comes back around to Boston. Yeah, we’ll drive there again, so Hot on the heels of specialty coffee Expo, right which is like coffee nerdcon. It’s coffee con for car. You know, it’s Comic Con for coffee nurse. Okay. So we Came out of that. I was talking I was thinking about like doing this what it would look like to do this other Cafe situation and I just I came to this place inside of myself where I was like, okay, what? Why do I feel so strongly about coffee and what makes me so passionate about it. And and what does it mean like to be in coffee and I just got I was like thinking like like why do I do it the way I do it why does story exists and why do we do coffee the way we do and I kind of like started to write a wrote it down. I kind of started writing this diet right as it were and I didn’t like really. The stream of conscious. Yeah, exactly. It’s kind of a rough draft. Like I didn’t go back and edit it. This is kind of how the words came out but as but reading through it, it’s more coherent although again. Where do you might have to Define some things but like it’s pretty cool Herod. First for a stream of Consciousness. I was like, this is cool. And then I titled it man. That’s my coffee Manifesto. Here, so let us let us dig in. Should I read it show read it all like dramatically. Probably not probably not. All right. So here we go. I dated April 203. I have just a full disclosure. I have read through it. You have read this you have read it slash we read through before. Yes, but I I’m gonna be taking notes as I listen to see if anything like sticks out to me that before all right. I have been thinking about what drives me. It’s coffee to be sure but it’s more than quote coffee in some abstract sense rather its specific Notions that I personally maintained regarding the coffee experience. These are principled Notions that I would be disingenuous to deny or counteract. I say quote coffee experience on quote because I believe coffee should provide an experience one that is first satisfying to the expectations that one brings to having a coffee in parentheses the opposite of an unpleasant or quote unquote bad cup of coffee and second rooted in an overall Hospitality driven delivery that aims to give the best feeling possible through thoughtful intentional behaviors along with the coffee product itself. A third feature might be added to these about which I am. as equally passionate as the first two that is that a coffee produced to today’s modern standards can in itself be a sensational exceptional experience. Today’s approach to Coffee allows for so much to be offered through the process of proper roast development and extraction. Many features of a coffee drinking experience that would defy and exceed expectations. So I couldn’t tell with the punctuation was on that. Oh, it’s sorry, okay. Many features of a coffee drinking experience that would defy and exceed expectations. People don’t expect the flavors from coffee that can be unlocked by this modern mindful approach. Providing coffee experience is in line with these principles will in turn increase the perceived value of the coffee product and the accompanying experience. This is good for one’s overall business when committed to providing these things, but it will have the added benefit of helping Elevate the broader standard of expectation within culture around coffee products and experiences. I need to work in line with these principles. And that’s the end. My Manifesto everybody. All right. I do have the draft of a third paragraph. Fourth paragraph, but I don’t know where I was going with that and it doesn’t it doesn’t it’s not finished. It’s not a complete sense. So we will leave that out because it’s not relevant I think. I think I’m making enough of a point here and talk about where I’m coming from. That this kind of stands alone. So what what are the bullet points like give me three bullet points first. I’m going to say this if you heard my episode our episode from a couple weeks back on specialty coffee at home. We’re talking if you heard that episode. That everything I just read. Well, hopefully like yeah, you have the contacts for it. You have the contact everything. I said that episode unrehearsed and not with like this in mind to read this completely Echoes where I was going from in that episode having listened back to it. So that’s another reason why I said it too. Yeah, so either either listen to this episode and then go back and listen to that one or Pause right now and go listen to that one and then come back either way. They kind of like these things are in me. They’re like, they’re like my values and this was me trying to express them and so they came out in that episode which was cool because that kind of that episode kind of like came out of nowhere and then they’re right here on paper at the same time. Okay bullet points. three Okay. I have coffee should provide an experience that was gonna be my first one was the like the experience of coffee. The experience of coffee should be above General expectations for what someone expects to get when they order a cup of coffee? Okay, but like you have to Define what people expect they expect a couple with dark liquid in it. Right, so you think about that? No, just kidding that watered down. Water like a watered down version. What do you mean? um No, I mean that they expect coffee. They expect something that’s going to be. They okay. If you order a cup of coffee, I mean, here’s the thing. Here’s the thing. It depends on if you were a cup of coffee. Would you be yeah, right? Okay. All right. Hold on. I say coffee experience. I believe coffee should provide an experience one that is first satisfying to the expectations that one brings to having a coffee. It feels a little broad to me. I Define it in this way that I Define it in terms of the being the opposite of an unpleasant. or Bad cup of coffee. Okay, most of us have had a bad cup of coffee whether it was And that can be defined by probably like the unpleasant characteristics of bitterness bitter maybe burned flavors, you know, think about like the diner coffee or the gas station coffee is just sitting on the pot too long stale coffee taste. Wooden or cardboard just like no Fleet know like Pleasant flavors to it. Okay. So those could be things or flip side could be too acidic could be weak could be watery. That’s my pet. Peeve of coffee is like when it’s yeah super weak and you could see the bottom of the cup from like they pour it down here like this isn’t coffee. Yeah, so so that is I said one that is first satisfying to the expectations. The one bringing us to have a cup. So my point is like you expect to get something you’re going to enjoy. When you go to when you order a coffee doesn’t matter what it is if you order a drip coffee because you like drip coffee you expect that to be. you know how have like it has to be drinkable and if you get a lot, hey, you expect it to have a nice milk texture and like you expect to be able to take the coffee and the and the milk or and the flavor. Yeah, so if my further clarification question is Dip you’re talking about the coffee for all intense purposes a naked cup of coffee without any like milk or sugar or anything added. I don’t mean to say that no. Oh I said coffee experience to broadly. I’m trying to broadly describe when you when you walk into a story coffee. You know that you want to order a coffee beverage off of a menu. And you expect that beverage. For for many different reasons you expect that beverage to come out a certain way. Mm-hmm. It’s probably either you expect it from story to come out how a story makes it because you’ve had it from us before or you go to Duncan you get a caramel macchiato and you ordered out of my shop and then you expect to get you know what I mean. So it’s it might be the culmination the combination of like experiences you’ve had in other coffee places quote unquote, whether it’s independent shops or chains or whatever. If it’s got the same name, you kind of have this category for it and you kind of know what to expect or if you’re just getting latte. You’ve had a lot of day before you come to story like hey, I like lattes. I think let me try that over here and you kind of have this sense of what a latte is going to be. It’s gonna be this Milky coffee beverage. Haha, you know, it’s gonna have the right temperature not too hot. It’s gonna have a sweetness to it. Not not bitter, you know, you’re gonna be able to taste everything in kind of like its own component parts, but also Blended well at least you hope right you hope for those things to be true. No one orders a coffee expecting a really gross bitter situ. And that is what you are defining us the coffee experience. Yeah. Yeah Yeahs at its base okay, but I go on to say I think I included in there that that you Better yet if you get more than a cup of coffee. To put it in different words write better yet if you go into a place and they’re extremely friendly. They walk you through that ordering process. They rooted in overall Hospitality. You heard it. You heard it right here as I read it out loud. Yes, exactly. So you want that experience of ordering that beverage and being served that beverage to be rooted in a to be like blanketed in this overall like a little feeling possible warm feeling. Their thoughtful intentional behaviors. Yeah along with the coffee product itself. Exactly exactly. I couldn’t have said about her myself. So from your fingertips the world so true so true. So a lot of what I mean, I actually put in here, right? So what we would need to do rather than be so picky. I’m not trying to be picky. No. No, I’m trying to be very what would be better to do is yes clarifies exactly what I mean it if something I did say in trying to explain something isn’t clear enough Notch then it’s maybe better to try to find that but but so I think we’re I think That’s why I like that. I wrote this. I like it because I like I was more thorough like I wrote this. I almost a year ago and then I kind of forgot about it and then I found it recently and I read it again. I was like, oh man, that was pretty okay, you know, like I I anticipated yeah, even for myself I try to explain exactly what I’m meant in the most concise way when I was just stream of Consciousness seeing this thing. Yeah, okay. No, and you just yeah, you just we just basically answered your question by reading more. Yeah what I wrote people don’t expect the flavors from coffee that can be unlocked by this modern mindful approach. So this is a good bullet point probably so the first bullet point is coffee as an experience. Yeah coffee is an experience. Yeah, that’s probably one big bullet point right and that’s both the coffee product and the experience of getting a coffee products that can be really nice. both in the quality of the drink even to your subjective sense of taste what my point is it should meet or defy your expectations, right? Even though taste is subjective. There’s enough of a common sense of what is good and expected in coffee that we can run viable businesses based on creating this one version of this product. So there’s something we said for some objectiveness in the tape, but you know everyone you but the counter is like okay, I serve black coffee. I serve it like I brew it the right amount of coffee to the right amount of water at the right temperature. I serve it black will someone wants five sugars and three creams in it and someone else wants it black or they want just a hint. You know what I mean? So there are ways to approach that particular drink or someone wants a plane lots a versus someone wants a vanilla latte or a large versus a small because different ratios of things so point being though you get these broader categories and then you get the specific ways that people do it. Either way you have this overall sense of like your experience of going to get that particular product that you know and love or wants a love. And how it served to you. I used to say this some of my favorite places to get coffee because of the coffee is self because the product is going to be the best loss I could get. Or my least favorite place is to go get coffee. You said that in early episodes because the people were friendly they didn’t care about my name. I’d been there three years and never, you know, maybe they recognized me but they didn’t really acknowledge it. Yeah, and it’s like I want more which to point out more from everybody every time. Someone comes through that you don’t recognize you always double check to make sure you know their name and you’re like, oh, I don’t think we’ve met before. My name is Rich. What’s your name? And you’re you’re always making an effort. To remember people’s names even if they have been there before you’re like remind me of your name again and then like you you’re like, okay like you try to remember the name. Yeah, totally and or details about their yeah funny enough. Sometimes I’ll remember every detail about my conversation or interaction. I don’t like I just don’t worry your name. It’s like one thing that escaped me, but I remember your kids birthday. Yeah, you know, yeah, yeah. but yeah, thanks for noticing that and that’s the so now you hear you hear exactly what comes from one my experience was poor. in other places and then and then I believe that coffee is going to be better if you feel better when you get it and so I try to cry I want to craft that whole picture that whole experience so that not only the drink is precise, but also there’s The way we we serve it to you have some precision and intentionality is a better word to it as well. And then we try to teach our braces that as well and you know, I don’t know I think it I think it shows people it does show people notice and thanks so coffee as an experience. I say that’s one big bullet point and then we went on from there. That’s on the coffee product itself. A third feature might be added about which I was equally passionate as the first two that’s that a coffee produced. Okay. So this would be probably the bullet point. Number two is coffee to put it in the words. We put it before coffee deserves better. We deserve better. You deserve better coffee, right? So this is this line. A coffee produced to today’s modern standards can be Sensational exceptional experience. You can bullet it with that. And that’s to say that if you’re clued in so where coffee has gone in the last five years. You recognize that dude. We can roast a pretty freaking good cup of like pretty good being. Okay, and then if we use the right the right the right procedure in extracting AKA Brewing that coffee. Even if you got a missed your coffee at home in a worldly blade Grinder like you can still call me. I’ll get a pretty good. cup, like if you if you just treat it with some respect, you know, there’s things we can do and they’re not we talked about before it’s not like it doesn’t have to be a huge investment or or like the most fancy version of a tool like we can get we can get a pretty nice cup of coffee. If we if we do it right by utilizing some Modern centers and ends. the the opposite of it is like don’t just take coffee for granted. Don’t take for granted that you understand how Coffee Works which so many of us have always done or or do you know and so many even coffee shops and Coffee Roasters beloved places in our capital region. I was just talking with some people today about it, you know, if a shop opened in 1994, okay, they might have some specific ways of thinking about coffee and coffee roasting that a little outdated if they haven’t kept up with standards and in my humble opinion, they haven’t you know well and that’s that’s so that’s cool. That’s fine. There’s a place for that. But it’s going to fall short of expectations like mine. Yes. Yes. Because I deserves that because I know more like I you know, you don’t know what you don’t know, but I know and I know we can do better by that coffee. And the funny part is I am talking about a specific place right now, but I’m not going to name. It funny part is like I was I was hanging out with someone at the shop today. Shout out to my new friend Brittany who? Works in this place, and we We and hanging out at story today. I was a story I was working on this this friend came in who comes to story has been coming but I think with me being out of the office, I hadn’t met her yet today. I met her how there was working as well. And so she ends up sitting at the bar which is a dangerous place to sit, you know, so she hang out there for hours and we were talking and then Heather eventually left and then she was still hanging and we were talking about part of what time I was Coffee Culture coffee shops coffee roasting whatever so she works at this place and Um, we were having that conversation about like it’s just like I think there’s an old-school mentality They Don’t Really Care to invest in the process and this girl she’s really passionate about coffee. She wants to open her own coffee business. She wants to make she wants to approach coffee like we do similarly to how we do and and just with more precision and more care around and we were just commenting on like why don’t some people care about making it different especially when like your own Baristas your own people comment on this and know it could be better they want to be better. But but you like resist your efforts, you know, that’s a frustrating place to work. That’s a frustrating place to be and I said, yeah, I mean, it’s just the way people think about these things. I think part of its rooted in an old school mentality. Although I guess that business recently changed ownership. Okay within the last few years. But either way I even though the old owners. And now the new person even less so cares about like really did I probably been oh, yeah. Okay. Oh, yeah for sure if you’ve lived in this Capital Region for anybody time. No place I’m talking about right because that’s true of enough places. Yeah, you’re right. You’re asking yourself. Yeah, where is that? Because it could be anywhere could be anywhere. Yeah, the amount of places that care enough to do coffee kind of like the way we think about it. It’s a kind of want two hands. In the entire for 100 mile radius. All right, maybe not maybe 50 mile radius. But it’s not a lot. But why because it’s modern because it’s it’s new. It’s because we’ve we’ve you know by God’s grace we’ve experienced coffee on a different level one way, you know just it just came to us this way and this one place and you know, we and then something may just curious about how she is that coffee with nothing in it tastes like blueberries, you know. or or lemony or like now something like I don’t want to limit in my coffee, right? You know, so okay. That’s just like that a bad thing. No. No, those are like some of the like citrus flavor notes or whatever right suggestions of what am I remind you when you’re drinking it. That’s what that’s how I had to find a Flavor no. I like my fruit with fruit. Yeah, I don’t I’m not really one that has I don’t really enjoy. I want to make you some some we’ll make you some. It’s actually drawing a blank on which which coffees are known for the blueberry profile, but that’s wish gosh. No. They are they’re not known for a blueberry profile. They have they have blueberry a blueberry Brew. I haven’t tried it, but I’m saying is. my I’m not a fan of my Prue and coffee or fruit and chocolate or I just like Did we talk about chocolate? I think we might have in episode or did you and I just talked about chocolate. I don’t know. I probably said it before but like fruit and chocolate which and coffee or anything. Like what are you like a nuttier profile or just like the roast year? You like a darker kind of right? Yeah, I like it. So you get like those roasty toasty. Yes chocolatey Vibes, but without the freaking without the fruit. All right, that’s fine. That’s cool. That’s my I wasn’t my point is like we’re not talking about coffees that are artificially flavored though. My point is there are coffees that exists that just they’re so naturally Suites and like juicy that they come they remind you of like this to Wine in the episode. We did about DJ So when you when you have a coffee, that’s a quote black coffee what it reminds me. It tastes so much like will remind you of something so vividly outside of that but also has like coffee notes, you know, like like a A bitterness that is is like pertinent to Coffee it it’s it can be a really mind opening experience and a lot of people have experienced that that’s kind of like how they end up in a special coffee and I got a new pour overs because it’s like how you get these flavors and then it’s just becomes this like so the poor over is like Flavor often. Okay, pour overs are gonna be recommended for we said it last time. There’s different reasons. You might do a pour over for the ritual for the fun for the experimentation for the convenience. Depending on your scenario. But but also often for the way that it preserves the clarity or accentuates the flavors inherent to the coffee, depending on what your what Your Brewing. The story blend that you’ve no doubt because it was the only coffee we carried for the longest time. It was a blend of a Guatemalan dark roast and a Honduran light Rose and not to get it all this but is naturally processed Honduran let roast coffee which means that in the process of preparing that raw coffee before being roasted. A little bit of fruit is left on the seeds as it dries. And so it becomes it imparts like some fruit and more sweetness to that bean plus it’s light roast at which helps accentuate some of those flavors as well. So that’s a coffee that when I was playing with it to develop the story blend it. I was getting like like red berry type. Flavor profiles, you know, so I was thinking along lines of like dark cherry or or strawberry at first. So that’s why I would call that story blend when it was when I would Brew it right and so then adding the Guatemala which was a dark. Profile a darker profile a little more like just a little more bitter more ashy Miss to it. It created this this like chocolate dipped Cherry type vibe in my mind, you know and for me that was really nice and that worked very well as our story coffee for a long time and then we recently changed it for very reasons. But yeah this that’s all they’d say like we’re talking about right now is what is possible with a coffee? If it’s respected and treated sure right right, but so much had to happen for that to come to me and taste like cherries. I had to brew it, right. So I had to know a few things about how to do that. Okay check. Um. It had to be roasted well, which it was in the hands of crew so check and it had to be processed. Well, which it was it is because crew Only Stores is great coffee is that particular Honduran one is from a woman owned a woman owned co-op in Honduras. And this is true coffee k r u k. Are you crew in Saratoga Springs New York? So we’ve been partnered with them. We don’t roast coffee at story. We yeah currently purchase it wholesale from our local a local roster called crew. love their work always super consistent and yummy, and so We talked about the supply chain in coffee, and that’s that’s part of it. You know, we’re kind of and result you. Hope your braces gonna do justice to all the hands and like amount of work that went on to get that home comparison to this. Yeah, always. It’s kind of like because this is what helps me understand things better. And I feel like this might help our audience give it a whirl. So it’s kind of like brewed up. When yeah when you’re building a house and you want to make sure that all the elements of your construction are like perfect along the way or done structurally sound and so you you make sure that like the floor joists are Level you make sure that when you’re all the electrical lines are run properly in the plumbing is tilted such right so you don’t like get like a backup and you make sure that like with the finish work you want to make sure like when the drywall is up you and you have like the the taping and painting done. You want to put like you want to go halfway on the paint job because or even the taping or even the taping because that’s the finished work and it would make all the other work that you’ve done feel so far because oh the paint is done like smudgy or the seams of the drywall aren’t lined up properly. So they’re like cracking or there’s screw pops or whatever and so You don’t want to skimp on the finish work because it will make the all the other work and effort you did to put into it feel obsolete. Yeah. I don’t see why that comparison wouldn’t work. And you could kind of make the same point like you could cheap out on a house renovation. You could flip it. If you talk about that in the past, you could flip a house for cheap to a shoddy paying job crappy trim and like you’re just trying to flip that thing, you know, whether you sell it or are or rent it. Yeah, if you rent it, you’re like who cares they don’t care. You don’t mean quick between 10 minutes. Just knew. Yeah, first go to paint. like yeah, you could do skimpy work. Cheap work, you know, or you could have like something you take pride in. Yeah, so that’s gonna last you know, every now as we break down but but yes same principles. It’s like look like any products you can get a cheap version. or you can ask yourself what went into this what makes the difference, you know. So yeah, that’s a cool. That’s a cool way to think about it and so, you know to to just catch up to where we are here. It’s like Okay, we talked about coffee is experience. We were talking about coffee as a raw product and its potential for mind-blowing. Flavors and I think that’s true. You know, I was mostly talking about brewed coffee like straight up drip coffee. That’s so much is is true of what’s possible in that now, but it’s true and espresso as well when you brew espresso. I think that whole thing. In fact, I always celebrate Russell a lot more than drip coffee its story because we sell a lot more of it and espresso makes up the base of Almost every drink on a specialty, you know caught a specialty coffee shop menu lattes cappuccinos. Cortado macchiato like all these different drinks. they have a espresso as the coffee component and talk about something that gets taken for granted. If you think people just broke coffee without thinking about it. I mean Almost every Espresso Bar. And when I was talking about other place, you know, I was talking about them in terms of their roasting, but all in terms of their their their coffee service and like espresso service cycle with Brittany about that. so I just think for my my principles my purposes my Manifesto. Yeah, what I’m trying to say is like coffee. Has so much potential and we got to do I got to do right by it. It’s my job as a barista as a barista trainer as a coffee shop owner Espresso Bar operator person in the specialty representing specialty these soul and primary representative of the specialty coffee industry. I’m just kidding. I’m not that person. He did make that joke last week. You know, it’s on me. So like care sure. Yeah. So my points is that we have the technology. And the knowledge by in today’s modern. Economy in today’s modern world like you can get this knowledge for free. On YouTube on the internet just follow James Hoffman. Look up Chris Baca real Chris Baka. Look Lance Hedrick, dude. Oh boy your mind. Look up Morgan drinks coffee love her. Top four. Yeah, do I even have a fifth? I don’t know. Who would be fifth Scott rail look up Scott rail, if you looked up those five people and if you want a six check out Matt pirker. Okay, so so many That’s your top five or six coffee industry like standard errors for today Scott rails pretend primarily in the roasting. Realm James Hoffman. He’s a 2007 World barista champion freaking crushing it on YouTube though. He’s got videos on everything. You could think of he’s the one doing all the weird coffee science stuff. Okay. Purger owns a company called Barista hustle, and they’re all so deep into like coffee research and books. Who I forget all the people as a Chris Bacha. He’s cool for like really practical Hands-On. Like just how many better coffee at home. He’ll make good espresso like just good techniques all my breezes watch Chris bachava videos for training and then we then we just basically build off of those. And I forgot the other person said it was but those are my oh Lance Hedrick. He is incredible coffee nerd on YouTube and Instagram, he reviews all kinds of coffee equipment and tells you all kinds of things. You never even wanted to know about you never even Thought you wanted to know and you still don’t want to know but he’ll tell you anyway, yeah, no kind of break it down. The real coffee nerves are into him. But you know, I always learn something from from him. So yeah, those are the those are the those are the people that I think right now are kind of bearing the standard of like modern specialty coffee movements. And those are just I like Morgan’s videos. Yeah, exactly. Well, that’s why I recommend her because she made she takes specialty coffee and makes it incredibly accessible and relatable especially on the Morgan drinks coffee videos. Those are sick and but the cool thing she’s been doing with her account lately is bringing you into the world of her like World Barista her. Yeah her us and World Barista championship. Training so you get to so I think she’s doing a really cool thing where she’s she’s drawn all these people in right? She has like a million people or more on on Instagram. She makes these like relatable coffee. Shop quips. I love it. Alright anyone can watch anyone can relate to whether you’re working coffee or just go to coffee shops or just just watch hold just like wholesome content, right so good and then at the same time, she’s like got all these videos recently on Like really technical specialty drinks that they’re making like like almost like coffee cocktails except without alcohol, you know, like a like a cocktail version of coffee for like the different competitions that she does and how they create crafts with the cost a cig a cig Bev a signature drink for the for the competitions. So yeah, she’s cool to check out because she’s less sciency. Yeah, but you get to see the process and she’s really relatable and then as I already said what the other guys are all doing. there are other women in the space, you know, and and even though I mostly named men, but there’s there’s someone for everyone out there who isn’t supposed to coffee and they’re all. Pretty my good friend made accessible. Her partner’s name is John Gordon and he’s in New Zealand. He yeah, like in the coffee scene. Yeah and over that way and I know he’s done a ton of competitions. I said it before but like Australia and New Zealand Coffee Cafe culture Coffee Culture just so much more developed in here. And I don’t know why I got to look into that. I got to look into how they got 10 to 15 years ahead of us in this stuff why the whole country cares about coffee versus over here? It’s like again we take it for granted. I don’t know how that happened, but it’d be an interesting. Case study but yeah, that doesn’t surprise me here. Matt Berger is Australian. Okay as well. Um Like what you said about providing coffee experience is in line with these principles will in turn increase the perceived value of the coffee product and the company experienced that was a mouthful and that took me a while to like digest it when I first read it the first few times but after hearing you explain the previous paragraphs of your Manifesto reading that again, it makes sense. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah, that kind of is like the third bullet point right? Yes. It’s like how this helps it. It’s kind of twofold benefit. Yes, two-fold benefit one is to your business. If you’re going to run your business on these principles, if you’re going to treat coffee with a special as a special products, but make it accessible for everyone and make them feel great about it if you’re gonna do that. Then it’s going to have this benefit of one helping your business because you’re going to have more satisfied customers you’re going to have and hopefully that translates to like more more. I don’t know sales sales more repeat business, you know, and and then just a growing reputation for like being a good coffee shop. Um, but you’re also going to have the hidden benefit of helping create that culture where more people care about coffee. Yes, and that’s I mean that’s what happened with me that has maybe been my number one value from the beginning. helping people helping Elevate the standard for specialty. Anything yeah, helping helping Elevate people standards for specialty coffee experiences in the capital region and beyond that is actually stories original mission statement. You wanted to help Elevate that standard for specialty for art. We say ours and we say we want to help Elevate the standard for artists in. beverages food and goods in the capital region and Beyond and we listed those three things because it was beverages. It was coffee and espresso and bubble tea and we said I didn’t at the time, you know, we were into yes folk and looking around at other specialty coffee shops, and we’re just like we want to be part of helping Elevate the standard that people Elevate the expectations that people have for like for these things and just helping them realize these things exist. And then we would say Artisan food. So I was thinking of maybe maybe Bakery products just like people who I think I was clued into places like fox in the snow, which is really cold Bakery Cafe in Ohio and just realizing like man, we can do things on this like artisan. Specialty level. Yeah, again. It doesn’t have to be priced out or like inaccessible. But I know which is make it good. I really love a specialty donut shop. In this Capital Region, give me a year. I well. I mean you just nibble ink they were super specialty potatoes like yeah, they were so no the camera like a flash of the band. They’re here in gone. So quick and was really I would drive to Troy the story of how they close is so gnarly yeah. I don’t know if I heard that from you from me. Anyways, that’s what I’m looking. Somebody was stealing for the thing if you are listening crazy, and you remember nibble Inc. And you want to a specialty donut shop. I will be your number one buyer. We never even got that. I don’t even think I got the ones I tried to go over the 2016. They were sold out. Yeah all time. Okay, I’ll keep that in mind for story iteration number five. So that you want to elevate the standard and they were coffee and Beverages and food and that’s a good example. That’s a good nibbling the kind of place. Um, we were we’ve included with cider belly for a long time. So, I mean they are supposedly donut shop in Albany and then you have good, you know I’ll just the Makers Mark just the makers of the world like so many good local businesses and like people making soap and like how about pong pong wasn’t on the scene when I was originally their own if opened a 21 I know but I think No, yeah, they’re great. I’m just saying I’m talking all elevated because of her. Thank you. I appreciate her. All I’m trying to say is in 2018 when this was my mission. I’m talking about the places that I was in with that clued into that like had me saying that that at that time, you know, I just I wanted to be part of this what I saw the movement of like okay, we got we got this, you know, I was we were doing pop-ups that great Flats which craft beer and that’s I was a roadie it just for it’s very Farm hosted us a couple times was that was that was cool. So it’s just like I we were trying to be in his this artist in style of other things and by our sin, I you know, I I don’t know if that’s self-explanatory kind of word. I just mean like crafted with care type of products food Goods beverages. Like that’s what we want to be a part of in our our mission kind of evolved and grew from there. But like that’s still value that I hold obviously. I’m still very much a part of who I am and why I’m still doing this is like we’re just we still want to be contributing toward and that’s what I want to do. Now season two of the podcast with my realm. It’s like here’s an opportunity for me to hop up on the soapbox and And and just talk about this exact thing. I’m here for this is where This is probably the most clear and like specific place I get to do this now. I can kind of have these conversations of storied but they’re you know, they’re few and far between because what you find is that like people don’t care right? So now you gotta either or they’re already on the same page because they’re at stories. Oh, yeah. Yeah, sure. Sure. Yeah, give yourself more credit. There are definitely are we have you know, there are our people there, but then you know, there are also just the average people walking into a coffee shop called and expecting a certain thing and I just try to match that expectation with kindness and friendliness and like a good product, but I’m not gonna educate you necessarily unless you know, it’s a real organic part of the conversation. We’re having so I’m doing it in all the little like I can’t yeah. So that’s it. Right is that Manifesto write their Manifesto man bullet points coffee as an experience. Where like you can make the experience of coffee great on two levels one you get a good feeling by going to get a coffee your whole experience in his shop is cool. The people are invested in you they care about you. They want to share your life with you. I want to hear what’s going on. Like that was why I opened a coffee shop. I want to have those conversations with human beings. Know your name, you know mine Etc. But at the same time you came here for coffee and you’re gonna get a dang good cup because that’s also why I exist. I’m sure your life. and give you this here A cup of coffee, that’s gonna Knock your socks, you know, so that’s that’s coffee is an experience. Okay? Coffee itself is a sick product. That’s more complex than Wine. Dude. We can do a lot with this thing if we want to. We can respect it. We can love it. We can make it taste real good. No matter what we do to it. We can do everything we do to Coffee we can we can do it with care and and ultimately each thing can add value. Yeah to the raw products and No matter how we do it if we do it right do it. Well. We can come up with a really nice and result for you. So that’s coffee as a as a really cool. In the modern era we can do really cool things with coffee. That’s bullet point. Number two bullet point number three. We just got done talking about it some Rising it is it can benefit both your business. If you’re going to do it that if you’re going to do this as a business, it can have a lot of benefit for you and He will you will have a hand in helping our culture progress in terms of appreciating Finer Things in life, including but not limited to coffee. Yeah, and coffee adjacent culture. We can bring our culture into the modern era. Yes, and look more like Australia with less deadly animals and more delicious coffee. Yeah. So those are bullet points Manifesto we can get this thing out in writing somewhere right? Turn on our website. Do we have a Blog know put in the show notes talk about the show notes. Yeah for sure. I like this we can even post a picture of your Manifesto on our Instagram. That’s true. That would probably be the easiest way. Yeah true. true No, I don’t know is that it? I think that was very detailed very clear. And if anybody has any questions about specialty coffee, they should direct them to Rich at House Coffee podcast at gmail.com. And I’m sure you would love to take the time to answer those questions or we could yeah your question with your permission on our show and Um answer the questions for broader people because I think if anybody has a question, and I’m sure they’re not the only ones. Yeah, yes. Sometimes you have a question but a lot of people have the same question, but you gotta be the one to To ask you right? Yeah. So hopefully it’s clear like this is this is me. This is my take ya on coffee when you hear me talk about coffee on this podcast. Whether it’s in the first 33 episodes of season 1 or whether it’s two episodes ago. Ranting and raving or whether it’s in the future like this is where my thoughts come from. Yeah. Exactly. This is kind of the Baseline thoughts that I have. This is as I’ve concluded. I need to work in line with these principles like anything. I’m gonna do from here on out. This is I wrote this down because I was like if I’m gonna go work in somebody else’s Cafe from gonna go work at visher Ferry. I it only makes sense to do that if I get to celebrate coffee in the process, right? Because the question of the table was am I gonna I’m gonna go work in someone else’s business rather than spend the same time in mine or on my business like my times and we live in why would I spend my precious time? Yeah, someone else’s business. There’s got to be good reasons for and there were there were good reasons and but but part of thinking through that gave rise to this thought process of like, how do I really feel about coffee? Why do I think coffee is an important part of what I would do in some other context and it and then I wrote this and it was like, okay. It’s because There’s more to it. You know, it’s because of what I’ve experienced because of what I believe. And so whatever I’m doing in the future, you’ll find me. Living by these principles probably that for you love that for you. Thanks fam. Yeah, you know where to find us on all of our socials and you know how to rate and review us too if you like where you are headed in this direction. Hey, you know, we’d love that. We’d love that. We’d love that. All right. Well, we love you. We’ll catch you next time. Cheers later.