The Exchange: Episode 2 - The Coffee Roaster & Coffee Blending Part 1
- Why we blend.
- Basic approaches to blending.
- Where blending actually starts.
- Relationship of blending to branding.
- What blending should not be.
- What coffee drinkers want.
- Iconic blends.
- Marketing vs. components.
- Two types of coffee drinkers.
- The value of consistency.
- What wholesale customers want.
- How many products and how many blends?
- Blends and grocery history.
- Bratty, edgy, interesting, dynamic, needy coffee vs. approachable and flexible, clutch-player blends.
- Session beers.
- Bruce Springsteen.
Also Available on iTunes and Full Transcript Below
The Exchange is Presented by Olam Specialty Coffee
Hosted by Mark Inman and Todd Mackey
Directed by Mike Ferguson
All music is available and used under Creative Commons:
Opening Theme, A Cup of Coffee for Your Fears by Veve Seashore
Closing Theme, City Riding: Morning Coffee by Bottlesmoker
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Mike Ferguson: Hello, welcome back to The Exchange presented by Olam Specialty Coffee, hosted by Mark Inman and Todd Mackey. I'm Mike Ferguson, this is episode two, the first of two episodes on Coffee Blending. In part one, Mark and Todd talk about the reasons for creating blends, both the good and the bad, and the role blends play as part of your wholesale offer. And here they are, Mark and Todd.
Mark Inman: Welcome to The Exchange presented by Ola Specialty Coffee, I'm Mark Inman and with me, of course, is my co-host Todd Mackey. Todd, how you doing?
Todd Mackey: I'm doing very well today, Mark, how are you?
Mark Inman: I'm doing well. As we like to start off every episode of The Exchange, what's in your cup today, Todd?
Todd Mackey: Mark, I am drinking an organic lot coming in from Tolima, just hit on the East Coast, [egger proson 00:01:07], it's a cooperative coffee from small holders in Tolima. Juicy, big-bodied, notes of dark chocolate, just very, very full and round. What are you drinking?
Mark Inman: I've decided to go, I thought about the Colombian this morning, it's funny that you said that, I was looking at that same thing, but went with the Guatemala Way Way Tunago, the Finca Terrazas, it's 100% San Ramon. It, to me, is like that classic cadbury, fruit nut bar flavor, just like berry and dark chocolate, and little bit of nuttiness, and very clean. Just a nice, good overall morning coffee.
Todd Mackey: Awesome, sounds delicious.
Todd Mackey: Yeah, no I was just going to jump right to it. It's exciting to be back for our second episode, certainly excited to dig into our content today, I mean we're talking about blends-
Mark Inman: Blending and blending theory-
Todd Mackey: And I just thought, maybe, the place to start was really why blend? And maybe we can look backwards as sort of our foundation, and we can build from there. So yeah, for someone like yourself, long time roaster, working, obviously, with a lot of different, diverse companies. When you look all the way backwards and sort of identify themes through to today, what is the biggest why that you identify when it comes to blending? Why is it there? Why do people do it? Why does it have stain power and why should it?
Mark Inman: Yeah, for me, the idea behind blending is to create a coffee that's better than it's individual components, and as you know from any single varietal coffee that you are drinking at any given time, it has a certain attribute, or strong point, but then tends to lack something, it could be body, it could be acidity, it could be sweetness. The idea of blending is to introduce these elements that would actually make this final product better in the long run. But I came about this blending through my background in wine and learning how to blend wines, things like a Rhone style blend or a cabernet that uses cab franc, and Merlot, and think to smooth and rough around the edges.
Mark Inman: So I have always tended to blend using a type of wine type mindset, just because it's something I was trained to do, something more formal, and ... for me a fun exercise that I like to do here, and I've done it at the office here, is to invite winemakers to come to the office and show them here are the typical Rhone style grapes, the coffee version of that. Thinking about it in those ways, what would you do? How would you blend? And watching their minds work, and seeing how they create. And I think that the idea of getting two worlds together to create blends using different types of approaches, always makes, in the long run, for a better way of blending.
Todd Mackey: Yeah, no, that sounds awesome. I think zooming out for me, you see one of three core objectives that a roaster might have to blend, it's either to build accessibility, to build some sort of alchemy, or to sort of achieve acceptability, little less inspiring but certainly a part of the history of blending when you look back is maybe matching what is more price level, or cost of value, and just making something that's acceptable to that customer. But I love thinking about blending as that overly romantic, but appropriate, sort of alchemist approach where you are taking two parts, you're making what is ultimately a more drinkable coffee and maybe a more widely pleasing coffee, and when you look at the aim to increase your market and to build your business, and to really become a repeat pursuit by many different types of guests and customers, that's really what we're aspiring towards.
Todd Mackey: So I guess, in terms of using that maybe as where we start, what do you feel like are the ... I guess, biggest considerations in creating a blend? Obviously we're dealing with single varieties in some cases, multiple varieties in the case of many lots, I mean a lot of green coffees are blends of varieties to begin with, intentionally or more practically speaking. But what do you think, as basic as how many coffees should be in a blend or what's too many? Some of the golden rules, maybe that you feel like you've discovered, or that you see at work in the trade, when it comes to blending or creating a successful blend?
Mark Inman: I tend to believe, well I guess let me back up a little bit, the idea that you brought up earlier about blending is, I guess we need to hit on it a little bit harder. That when you think about the Colombian that you drank this morning, that's not 100% ... that is a blend, it's a blend of probably a handful of varieties on the farm. It is from one origin, it is from one region, but it is multiple plant varieties, or coffee varieties, and so it is already a blend. The idea of blending different countries, which does not happen in wine, you don't see a French wine blended with a California wine to create something different, what we're looking for are inherent attributes in those regions.
Mark Inman: I tend to approach blending as a way to create something, at least for a product line, something iconic or something that identifies who you are and what you're trying to say as a coffee company. I had, early on, spoke for years at conferences about the one clear advantage that small roasters have over the big guys, and you can insert large multi-national coffee company in there, is that you can actually beat them at their game by buying small, single varietal lots because they can roast and buy in those small of quantities, so it allows you to be unique and to stand out in ways that your big competitors cannot and the idea of blending at the time what I was saying, was that the big guys can blend circles around you and so you're going to end up losing at that game and tend to avoid that.
Mark Inman: Obviously I learned more and as time passed, I realize that, that was a very, overly simplistic view of how you should look at developing a product line, because I think what comes with that, is that you also lose your identity if you're just jumping from one single origin to another single origin, and you have nothing that ties things to you then you tend to get lost in that shuffle, as a brand or as a coffee company because everybody is doing single origins nowadays. So the idea of blending, in my opinion, is to create something iconic, create something lasting that your customers end up knowing you for, and I think that, that is a very important thing for a company to do, and I think you have to take the idea of creating that blend extremely serious, it can't be used for other purposes, it can't be about hiding cheaper coffees, or hiding overages, or covering up mistakes; this ultimately is the ultimate representation of who you are as a coffee brand.
Todd Mackey: Yeah, yeah, no, to have a cross seasonal, sort of always present and available, hallmark product that smoothly marketed around core values, or your culture, or what have you, ideally everything all in between, is clearly wise, right? When so many consumers have this dramatic, emotional response to your coffee. What type of sensory experience they're having, what type of consuming experience they're having, but the don't necessarily have as much a command of why that might be, or even really like a confident way to dialog about the sensory experience they're having, whether they would like to or not. So I look at these, I mean I think immediately of Hairbender, or Black Cat, these very long standing iconic blends that have been smoothly marketed, have been consistent in terms of what they deliver, and they have fantastic followings of people that buy them faithfully season after season, after season.
Todd Mackey: To that point, how much of that do you feel, zooming out take this any direction you want, but how much of that is marketing and how much of that is composition? Obviously it's a combination, but there's people on both sides that might say “Hey, this is smooth marketing, I could throw anything I want in here.” But then we know that's not true, people take their coffee so serious. I mean I used to joke working bar you can pour someone the wrong drink at a bar and comp them, and it's no big deal, if you mess up their coffee it's like the end of the world. So I guess I'm curious your thoughts, how much of that type of corner stone, blended product approach is the marketing and the representation, and how much really boils down to the constituents of the blend?
Mark Inman: I think marketing is not going to cover up for a bad blending or inconsistent blending, especially if you're using that blend as kind of the dumping ground for coffees that you bought too much of or you found at a deal, or whatever, but I do think ... I have a couple thoughts on this, the main thing is that I look at two types of coffee consumers, one is somebody who is like I want to be dazzled, show me something great, I'm up for an adventure, and that's the person you can throw a honey coffee and a natural, and then tomorrow really acidity coffee, and they're always up for some type of adventure, and that is a perfect consumer for single origins, or seasonal blends, or short-run blends.
Mark Inman: The other type of consumer, which I believe is the bulk of people who eat and drink anything, want something consistent and want something that they count on, and aren't necessarily looking to be challenged everyday. If you can imagine getting up at 5 AM and being tired, and it's your quiet time, your kids aren't up yet, and you may have the radio on, and you have that cup of coffee, and it's there to just be a grounding, comforting force, and at that point you're not holding a brandy snifter and contemplating your existence, it isn't that type of experience; this is comfort food at its finest, and in that sense a blend, a great blend, that you can get year round, something that is consistent and you can count on, it creates a lot of brand and product loyalty for you, and you could apply that to the beer world, or to the wine world, or to coffee world.
Mark Inman: Things that are constant have a very, very strong place in the marketplace and I don't think you could underestimate that. I mean as a roaster, when I was messing around with a lot of single origins, and not paying as much attention to my blends, I head that feedback right away from my customers of look I like that particular blend, it seems to be moving around, what's going on? And it's because I was buying so much single origin, what I have that was similar to what was the blend component, I would be sticking in there if I bought too much of it. Now, one step further, what I think is I became much more fascinated by, as I went throughout my roasting career, where companies like probably the best example, it's a West Coast example is Graffeo Coffee Roasters in San Francisco.
Mark Inman: Now this is an interesting company and probably one of the most fascinating coffee companies that I've come across, that they had a store in North Beach San Francisco, they had one off in Beverley Hills, right off Rodeo Drive, and one in San Rafael, and they do have a licensing deal in Singapore, I believe, but that's not the same company. And you go into a Graffeo and what you see is a marble countertop, a grinder, and three trays, and there's nothing being brewed, there's nothing to sample, there's nothing to drink, and when you go in there the choice is dark, light and decaf, that's it, and it's the same blend done three different ways. And at its core you think this is too minimalist, it's too much, but the brand has been an icon in San Francisco going back to the 1950s that, up until recently, if you had a restaurant, especially in North Beach, more times than not you were serving Graffeo Coffee.
Mark Inman: And I fell in love with the idea of the simplicity of that model, and the elegance of having something honed so right that they only needed to do it that way, and it's similar to In-N-Out Burger, also in California, where it's hamburger, cheeseburger, french fry; that's the menu, I mean there is the secret menu, but there isn't chicken sandwich, and the fish sandwich, and curly fries, and then now we're doing seasoned fries, they don't go off into the absurd, they're keeping it elegant and very clean, and I think there's something really great about that. That not enough coffee companies have experimented with, I think will have a blend or two blends, but then they'll have a whole bunch of other coffees in their line up and I do think that outside of big companies like Dunkin' Donuts and McDonald's would be the two largest, that do, do a blend and they don't do a lot of different coffees. Graffeo is a specialty version of that type of elegance and simplicity.
Todd Mackey: No, I love that you bring that up because it's interesting thinking back to my entry into specialty coffee and it seems, I'm sure given where I was located the different influential players at the time, who really shined a light on what was going on really, for anyone, would color their perception of what was cool and what was happening, and the values of the market as a whole, or at large. But I feel like as I was coming in the door, it was in a time of just countless blends, it almost seemed like a roaster was in the position to hang his or her hat on the number of coffees offered, whether single origin, flavored in many cases, or blended, and it really wasn't about well here's the substance, and the purpose, and that certainly not the elegance of simplicity as to why they're there, it was much more well we have a coffee for everyone.
Todd Mackey: And so that's obviously counter to where we're headed now, and where it seems like most roasters offer lists are sort of dialed into, but I guess I'd be curious where do you think the appropriate balance lies? When you talk to folks in different segments, retailers who are buying roasted coffee and seeing lots of different offer lists, people who might look from our supplier side, and say "Okay, how are these coffees going out? What should I produce and where are opportunities?" What do you think is the right type of balance, in terms of number and sort of positioning-
Mark Inman: Well I think there's two ways of looking at this, one is what's the purpose of your business? I want to say, well ill tell you two versions of this story, but if you're in grocery wholesale, the original idea behind having a bunch of blends was to get a grocery store to give you as much shelf space as possible to squeeze out your competition, so you would create, in many cases, five blends that really are the same components, but you would call them something different. So there was a strategy behind doing the absurd amount of coffee offerings in your product line up. And as time marched on and as grocery stores started falling in love with multiple coffee companies, and loving all of the kind of small movement of coffee roasters out there, those opportunities to gobble up the line share of a grocery shelf space disappeared, and what they were looking for was the best of the best that you could offer, and then the best of the best that I can offer, and they would stick them all in one shelf.
Mark Inman: That being said, I had a competitor/friend that was a mentor to me throughout the industry, or my time throughout the industry, and we both had wholesale coffee roasting companies and at one point he was complaining about I have 128 SKUs I have to manage, and what a headache it is to manage that, and I thought god, 128 products, what a nightmare that would be. And meanwhile I had 30 product, and even that was a headache for me to manage. And when I really dud down into my numbers, when I started my company I had four coffees, I got to around six, and then nine, and then level off there, and then starting adding more and more products. And when I looked at the numbers, I could've stuck with between six and nine, and done incredibly well, in fact there are two coffees that I have in my lineup that if I only had those two, I could've made as good of a living as I was making doing the 30.
Mark Inman: But I do think for a good rounded out product line, six to nine offerings is plenty. I mean, if you would look at a beer company, or a wine company, they're not offering much more than that either and yes the world is our oyster, and there's a million origins available to us, but that doesn't mean all are appropriate for your line, or all work, or all make sense. So yeah, I settle on six to nine, I don't know how about you?
Todd Mackey: So six to nine total products, you mean?
Mark Inman: Yes.
Todd Mackey: Total products-
Mark Inman: Including espresso and a decaf.
Todd Mackey: Yeah, and how many of those would you flag as blends? Let's just say you're at the top end, you have nine products, how many of those are LTO, limited time offer, coffees that are swapped out seasonally and how many of those are mainstay blended products?
Mark Inman: The mainstay blended products would be my decaf, my espresso, and then a lighter blend and a more of a medium to full city blend, and then everything else would be a seasonal offering of some type.
Todd Mackey: Got it. Yeah, yeah, no, I don't think I fall far from you. To me, it's I come from the sort of influx specialty coffee heads that for a time were so intensely anti-blend that you're just like completely impractical, totally self-indulgent and completely casting off really that type of experience that you were describing earlier, that something reliable, something fundamental as part of each day. Which now, as a consumer even, I found myself leaning towards supremely drinkable coffees, not because I don't want tasting coffees and adventurous coffees, but because I love that draw, the cup coming back to your mouth over and over again just on muscle memory, and the want for something really sweet and balanced, and approachable.
Todd Mackey: But yet, I think I still land in this very simple stripped down type of place where, to me, I think nine or 10 offers would be at the very top end of what I would want to see, or what I think you can really, as a small to mid-size specialty roaster, just thinking average sizes, that's really the top end of where you might want to be in terms of managing inventory. And also, keeping a concise message where you can really put the energy into each coffee and story, and really properly mark it and give the right type of attention to each one. In that, I would probably look to have, at the most, two blends, maybe three, kind of where you're at. I'd be more apt to stick with one or two just to have a coffee that is completely, again, approachable, and also flexible when it comes to brewing. Just knowing as someone with a lot of retail experience, and knowing just the challenge and breakdown often of communicating brewing standards and approach, and recipe, when you're talking about bratty, edgy, interesting dynamic, but sort of needy coffees.
Todd Mackey: It's a whole lot harder to hand those off and to entrust them to our retail partners and expect the very, very best, they just need more attention and ... so you want to have something that can be brewed as espresso, brewed as a filter coffee, house coffee, breakfast blend, whatever sort of nomenclature is attached, or whatever; a brewing approach is attached, it's really sort of a, I don't know, you're sort clutch player, if you will, that you call in for almost anything. And with that-
Mark Inman: I'm not a big beer drinker, but I look at the idea of good blend, like I'm not, and if I get this term wrong, Todd please feel free to skewer me here, of a session beer. It's basically what you're looking for, something that you can get into and enjoy, and you can do a lot of it, you can drink a pot of it and you're going to enjoy it versus something finicky, and fussy and very particular.
Todd Mackey: Yeah that's exactly it-
Mark Inman: You're a session beer to a sour beer, I guess I would say.
Todd Mackey: I was going to say exactly the same thing, sours, wild fermented beers, these really intensely barnyardy, natural wines versus some of the lasting, standard blends; there's all these different parallels and it's not to take the merits of the wild, and sort, again, edgy really stimulating side of this, it's not take the merits away it's more to just say-
Mark Inman: No.
Todd Mackey: There is more often the want for that session beer, or per unit volume you're certainly going to be moving, selling, supporting, engaging your customers for more of that than you might these really challenging beers. I love the analogy when you said challenging as an element, or description, earlier about grapes and about coffees. I immediately thought about music where you go see Bruce Springsteen and it's just like yes, the guy will play for four hours and he's just crushing the backbeat, and then you see maybe a more contemporary artist like Bon Iver, or someone who's in a more challenging space, and you're really stretched even as someone who's on the outside.
Todd Mackey: And I think that's another parallel for, obviously there's a lot of folks coming from music into specialty coffee, and thankfully so. But yeah I always go back to one to two coffees that play this role, specifically blended, whereas I think too I see more and more, and I certainly am a proponent of this, and make the same suggestion where there are these larger blended lots that in and of themselves, even though they could be “single origin coffees,” they could be single region coffees, they might even be a state coffee, single farm coffees, and single variety, but they just exude a sort of blended, balanced quality. There is almost a gray area in between, where I still think, whereas those might've been blends and sold under sort of a product titling, rather than sold as an origin, and or farm or producer, you're seeing a lot more fit into that in between as well.
Todd Mackey: Hi everyone, this is Todd Mackey. Obviously Mark and I have much more to discuss, so we're going to land the plane, though briefly. Tune in, in another two weeks for episode two on blend.
Mike Ferguson: You've been listening to The Exchange presented by Olam Specialty Coffee, hosted by Mark Inman and Todd Mackey. Produced by Mike Ferguson. Our opening theme was a Cup of Coffee for your Fears by The Veve Seashore, our closing theme City Riding, Morning Coffee by Bottled Smoker. Both songs are available and used understand creative common. If you have any questions you'd like Mark and Todd to consider answering during a podcast, send an email to TheExchangeOSC@gmail.com. Thank you for listening and we'll see you next time for our third episode, Coffee Blending Part Two.
