September 2011 Coffee News

-Coffee: The World in Your Cup at the Bell Museum
-Learning from Our Customers
-Special Orders

The start of Fall for our family means new backpacks, new schedules and new teachers; the start to football season (our oldest is playing varsity for Highland Park High School - Go Scots!); and the return of many of our school coffee fundraisers. Our kids seem ready to return to school to see their friends and perhaps even learn a few things. Along these lines, we have several learning opportunities in this month's newsletter a new Coffee Exhibit at the Bell Museum in Minneapolis, and a review of what we have learned from our customer survey (which is still available if you'd like to add your input).

Coffee: The World in Your Cup at the Bell Museum
Did you know, plants use caffeine as a natural pesticide to paralyze and kill destructive insects. (Wonder if the same benefit extends from the coffee grounds in our compost? And what caffeine might possibly do in our bodies?) Learn this and much, much more at the Bell Museum of Natural History's newest exhibit, "Coffee: The World in our Cup" which opened last week and runs through November 27. The exhibit "showcases how every cup of coffee we buy and drink connects us with a web of hidden stories around the world."

We haven't had a chance to go yet, but when we do, we'll be sure to share what we learn in upcoming newsletters. We are also excited to be participating in two of their "Thursday Evening in a Cup" events on October 6 and November 3 where Guillermo will be one of a few "coffee experts" on hand. It would be great to see some of you there.

  Learning from Our Customers
We're looking forward to the opportunity to learn more about coffee and to share what we know at the Bell exhibit. We also greatly appreciated learning from the feedback we received from the 35 people who responded to our customer survey. Here are a few things we learned:

• 100% of respondents thought the flavor and freshness of our coffee was either "Very good" or "The best they've ever had."
• 91% thought our prices were fair or even "a great deal".
• 97% (all but one) said our coffee always arrives fresh (and that one person said it usually does). 91% said the bag always arrives in good conditions (and the others said it usually does).

We're really pleased that respondents gave our coffee such high grades and that our monthly newsletter and our family business model are well appreciated. But please, we want to emphasize, if at any time our coffee and/or our delivery or mail service is not to your expectations, let us know and we'll make it right!

Special Orders
We also received several suggestions for expanding our products. The good news is that most of the things people asked for are available right now through special orders as long as we get them prior to our monthly roasting order (We will be placing our October roasting order September 26). A few of the ways you can customize your coffee order include:

• Variable grinds. Our ground coffee is done for the more common auto-drip coffee makers. But our roaster can also do a coarser grind specially for cold brew or french press, or a much finer grind for espresso or turkish coffee, and several variations in between.
  
• A wide variety of flavors. We just need a minimum order of 5 lbs and you can enjoy any of the over 70 regular or seasonal flavors that our roaster offers. We can also do flavored decaf options this way too.
  
• Special blends/roasts. We've had requests for a half light roast/half dark roast blend (our Breakfast Blend is 80% light/20% dark), or half regular/half decaf. Or a Breakfast Blend version of our decaf coffees. There are also two roast variations between our lighter Full City Roast and darker French Roast Vienna Roast and Italian Roast. (Special blends can be done in any quantity. Special roasts need a minimum of 30 lbs.)
  
•  Different Packaging. In addition to our regularly stocked 8 oz flavors, 12 oz regular bags and 5 lb bulk bags, you can order smaller 8 oz bags of any of our coffees for a sampler gift basket. 2 or 3 lb bags are also possible. We can also request a gold backed bag (instead of our usual black) for the same price.

Let us know what you are interested in. It is very likely that the unique grind, flavor, blend or packaging you want to try is possible IF you get your order to us before we do our monthly roasting order. We have already placed our September roasting order. (We usualy place it the week before our newsletter goes out). But you can plan ahead for October and get your special orders to us before September 26. Our November roasting order will be placed on October 24, and our December roasting order on November 21.