Why we roast to order, and what it costs us
Roasting after you buy makes the coffee better and the business harder. We think the trade is worth it. Here is the honest maths.
Coffee is at its best somewhere between three days and three weeks after roasting. Before three days it is still off-gassing and tastes a little wild. After three weeks the aromatics start to fade and the cup goes dull, slowly enough that you might not notice but quickly enough that it matters.
Most coffee on a supermarket shelf was roasted months ago. It is not spoiled. It is just tired. We did not want to sell tired coffee, so we roast to order. You buy a bag, we roast it that week, it ships within a day or two of coming out of the roaster.
What that costs us
Roasting to order is genuinely harder to run than roasting big batches and warehousing them.
- We hold green coffee, not roasted stock, so we are guessing demand weeks ahead when we buy.
- We roast in small batches, twice a week, which is less efficient than long production runs.
- A spike in orders cannot be met from a shelf. It has to be roasted, which means our Tuesdays and Fridays get long.
None of this is a complaint. It is the deal we signed up for. But we mention it because “roasted to order” gets used as a marketing line by plenty of brands who roast on a schedule that has nothing to do with your order. We would rather tell you exactly what we mean by it.
What you get back
A bag from us arrives near the start of its best window, not the end. With a subscription that timing takes care of itself, because the next bag is roasted and sent before the last one runs out.
That is the whole idea. Buy less coffee, more often, and drink all of it while it is good. It is better for your cup, and it wastes less, which matters to us more than it probably should.