Sharing stories and adventures about all things coffee, stories, and stoke
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Reflections
One of the most exciting parts of reacquiring Loam Coffee after three years away has been sharing the journey with you—not just re-engaging with the company but also planning for its growth. Since getting Loam back was unexpected, I feel like I’m playing with house money. There’s no rush. Instead, I’m focused on the long game: building and executing a thoughtful, sustainable plan.
So, what’s the plan?
Since the beginning, Loam Coffee has been attached to mountain biking and trails. Some of our earliest outings were serving coffee to volunteer trail builders here in the rainy Pacific Northwest. This past weekend, we linked up with a couple of other orgs for a day of free shuttles plus free coffee. The goal? Not only to get out and ride but also to raise funds for a local trail building and stewardship non-profit.
It is easy to get boxed in with our own thinking. At times, based on social media algorithms, what we see, hear, and consume can be limited to an echo chamber of familiarity. Therefore, what we experience in the daily rhythms of life becomes normalized and then set into a routine. As a result, it is easy to go through life with something like blinders on, you know, like the ones at times placed on horses to limit their vision so they’re not easily spooked.
But then something happens, and it is as if those blinders are ripped off, our echo chamber is depressurized, and our routine is sabotaged. That's what happened when I explored the coffee scene over the summer in Bangkok ...
How do you normally brew coffee? Do you brew coffee differently at home compared to when you’re on a week-long bikepacking trip or exploring the high desert backroads in your conversion van? By the way, there’s no right or wrong answer here. If you feel stuck, would you like some more ideas and options?
Nacho the van has come a long way from being an 11-passenger van used to carry collegiate athletes to games all over the Pacific Northwest. At the same time, there’s still a LONG way to go. Since I bought the van from the university where I teach, many students know its backstory as they see it sitting in the school parking lot. Some joke, saying, “Yeah … it still looks a little sketchy.”
So, what is the latest on the Nacho conversion process?
While the title of this article sounds like I'm about ready to pick a fight, let me explain. I'll share a story about serving coffee to those who are not coffee nerds.
Yeah, I said coffee nerds.
We … yes, "we," get all nerded out about coffee. Talking about how coffee is processed, the varietals, cupping, roast profiles, flavor notes, and so on really is a lot of fun. Like, A LOT. However, if our customer is the very tiny slice of coffee drinkers out there who actually nerd out about this, then we might as well be speaking an unintelligible language.
