I’m sitting in the second of those two stores right now, a disarmingly beautiful space that is at once both cozy and comfortable. We opened this space on Monday, and we’re about an hour and a half away from closing down the third day of business here. To say we’ve been busy would be an understatement, but to attempt to say more would very likely fall short of what we’re feeling right now.

I had an older gentleman sitting at the slow bar tonight, regaling me with tales of his brewing exploits with a Chemex. His glee at sipping on our Rwanda Kigeyo was nothing short of perfect. He went through that brew fairly quickly, but from the happy glint in his eye, I don’t blame him. That ritual, the one where the craftsman shares in the satisfaction of his customer, has been played out for centuries by many others who have gone before us, but that doesn’t lessen the experience one bit. I’m sure he’ll be back, and I hope he looks forward to his next visit as much as I look forward to serving him.

Over the past several weeks, as I’ve thought through the role of the roastery and the (now) three stores, I came to a conviction: The primary role of the roastery must be to serve the baristas and the stores that serve our coffees, and, as lead roaster, it is my job to lead in that service. If you think that sounds a little daunting, a tiny part of me agrees with you. For the most part, though, the thought of taking the reigns of service really gets my blood pumping… even if I’m still really unsure as to what that’ll look like, or how the heck that’s going to happen.

I sometimes take a step back and think to myself, “John, you have a job doing what you love. Don’t ever take that for granted, you big donkey.” He’s getting quoted way too much for his own humility, but a couple weeks ago, after I dropped a load from the roaster into the cooling tray, Lee looked down at the coffee for a second before smiling and nodding slightly and saying, “Dude, that’s your effing job!” and gave me a fist-bump. And you know what? He’s right.

On Monday morning, just a couple of days ago, Ginger and Sarah and I stood around in the brand-new-but-still-empty shop, waiting for its first customer ever. We talked about how crazy things have been, but how all of us at the core of it are totally set on seeing things through. A thought hit me then, and I think it’s the closest I can come to articulating just how insanely wonderful this experience has been: There’s gonna come a day when all of us are sitting around, and one of us says something to the effect of, “Well, I’ve decided it’s time to move on… I’ve found another job, and I’m leaving Quills,” and with that statement, the wind will effectively be sucked out of the room. An end of an era will be upon us, and we’ll look back on these times with a sort of sad fondness.

All of this comes full-circle, you know. Sitting there, talking to that elderly gentleman, stuff like that doesn’t take place unless you love your job. And, what’s more, loving my job doesn’t happen unless the people I’m in the trenches with are totally loving their jobs, too, and help me do mine so they can do theirs. I suppose you could say this is my public way of saying, “Thanks for putting up with me, guys… I’m grateful for each of you.”

The short and sweet of the situation is that I see lot of customers come in, day after day, and they pay us a fair bit of their earned dollars to prepare them coffee. Some of them are regulars whose orders are an almost-automated dance that commences the moment they open the door and walk in. Others have never been to Quills, let alone Louisville, but they made a very special trip from out of town, found an odd, almost-illegal parking spot on a side street, and made their way into line at a spot that looked like it might be where they should queue up to order. For both types of customers — and everything in between — I’m grateful. I want them to experience great coffee and wonderful service in equal measure. They should feel that they are getting a freakishly great steal on their espresso or pour-over or whatever it is they purchase. And if not? If they feel like they could be getting better value elsewhere at another coffee shop?

They should go there, because we don’t deserve their business, period. If they get better value elsewhere, and I really care about the value my customers receive… well, you see where I’m going with this, right?

That’s not to say that I don’t like to hear about great experiences they’ve had in other shops, because I do. I’ve often made recommendations, telling customers to go to Sunergos on a certain day and time because Kenny or Jesse will be on bar, and I know those two will take care of anyone I send their way. The great thing about that? If my customers have great experiences, they’ll come back and thank me, telling me about the wonderful cappuccino they had. That, friends, is yet another way to build trust between you and your customers. It shows you’re confident in your ability to consistently deliver value, and that you truly care about them, the customer, even if you may lose just the teeniest bit of business in the short-term. In the long-term, though? They still think of you as the expert, the expert they trust.

The past several weeks — months, really — have been mildly crazy. Lots and lots of work, with not a whole lot of reprieve. I’m fine with that, though, as I’ve had the wonderful opportunity to learn and explore, all the while being paid.

Right now, this very moment, I have several batches of roasted coffee sitting just a few yards from me, resting and waiting to be pulled as espresso. In some ways, it’s the culmination of a lot of hard, painstaking work; in other ways, it’s just the beginning.

Cliché? Yes. True? Yes. Those coffees sitting there make me smile. You see, I can think all the way back to the day we cupped the samples of those coffees. We were looking for delicious coffees we could bring in and present to our customer base as not only regular filtered coffee, but also, eventually, as espresso. I remember cupping them with Luke and Philip, and almost jumping up and down in response to the sweetness and punch I was tasting from one of them.

No, I’m not telling you which one; you’ll just have to come in and taste it for yourself.

The months since then have been wonderful, but with lots of fulfillment and frustration. I’ve had lots of late hours at the shop, often profile roasting or pulling espresso, and I went to bed on more than one occasion wondering how to avoid scorching or tipping or how to properly store our green coffees over the long-haul. There were days where I wondered if I was in over my head — usually followed up by days where something or someone encouraged me beyond any point I deserved, and I again remembered why I was doing what I was doing… because I love it, and I think, at some point, I could perhaps be pretty decent at it.

I really want our customers to love our coffee. Heck, I want people who aren’t our customers to love our coffee, too. Slowly but surely, in spite of all the crazy setbacks and doubts, I think that’s happening. Awesome.

-Christopher Schooley

Tipping is one of those relatively easy defects to identify as a roaster. You can see it and taste it and, subsequently, learn to eliminate it. I say it’s relatively easy to identify because there are other undesirable effects that can occur during a roast that you won’t be able to pinpoint visually. Baking, sweating, uneven development, under-development… they’re all really, really easy to do, and sometimes, not as easy to identify.

That little blurb comes from a handout Joachim Eichner and Professor Henry Schwartzberg presented at the Charlotte SCAA in 2006. The chemistry that takes place when roasting coffee is nothing short of extraordinary, but to even try to begin to understand it makes me lament — deeply — all the hours I spent sleeping in Mrs. Taniguchi’s Chemistry class. I mean, I passed, but… well, let’s put it this way: I once was so out of it that I drooled on an exam sheet.

At least I spelled my name correctly… right?

In the past several weeks, I’ve had to do a great deal of thinking about espresso; being tasked with building a base espresso blend will do that to a person. The good news is that I’ve been quite excited about the challenge this little endeavor presents. You see, for a long while, I’ve had a lot of thoughts about coffee stuck in my head, a few of which I’ve come by through personal experimentation and experience, but most of which have come by the gracious dispensation of knowledge by those who’ve come and gone before me. For an example of this, read Chris Tacy’s challenge to roasters. It encouraged me to really strive to push the boundaries of espresso and not be afraid to craft something delicious.

Well, try to craft something delicious.

Luke and Philip and I cupped a bunch of coffees this past Saturday, all with the intent of getting a handle on what we’d bring in and how we might approach crafting a blend. I won’t disclose what that blend will look like, since that’s not my information to give out, but I will say that cupping those coffees infused me with a curious excitement, the sort that makes me want to squeeze the experiences of the next three months into the next three days. That ain’t happening, though, so like the rest of you, I’m going to have to wait and see and taste what unfolds.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that I can’t experiment outside of work. This afternoon, I fired up the roaster in my kitchen and pulled out three different coffees I think are absolutely lovely. Each of these coffees is outstanding, and each is very different from the other two. Roasted separately and blended post-roast, they’ll sit until this weekend, and if I have time, I’ll pull them and see what happened. Which coffees, you ask? I’ll give you the continents: South America, Africa, Africa.

No, it’s not what you think. Well, probably not. Until this weekend…

Anyhow, I’ve done exactly five brews on the Kaffeemaschine. The one thing that strikes me most is that, as a brewing device, it seems remarkably sensitive to pre-brewing parameters, particularly grind and dose. In other words, it’s a little difficult to adjust in the middle of brewing as one might with, say, a woodneck brewer. Despite all of that, or perhaps because of it, this device is capable of making a very delicious cup of coffee.