There are many paths to becoming a coffee roaster, but I’ll share the path that I followed here in case it helps you on your journey.
Learn How to Taste Coffee
Before you even begin roasting it can be extremely helpful to become good at coffee tasting. I don’t mean paying for coffee tasting classes, but I do mean spending time trying different coffees black and taking notes on what you do and don’t like. If you can’t tell the difference between a coffee that you like and a coffee that you don’t like it will be hard to know if you are roasting good tasting coffee. I had notes on about 50 different coffees that I had tasted before I started roasting my own coffee. I knew some of the coffee origins that I tended to prefer regardless of the coffee roaster. You can skip this step, but it can save you time later.
Buy or Build a Home Coffee Roaster
Start by building your own or buying a home coffee roaster. Most people opt to buy a roaster, so you may want to go that route unless you really have the desire to tinker and learn to understand the “feel” of the coffee roasting process. My one beef with some of the higher end small capacity roasters is that they take a lot of the “feel” out of roasting through automation, making it easy to assume that the computer knows how to best roast when it often doesn’t. There’s no right way to get started on this, so feel free to just pick a budget friendly roaster option and get started!
Roasting Coffee Using a Home Coffee Roaster
Whichever roaster you choose to start out with, you will need to practice a lot to get familiar with your home coffee roaster. It took me about 100 roasts on my roaster until I felt really comfortable roasting any coffees that I sourced. Mine also had no temperature probe so I roasted by time, sight, and smell. Make sure to take detailed notes on every roast so that you can adjust after each roast, making your roasting an empirical process. And make sure you actually taste your roasts (give them a couple days to degas, and then brew a cup).
Selecting Your Coffee Beans
This is an important step to mention – make sure to choose high-quality green specialty coffee beans from a reputable source. I used Dean’s Beans and Sweet Maria’s for a long time since they sold in smaller batches, ideal for home roasters. Experiment with beans from different regions to understand the variety of flavors and roasting characteristics.
Find a Coffee Roaster to Learn From
You are in luck – I love talking to people about roasting coffee. Feel free to reach out using the contact form if you want help learning to roast coffee. Otherwise there are some good online forums that you can also use to learn more about how other home roasters roast. I found Home-Barista pretty helpful, but make sure you trust your gut when you roast – just because someone else has a process that works for them doesn’t mean it will be best for you.
Building a Client Base and Finding People to Sell Coffee To
- Sell to Family and Friends: Initially offer your roasted coffee to people you know. Gather feedback and refine your product.
- Farmers Markets: Start selling at local farmers’ markets. This not only helps to build a local following but also offers direct customer feedback and makes it easier to understand what your customers do and don’t like. Selling at a farmers market was the first big step in scaling for me
- Building Relationships: Network with local cafes and businesses that might be interested in selling your coffee. Local coffee shops and local boutiques can be a great way to start into wholesale coffee sales. Don’t underestimate the value of wholesale – you will likely not be able to make a jump to a commercial roaster until you have a few wholesale accounts.
- Online Presence: Create a website and use social media to sell your coffee and tell your roasting story.
- Participate in Coffee Festivals: Depending on where you live, participating in a regional coffee festival can be a great way to meet other coffee roasters, find new customers, and get your coffee in front of a lot of new people. This was my second big step in scaling. When I started attending the Columbus Coffee Festival I had to commit to roasting more coffee and making my operation more efficient, and then I got to learn from that experience.
Maximize Home Roaster Capacity
Before the big leap to commercial roasting, ensure you’ve maximized your output on the home roaster. When demand consistently exceeds your roasting capacity, it’s time to consider the transition to using a commercial roaster.
Check for Roast-On-Demand Options
I got lucky in that I stumbled upon First Crack in Cleveland right before my first stint at the Columbus Coffee Festival and shortly before I got my first wholesale coffee order. See if you can find any coffee roasters or roasting facilities nearby that would let you roast from time to time on commercial equipment. This also gives you useful insight into the how-to’s of roasting on a commercial coffee roaster, as most of them function differently from home coffee roasters.
Stay in Touch
If you are at some point along this journey, feel free to reach out with questions or feedback! Head over to my contact form and send me a message!
if you enjoyed this article and would like to support a great local Cleveland coffee roaster you can buy a bag of coffee.