StickerGiant Chats Coffee Roasting and Bicycle Delivery with The Coffee Ride
In this Stickers on the Mic episode Hamish sits down with Josh from The Coffee Ride, a new coffee roaster from Boulder, CO with a unique approach to the subscription service for quality coffee - delivery by bicycle and direct trade for delicious coffee starting at the source.
Want to Read it Instead? Check out the Full Transcription Below!
[music]
[00:00:07] Announcer: Welcome to the Stickers on the Mic podcast, brought to you by stickergiant.com. If you're joining us for the first time, welcome. If you are a regular listener, thanks for tuning in as we talk about business, growth, and marketing with our customers.
[music]
[00:00:25] Hamish: Hello and welcome back to the Stickers on the Mic podcast. My name's Hamish and I'll be your host for this episode. I'm really happy to introduce my guest this week, Josh Crane, owner, and founder of The Coffee Ride, a Boulder-based coffee roaster celebrating the love cycling and coffee. Josh, welcome to the show and please kick things off by just introducing yourself and explaining to our listeners a little bit about what The Coffee Ride does.
[00:00:49] Josh Crane: Awesome. I appreciate you guys having me on here. This is pretty fantastic. The Coffee Ride is a Boulder-based company that I started out in my garage about four years ago, where I found my love for coffee roasting. We do bike delivery, basically like the milkman of the coffee world, with fresh roasted coffee that shows up on your doorstep or workplace every Thursday, for right now.
[00:01:20] Hamish: Cool. We've had the quick intro to the business, so we are going to jump back into more detail about that. I would like to start with your background. What led you up to The Coffee Ride? What was your professional background before you started doing this?
[00:01:35] Josh: I was in pursuit of going to medical school. After I actually graduated college, I went back and did all prerequisites and stuff like that. Basically, from all the studying for MCATs and the amount of time that you are just head in the book, I was just hitting coffee shop after coffee shop after coffee shop. I started to develop my palate and realized that not all coffee is created equal.
Then, from working in hospitals, I decided I wanted to go work in a field where I rode my bike more. I started working in the cycling industry where I actually rode my bike less, imagine that? At that time, in between, I started experimenting with home roasting for about two and a half, three years. I started with a little popcorn popper with a meat thermometer stuck in there and started buying green beans. It just basically ended up being where the best part of my day was my bike commuting to work.
Then we had a pretty bad office coffee where I was working. It just bombed everybody out so I started bringing in my own coffee, making the Chemex every morning. It was the best part of my day and it was the best part of everybody else's day. I was like, "Man, I want to do this for everybody, forever." So, I was like, "Let's do this, let's ride roast coffee and ride bikes around town."
[00:03:12] Hamish: That's cool. So it's really almost like a hobby, developed into a passion and something you brought to your co-workers and you are like, "I've got a good idea."
[00:03:21] Josh: Yes. It was just something where I was it it's-- I love coffee roasting so much and the science that goes into it because it's basically just a bunch of chemical reactions and controlling. It's a lot like cooking. If I can take two things that I love, and even if it's just riding around and delivering one bag, it was worth it because I was going out and riding my bike anyway.
[00:03:48] Hamish: Yes, I guess it's every cyclist's dream to be able to ride their bike more.
[00:03:52] Josh: Yes, and when you're not-- It's one thing if you're good enough to be a professional athlete but when you're not good enough to be a professional athlete but you have that passion behind what you're doing, you just try to figure out how you can still get paid to go [chuckles] do those things that you love to do. This is one of my ways to be able to-- You know the coffee roasting and being the best part of somebody's day, when you drop off a bag of coffee, that fulfills the need of why I wanted to go to med school and help people. This definitely, kind of, along those same lines where I'm getting to be a part of somebody's life and make it better; instead of with medicine, it's with coffee.
[00:04:34] Hamish: Yes, that makes sense. I feel a lot of people can relate. The best part of their morning is probably that cup of coffee [laughs].
[00:04:38] Josh: Yes, that's the one thing Folgers got right is, the best part of waking up is coffee in your cup, not necessarily Folgers.
[00:04:46] Hamish: We've got where the passion came from, so tell us about those early days as you transitioned from doing this as a side project to actually making it into a functional business.
[00:04:58] Josh: You know, I feel like a lot of it is just a mindset of the individual; just like flipping a switch and deciding that this is what you actually want to do as a business. That's always the big jump, is convincing yourself, not necessarily other people. Once you convince yourself then you're like, "Okay, let's do this." You just try everything. I printed up door flyers and I walked around and I was like, "Let's do different pods of Boulder to do the bike delivery." I was hitting up neighborhoods and knocking on doors and stuff like that. It's just the grind I guess.
[00:05:43] Hamish: Yes, those were early days. That was your marketing strategy, it was to just be out there on your bike, actually knocking on people's doors.
[00:05:50] Josh: Yes.
[00:05:51] Hamish: Was it, "Do you want to buy coffee or you want to sign up for a subscription?" How did that work?
[00:05:56] Josh: I'm an outgoing introvert. I don't ever really want to bother people. I made up 5,000 door flyers and put them on doors. If it's a Saturday or something like that, I don't really want to bother somebody when they're actually enjoying their morning.
One of the big things I did was, every Friday morning I would make a couple of air pots and ride down on the bike path, down on Goose street bike path and just give free coffee out to people especially like when it started getting colder and people make bad decisions and they're wearing shorts and it's like 40° out on their commute. They're like, "Oh my god."
I still see people today on bike to work day and stop, they're like, "I met you four years ago on the bike path and I was freezing and you gave me a hot cup of coffee." It's like those are the things that propel you forward to keep going and doing stuff. They're just pretty sweet.
[00:06:56] Hamish: Yes, that is fulfilling, that want to help people and coming back four years later. That person's probably a customer for life now which is an awesome story. I know when we came over to your place and we shot the intro video, you talked about selling your car to finance that initial setup. Why don't you tell everyone a little bit more about how that happened and how that propelled you to go all in. You buy a bigger coffee roaster, that kind of thing.
[00:07:25] Josh: Yes, that was the defining moment, was buying a commercial coffee roaster. They're not inexpensive and that time I had a pretty all right Subaru and sold that, bought a coffee roaster. There was a roaster up in Glenwood Springs that was upgrading and I bought his roaster. That’s an epic story on itself driving through a snowstorm, trying to get it back down to Boulder but there is never on rest when you own a small business and you're trying to get something off the ground.
Yes, sold the car, bought a coffee roaster, bought a $800 Toyota Forerunner and just crossed my fingers that that thing lasted me through over the years and pretty much just rode my bike everywhere else. It's not like a really needed a car at that time so it worked out.
[00:08:20] Hamish: Yes, and it goes back to that thing you said about making that decision to be like, "I'm doing this. Goodbye car, here's my coffee roaster, now in business."
[00:08:31] Josh: Yes, and it's funny the way that like, once you get the ball rolling, it's like you're still not 100% convinced that this is what you should be doing. But then what's funny is suddenly you have this like, "Oh crap." moment where, now you've got customers and then you're like, "Okay, so now I'm a business." You can't just stop one day and go, "I don't really think I want to do this anymore." Because, then you've got people depending on you and you just keep going, you just figure it out all the time, which is always interesting.
[00:09:05] Hamish: That's a very interesting take. Actually, I never thought about the responsibility to your customers and obviously, you're doing it. You know you don't want to go out business, you don't want to let people down in that sense who've come to support you and love your product.
[00:09:20] Josh: It's a symbiotic relationship where you're providing a service and it comes back to you that they're depending on this service and you're just working with each other and it's pretty cool. You have to honor what the customers been supporting you with.
[00:09:41] Hamish: Yes, it's almost like a little investment from those early customers that they are putting their faith in a small business. You always take a chance with a small business. You're like, "How is the product going to be good? Is it going to be reliable?" I think you really probably come to appreciate those first few customers that you got.
[00:09:58] Josh: Yes, you're never prepared when you are starting a small business. I remember, I thought I had every single thing dialed. I was like, "Alright, Josh, you're going to do this, you're going to go out, and you're going to start pitching your business and your coffee." Then it was like, it seems like every single thing that you didn't think about people ask for. It was like, I had five, six drip coffees that were dialed. Then it was like, as soon as I would walk into an office, they would be like, "Do you have espresso?" I was like, "Oh, man, I didn't even think about that." Then, I had to go and research and spend another six months bringing different beans in and trial and research and sampling in order to get that dialed.
Then it was like, I was like, "Sweet, I got espresso, let's go out and let's hammer this again." Then it was, "Do you have decaf?" Decaf is a whole other roasting process. It's completely different from everything else. I was like, "Back to the drawing board." It was basically a year later then I was actually like, "Sweet. Now I'm ready." Then it's logistics and trying to figure out how to-- For example, I used to give out Tupperware to my original customers and have them put that out in order to put the coffee bags in. Then that wasn't really working and people weren't putting it out.
I figured out a way to do compostable poly bags so that that can keep the coffee safe from all the elements. Then basically, every single thing that I'm giving the customer can go back. Besides the little tin tie that closes it, everything else that I give you is compostable. It's a totally sustainable process that takes a little time to figure out. As long as that's at your forefront of importance, then you can make it happen.
[00:11:49] Hamish: I know that's a big part of your business. I want to jump into that in just a sec. While we round out this founder story, do you have any tips for other small businesses or start up, something that you wish somebody had told you before you went out there and jumped into it?
[00:12:04] Josh: Man, I always feel like I need to know more. If there's something that you feel that you're passionate enough about, because business isn't what-- I'm sure people have heard this millions of times but if you're working for somebody else, people will say that you're chained to your desk but when you have your own business, basically, all that you're doing is you're trading out desks. Now, you're chained to your own desk, except you pretty much work all the time. If you're going into business thinking that you're going to have a bunch of free time and it's going to be easier, that's not the reason to start doing it.
If you're that passionate about something where you're like, "I don't even care." The driving force isn't financial, but it's for a better good, I say, "Go for it and make it happen and you'll figure it out if you're really that passionate about it." The best thing I've ever done.
[00:13:10] Hamish: I was going to say, do what you're passionate about and then you're not going to get bored. Do it for the right reasons.
[00:13:17] Josh: Every single day is different. You never know what's going to throw at you. If you're that type of-- It's definitely a personality thing too. If you're that person that you never feel like you're given enough responsibilities and you just always want to constantly take more on, man, start something, but it's definitely not easy.
[00:13:39] Hamish: Cool. Let's jump into this. What makes you different to other coffee roasters?
[00:13:47] Josh: I would say, there's a lot of really,really great coffee out there. I'm definitely not the type of coffee roaster that is barista competitions and roasting competitions and stuff like that and battling for who has the best coffee. Because in my opinion, coffee is such a subjective thing that there really isn't a best. There's what's best for you. When I first started roasting coffee, I got into it because I couldn't find a coffee that I really liked from somebody else. I was like, "Let's try this out and see what happens."
I think that the coffee that I roast is the best coffee that I've ever had, which is the benefit of being able to roast your own coffee and source whatever you bring in. But I definitely think that what makes The Coffee Ride different is the experience that's involved. My goal is to, like what we were talking about earlier, about going into an office and taking a whole bunch of people that are bummed on the really bad coffee that's being served and wanting to go ride their bikes or be outside or whatever your happy place is. Coffee is one of those things where you can make a cup of coffee and be reflected back to your happy place.
I really like the idea of The Coffee Ride being your happy place and then wherever you are and you can go make a cup of coffee, you're instantly reflected back to whatever your happy places, whether it's--
To backpedal, if you're not a hardcore cyclist, and you don't know what a coffee ride is, coffee ride's actually, there's bike racing, there's training, there's commuting, there's all these different things, but The coffee ride is my happy place. That's like there's no agenda, it's all about exploration adventure, and you just stopping at coffee shops, and hanging out with your friends and drinking coffee. Then you go ride your bike some more and you find new trails, and you're laughing and having a good time. That's the kind of experience that I want to share with other people. Then, with every single sip, you reflect it back to that, even if you're having a bad day or something like that.
I think that's what separates everything. The bike delivery is super, super rad. Over the last four and a half years, I've ridden, just on Thursdays alone, over 12,000 miles, which is more than people put on their car in a year. The environmental impact is huge, too. For individuals, that reflection is where I think what makes us really different.
[00:16:44] Hamish: Your morning coffee, before you go to work, takes you back to your Sunday morning bike ride when you just had that first cup of coffee--
[00:16:51] Josh: It just makes you think of the weekend. You just wake up five minutes early-- I go to bed excited to wake up to have coffee in the morning. I just want to share that feeling with everybody else because it's like, coffee is rad, and we should be stocked on life.
[00:17:07] Hamish: I know, obviously you've mentioned you're delivering by bike, which is super cool. 12,000 miles is astonishing just on delivering coffee. I know you touched on it before, about having ethically sourced coffee beans. Talk about your distribution from farmers to your product.
[00:17:29] Josh: Cool, we use direct trade coffee. Direct trade is a really cool way to source. It's like the newer version of labeling something organic or fair trade. We're getting to the point in this world where big companies are now being able to financially support getting those certifications through the FDA. What this direct trade method is, is there's only one person in between me and the farmer themselves. Which is a really cool process because--
That's a skill set all on its own, is sourcing, but through partnerships with this distributor company out in California, they're able to work with the farms, educate them on what our coffee culture is, then, we're able to get very,very small micro lots of special coffees because we don't need these huge quantities that say, larger coffee brands would need. We get better coffee, they get education as well as there aren't as many people involved in the process. The people that are actually doing all the hard work and the picking, the farmers, get paid better, which is super important. Because, with the environmental changes and stuff like that, coffee is in this limbo place where we need to support where it's coming from.
What's cool is using the direct trade method and then the artisan part of coffee roasters is sourcing and bringing in. You've got the ability to choose who you support and whether it's a hundred percent women owned coffee farm and processing center to something that's somewhere where there's birds that live there, and it's a community where they're farming for their community and not just coffee for consumers. That's what the whole thing is. I started this business for a hundred percent winning process for everybody from start to end. We just do everything in our power to do that and keep that going.
[00:19:48] Hamish: Absolutely. I think in good business, everybody can win. You don't need to shortchange anybody any step in the process if you're doing it-- [crosstalk]
[00:19:56] Josh: Like everything, everything that I've done from the beginning has been an example. The 12,000 miles in four and a half years biking is just an example that small changes do make a big difference. That's one day a week. If everybody out there is able to ride one day a week, one day a month, once every six months, it does add up and make a difference. That's the same thing with business practices where everybody wins. It's very small changes that can make a huge difference on both ends of the farmer to the consumer. It's pretty cool. I’m stoked to be a part of it.
[00:20:34] Hamish: Obviously, local is a really big drive of your business. You're very locally present. Tell us a little about the subscription services, because that's a growing form of retail. We see a lot of customers doing subscription boxes and things like that. Why don't you talk a little bit more about that?
[00:20:53] Josh: Subscription service is pretty sweet. Like I said before, I'm pretty much like the milkman of the coffee world. My grandfather was a milkman. I'm slightly nostalgic for the olden days, where you knew the person that was delivering your local milk. It's just super appealing. This is like a modern take on that where you're getting a good or service that's locally sourced and roasted, you know the person that's delivering it.
Then, the delivery on Thursdays, you figure out what your coffee consumption is, and it's one of those commodities that you never really want to run out of. Because, running out of coffee on a Sunday morning when all you want to do is relax, is a bummer. It's just so nice to know that that's one last thing that you need to run to the grocery store for or worry about.
Then, the fact that it's freshly roasted the day before, every single week, you know you're getting a high-quality product too. Once again, it's that winning for everybody.
[00:22:02] Hamish: Yes, and the quality. I remember we talked and you were like, "I roast Wednesdays, deliver Thursdays." I'm like, "Cool, it's super fresh. It's not going to have been sat in a warehouse somewhere until it gets distributed."
[00:22:13] Josh: I didn't even start realizing how old some of the coffee was until I started-- Most people just assume when you go to a grocery store say that-- I don't want to bash grocery stores because I'm definitely in Lucky's here in Boulder, but you start looking at larger grocery store chains and start looking at roast dates, the biggest one is, if there's no roast date on the coffee, you know it's really old. Then if there's a roast date on there, some of them are eight, nine months off roast and then it's got another year of shelf life that they say. Then it's like some of them are pre-ground and it's just like, "Man, life's too short for bad coffee."
[laughter]
It's just one of those things that it's-- I don't know. First thing you can do is get out of bed on the right side. Second thing you can do to have a good day is to make a really great cup of coffee. I just want to be part of that.
[00:23:14] Hamish: I agree 100%. The bicycle delivery is obviously very cool. It's a really unique approach. We talked about the mileage and it's like a little bit of environmental factor there and the personalized touch that you have with your customers. How are you expanding with that?
[00:23:34] Josh: I currently have a good friend, Neyo, who's helping me out with the residential delivery stuff currently. We're just trying to figure out how to expand the bicycle delivery. The next step is looking at different local markets. The way that Boulder is set up is the real estate has gotten so expensive that there's all these surrounding towns now that are really up and coming and really rad. They're the original Boulder crowd that are moving to these outskirts. We'd like to find different hubs in each of these locations to do drop off points so that everybody can get bike-delivered coffee in this other town. Then just have somebody else that's managing these accounts in the different towns.
It's really exciting. It's cool because there's so many talented people out there and so many people that just want to go and get paid to go ride their bike and I want to support that. It's like the same thing with how I just wanted to get paid to go ride my bike but wasn't good enough. I want to be able to support other people being able to do that. It's fun, you spend a couple of hours out riding bikes and dropping coffee off like a little elf, dropping gifts off on people's front doors, that's just pretty cool. I just want to share that with other people.
[00:25:01] Hamish: Again, it's just doing something for the good of somebody else but also enjoying it while you do it. What's it like as a business owner taking on your first staff?
[00:25:14] Josh: It's super scary. Luckily, Neyo is a really rad guy, and I've known him for a while now. That was an easier transition. I do get emails and stuff. Not a ton, but I've gotten a handful of emails in the past being like, "Let me know when you need people to deliver for you. I want to come deliver coffee for you." Because, they just believe in the concept and what's happening.
Getting a new employee is scary. There's definitely some things where I'll get text messages and be like, "Hey, what happened? I didn't get coffee today." I'll be at my house and I have to try to figure out like, it's eight o'clock at night and I need to go roast a bag of coffee for this individual and go drop it off because it didn't get done. It's a step in the right direction but it's never easy.
[00:26:08] Hamish: Definitely, it's one of those challenges I think every startup is going to face. At some point, every founder is going to have employee number one and many more.
[00:26:17] Josh: It's fun. I have this vision of wherever I'm roasting, individuals show up and we drink coffee. We have everybody's delivery route calculated, and it's like, "Be safe, go have fun and drink some coffee."
[00:26:35] Hamish: It's about having that morning coffee with all your delivery bikers and then everybody going off and having their coffee ride, which is cool. We talked about locally, how are you advertising and marketing locally?
[00:26:51] Josh: Just trying to be everywhere. A big thing of what I do is just riding on group rides and networking that way. The cycling community here in Boulder is super cool and really tight-knit. Pretty much if you ask, people will give you answers. It's cool being at bike races and just sharing with other people, and stickers. Stickers are good, everybody loves stickers [laughs].
[00:27:20] Hamish: I know your delivery bike has the great sign on the side of it. For anybody who wants to see, the video will go off on Facebook so you should check that out as well. It's cool to see. Watching you ride around on that, I was like, "It's the perfect piece of advertising." You're on the bike, you are towing the trailer and there's like The Coffee Ride, sign right there.
[00:27:40] Josh: People roll the windows down all the time. They're like, "What are you? What do you do?"
[laughter]
It's always fun.
[00:27:48] Hamish: You're opening up a conversation. It's perfect, you get to explain to somebody. They're not just seeing an ad, they're getting a first-hand experience, which is cool.
[00:27:55] Josh: Which is important to tell that story and being a riding billboard is cool. It all helps tell that story.
[00:28:05] Hamish: I think it's a good tip for any business whether your online or local. Be locally present as a business because those people are going to be the core of your business. Obviously, it's very central to you but I think that applies to any business. I think even here at StickerGiant, we do so much in Colorado. That's part of the heart of our business is local. People will always want to support local and I think that's happening more and more.
[00:28:31] Josh: That's one of the reasons why I started going to StickerGiant because I remember the little spot in Hygiene when I used to ride my bike past there all the time and I remember seeing the StickerGiant sign when you guys are super tiny. It's cool to watch everybody grow and grow together. Community is important, it's like you’ve got to support the community that supports you.
[00:28:49] Hamish: Absolutely. We talked local, how is your online sales in comparison? How does that balance out with your businesses? You have a website as well?
[00:28:59] Josh: Yes, definitely. It's a super easy process on the website to sign up for coffee and stuff. It's slowly trickling outside of the state. It's pretty cool when all-- I had somebody order a gift pack that's in Australia and I was like, "I didn't even know I had international shipping setup." [laughs] I was like, "I guess that's cool if somebody-- I like the local thing but if somebody's interested outside of the state, that's awesome." It's all about sharing that experience with more people.
It's been a give or take too. When I first started, I never wanted to do shipping at all. Then having the completely sustainable delivery system and the compostability and stuff like that. Shipping outside of Colorado was-- I'm okay with that now, it's give or take.
[00:29:53] Hamish: Potentially, it's a solution now until maybe you have a delivery service on different states or cities. You might expand at some point beyond that. You have to do what works for you as a business at that time.
[00:30:06] Josh: If somebody wants that experience, who am I to say no if they want to enjoy that?
[00:30:15] Hamish: Are you doing much advertising online? What's your online presence like? Do you really let your local presence feed your website?
[00:30:22] Josh: It's pretty grassroots. It's conversations amongst other people. Instagram has been pretty good. That's a good way to be. I love the idea of being able to share pictures, whenever. Pictures' a thousand words. The pictures tell the story. It's been a good way but it's mostly people telling other people about it.
[00:30:53] Hamish: Word of mouth is the most powerful form of advertising, I think. You trust your friends to recommend good businesses
[00:31:00] Josh: I'm a terrible salesperson. I always have an easier time selling other people's stuff because to me it comes off as pretentious if you're like, "I have the best product in the world." If other people say that, that's cool. [laughs]
[00:31:18] Hamish: Exactly.
[00:31:19] Josh: I mean it's just a lot more meaningful if your customer says that than if you do, so let other people tell the story.
[00:31:27] Hamish: It's good you touched on Instagram there. I know the bicycle community and Instagram they go hand in hand. It's probably great to be in the bicycle community and running a business with how active they are on Instagram. I think that's a good tip for other small businesses. I hear it a lot where people are like, "I didn't know what to do on social media." Like, "What should you post?" It's like, try and just be authentic, show the behind the scenes of your business. Be a real business because people buy from people they don't buy from businesses.
[00:31:59] Josh: It's super important, especially for me, transparency is huge. If you've got nothing to hide then put it all out there and just be real about it. Post stuff that you're actually doing. If you're doing rad stuff, people will want to see it.
[00:32:18] Hamish: Definitely. Let's talk stickers. We mentioned a little earlier but you're using our stickers which is awesome. How do you use those to promote your business?
[00:32:28] Josh: I just worked with one of your designers, Alan Peters. He did a great job on a packaging reboot designed for us. We've got a ton of different little icon images that make up the package. It's cool because each one of those tells the story of how The Coffee Ride got started and what we do. Once again, it's just like those images tell the entire story. It's cool because then we can pick out each one of those individual images and make those into stickers. By sticking those on water bottles and wherever, it's telling the story wherever you go which is pretty cool.
From a business standpoint, it's super important to have constant reminders, so stickers are a great way to engage with customers and then be like, "I put that sticker on my water bottle and that coffee was really, really good. I should probably order some more of that." It's a great way to have fun, get the word of mouth out.
[00:33:34] Hamish: Definitely. We always talk about them as little billboards that travel all over the place as little reminders for customers. If you have a cool sticker someone will say, "What was that?" "That's The Coffee Ride, you got to try this coffee. It's awesome." It really works.
[00:33:44] Josh: It's a great starting point for a conversation, which is sweet.
[00:33:48] Hamish: I think as well what I wanted to touch on was, Alan Peters, he was a previous guest. He's also our creative director here at StickerGiant, he does all of our branding but he did this awesome design for you that goes on your packaging. I love the way that the little images that make up that bigger design are being used as your stickers and then you've also done the design on these tote bags that you give out as well. I think that's an awesome tip for small businesses of how to get the most out of your design work. I'm sure for any small business owner will know design work is never cheap to do. You really got to get that longevity and use it for lots of different things.
[00:34:26] Josh: It's important when you're choosing a design or anything like that to have that thought process at the beginning. Being like, "Where can I take this?" Alan he's so smart. Every single time I'm like, "I have this idea." He comes up with something that's a thousand times better than the idea [laughs] I came to them with. He has that idea of like, "Hey, this is going to be the packaging and then this is what we can do to move forward with the branding."
I'll have an idea and be like, "Let's do this t-shirt." He's like, "Well that's not really brand relevant. We should stick to the colors that you used on the packaging." I'm like, "That's genius. That's why you're good at this and why this is your profession. I roast coffee. That's my deal. I should let you stick to your deal."
[00:35:21] Hamish: That's pretty another great business tip, designers that they're professionals, they're really good at what they do.
[00:35:25] Josh: Totally.
[00:35:27] Hamish: I know Alan's great because when he does his design work, he designs with stickers in mind. I think just from working from us, it's been his thing. It's when you do your logos and stuff like that, think about how it's going to be on a sticker because stickers are really powerful especially for marketing.
[00:35:41] Josh: Totally.
[00:35:43] Hamish: What's next? We're going to wrap it up here pretty soon. What's your plans for the rest of 2018, big plans for 2019 and maybe any events or things that you're going to be out where people could find you?
[00:35:56] Josh: I always try to do a little everything. We work with 63rd Street Farms and do CSA pickup and we do coffee sales out there. Basically, it's grocery shopping from your local farm and you can get everything that you need at that one location. That's wrapping up. Those guys are great. I'm going to be doing coffee with La Sportiva out at Outdoor Retailer this year.
I think that's next month. Then moving forward just looking at expanding into different areas. I'm in the lucky East North Boulder location and looking to expand into all of their other markets too. Mainly it's keeping the bicycle portion at the forefront and trying to figure out a way to move that forward into other communities is definitely the most important part.
[00:36:53] Hamish: Awesome. Well finally, if you'd just like to shout out your social media handles and obviously your website so people can find you and check you out.
[00:37:02] Josh: Basically everything's @TheCoffeeRide. That's Instagram, Twitter, website, Facebook, all that good stuff.
[00:37:11] Hamish: Awesome. Well Josh, thank you for joining us today and sharing your story. It's been really fascinating. As a coffee drinker, I definitely learned a lot more about coffee roasting from hanging out with you, so thank you. For everyone listening, thank you very much for tuning in and more information about all our episodes is available at stickergiant.com/podcast. That's all from us today. Thanks for tuning in and remember every sticker has a story. What's yours?
[00:37:42] Announcer: Thanks for listening to the Stickers On the Mic Podcast brought to you by StickerGiant.com. You can download us on Itunes, Google Play, Soundcloud, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you enjoy what you're hearing please leave us a review. It helps us reach new listeners and share our customers' sticker stories. If you're inspired to create your own stickers or labels, head over to stickergiant.com to check out our options .
[music]
Thanks for listening to the Stickers on the Mic podcast brought to you by stickergiant.com. You can download us on iTunes, Google Play, SoundCloud or wherever you get your podcast.
If you enjoyed please leave us a review. It helps us reach new listeners and share customer sticker stories. Until next time we'll see you on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest at usernames stickergiant.
