Hope Springs Eternal: A Fresh Crop of New Roasters Emerged This Year

While the COVID-19 pandemic made 2020 an unspeakably brutal year for many existing coffee roasting companies large and small — especially those that leaned heavily on wholesale — a fresh crop of roasting startups managed to sprout up through the trampled dirt.

A number of these new roasters are leveraging their founders’ personal and familial connections to specific coffee-producing farms, resulting in near-direct connections between consumers in the United States and certain producers in Kenya, Guatemala, Panama, Honduras, Colombia and more.

Brands also emerged from the world’s youngest Q Grader, a roaster that makes music videos out of his roast profiles, and a company that roasts-to-order from a traveling coffee truck.