The Next Chapter for TCC

Hey Friends!

It’s been a minute since I’ve checked in! I know I’ve been quiet lately, but we’ve been working on a huge project. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t like to talk about exciting stuff until I know I can deliver on it. Imagine what it’d be like if it fell through? I’d be hinting at something really cool for months and then I just say “oh never mind, just kidding.” That would drive me and you crazy! But it's finally official:

We're joining forces with our favorite importer, De La Finca Coffee!

Thanks to your support, The Captain’s Coffee has grown a TON over the last few years! There are few things as satisfying as watching this business that we’ve poured our hearts and souls into take off and we’re so grateful to all of you for that. But the truth is we’ve always been a VERY small operation. I mean, it’s literally just myself and my better half, Britt. By the end of 2023, we realized we had to expand operations considerably to keep up.

So as a small, independent family business, we reached out to another small (but slightly bigger), independent family business. De La Finca Coffee has always impressed us: they started from the ground up as farmers and producers and decided to start importing the coffee from their family farms in Honduras themselves rather than relying on another importer. As they grew, they built relationships with farms from Mexico to Brazil and began importing for these partner farm’s coffee based on farm gate pricing. If you don’t know what farm gate pricing is, trust me when I say it’s rare in the coffee business! That relationship focus permeates every aspect of their business. They have already made us feel like family and that makes me feel confident that they will do the same for each of you.

So now that The Captain’s Coffee is a branch of De La Finca Coffee, allow me to introduce you to the folks who will be behind and in front of the scenes moving forward!

Nelson Amador (pictured to the right, of course) is the Owner and Founder of De La Finca Coffee! When he’s not visiting his family’s farms in Honduras, he’s visiting DLF’s partner farms all over the Americas to ensure harvests are meeting expectations. And when he’s not there, he’s here in DLF’s cupping room where they sample coffee nearly daily to check quality and to seek out future potential sources of greens to add to the lineup.

Ruben and Alejandra are at the head of daily operations here at DLF and are now in charge of overseeing fulfillment at TCC! They are some of the most hardworking and caring folks I’ve met in the coffee business. They have an intuitive knowledge of coffee that some of us will take a lifetime to achieve yet they are approaching home roasting with a level of excitement and humility that has impressed and humbled me as well!  When you’re not talking to me, you’ll be talking to one of them and I know you’ll be in good hands.

But what about me and Britt? Well Britt has taken the opportunity to return to her original profession so she’ll be a true home roaster hobbyist again just like many of you! Don’t worry, I’ll still be leaning on her for second opinions on my coffee evaluations and inspiration for what coffee nerds care about most, so she’ll always be part of what we do here at TCC.

And me? Well I’ll still be here in a very real sense! Sure, I’m not calling all the shots these days, but I’ll still be fielding your roasting questions, evaluating coffee, helping manage the website and hopefully making more videos to help home roasters! I won’t be the only person answering emails or phone calls, but if you email or call in and you wanna speak to me? Just ask :) I ain’t goin’ anywhere anytime soon!

And if you’re concerned that TCC will only be carrying our (now) Direct Trade and Farm gate partner coffees from DLF, let me assure you that one of our goals with this transition was to expand our offerings! One of the benefits of DLF being an Importer is that they can also broker and trade with other importers as well as work directly with source brokers (folks who don’t import but act as exporters at origin). De La Finca brings ALL of that to the table. That means we’ll not only have coffee from DLF's family and partner farms, we'll also have access to coffees all over the world with better pricing and better curation than ever before.

So in summary, our new physical headquarters is now right next door to De La Finca headquarters in Holly Springs, NC. Stop in any time and meet the whole new crew! Our goal together is to meet coffee roasters in their journey no matter how big or small they are. We want to provide coffee and a personal experience whether you’re a home roaster buying a couple pounds a month or a big, professional roaster buying 1000s of pounds a month. There’s no difference to us – this is a family and a community and each of us matters. A rising tide raises all ships!

- David

OH, I almost forgot! We're having a sale to celebrate!

DLF is introducing a bunch of new coffees including 4 Colombia Microlots which will be on sale for the next week! Check em out here and grab some while they're discounted. Enjoy a cup with us and celebrate the next chapter of TCC :)

If you'd like to learn a bit more about De La Finca Coffee in their own words, check out their website and be sure to follow their adventures on Instagram where they share informative posts on coffee growing and processing!