Overcoming Bad Coffee Experience

[ensoluna]

Wow! That is so unfortunate!! My fiancé and his family is from Guatemala. We are going in the next few months and I am so excited to be returning because I have more of a coffee background now Such a beautiful country!

yes, it is the most beautiful country in central america. by the way, where in Guatemala your family from? I work in Quetzaltenango!

 

[LoveCoffeeLife]

I'm afraid you're hooked now, there's no going back for you,

Glad they made it right for you, smaller companies tend to give better customer service as they have more to loose.

You're right about that, I am totally hooked. Yes, that's true with small companies but I feel like this owner just loves providing a great service as well. It's a Christian based company and I feel his heart is in it. I had the chance to speak to him directly and he was really cool and concerned that I got ground coffee when I asked for whole bean.

 

[CoffeeHappyHour]

Where are you at Topher? I live in Key Largo (well, in two more weeks -- i've been hanging out in Miami for the past year waiting to get down there). My first round of living in Miami years ago would bring me to Palm Beach and Broward county weekly, but I barely go up there unless I have a good reason now. Coffee is a very good reason. I've been a barista off and on for the past 15 years, but most of the time I am simply a coffee enthusiast who visits shops across the US/Canada/Overseas.

I am very interested in the art and craft of roasting, currently. I've visited many roasters with retail shops attached before, of course, but always with the anticipation of getting my drink on. I never fully paid attention to roasting since I was more interested in the end result. I'd love to visit roastery for a tour if that invitation extends to people who just show up with one post on here (I swear I had an older account, but I cannot figure it out).

Thanks!
Ela Anderson
@coffeeHappyHour on IG

 

[CoffeeHappyHour]

Twice I overcame bad coffee experiences by ending up as a Barista at the shop. LOL I righted the wrongs that were done to my drinks by doing them as best as possible for the customers who happened to come in during my 16-24 hours of presence at the shops.

Additionally, recently a new bakery opened up here in South Florida with obviously a lot of money and effort spent on the shiny shop. A young eager baker opened it and invested in the best La Marzocco machine and grinders with Coulter Culture beans to serve as part of their cafe. I watched in horror as the very timid barista killed our drinks. I couldn't even drink mine. So I FB messaged the baker owner and advised her that her staff needs additional training from CC and noted the things I saw wrong. I haven't been back to see if they have improved -- it left such a bad taste in my mouth (literally) that I don't even consider them for baked goods either.

Is the shop you ordered from (and received grown instead of whole) in Michigan, by any chance?

 

[LoveCoffeeLife]

Twice I overcame bad coffee experiences by ending up as a Barista at the shop. LOL I righted the wrongs that were done to my drinks by doing them as best as possible for the customers who happened to come in during my 16-24 hours of presence at the shops.

Additionally, recently a new bakery opened up here in South Florida with obviously a lot of money and effort spent on the shiny shop. A young eager baker opened it and invested in the best La Marzocco machine and grinders with Coulter Culture beans to serve as part of their cafe. I watched in horror as the very timid barista killed our drinks. I couldn't even drink mine. So I FB messaged the baker owner and advised her that her staff needs additional training from CC and noted the things I saw wrong. I haven't been back to see if they have improved -- it left such a bad taste in my mouth (literally) that I don't even consider them for baked goods either.

Is the shop you ordered from (and received grown instead of whole) in Michigan, by any chance?

Oh boy, yeah that's usually the response when having a bad experience normally the shop doesn't get another chance. Be interesting to see how things are for them now and if they took your suggestions to heart. *hint* Its awesome that you empathize with the customer and are committed to making a good experience for others. No, they are not in Michigan they are in Texas. They were very kind about it and I'm glad I stuck with it because the coffee is pretty awesome! I wrote a review in the review thread.

 

[LoveCoffeeLife]

Ensoluna, I'm on to my next coffee brand and have done an amateur cupping. It's a Guatemala Huehuetenango. I've never purchased from this company before and they have pretty decent ratings as far as the product is concerned. One of my concerns is freshness and working with an online company how can I ensure that what I'm actually getting is fresh coffee? I've done that baggie thing as well and not much gas coming from these beans. So what do you do in cases like this?

 

[Duffyjr]

Make sure you don't have a hole in the plastic bag. Do the beans have a date on the bag when they were roasted? I decided I'm only buying beans that have a roasted on date, but also realize that's not a guarantee, they could put any date on there they want, so I'm interested in hearing some more on how you tell if the coffee is freshly roasted. I just started trying different vendors and this is a concern.

The other thing I never see on these sites is them mentioning how old the green beans are they are using.

Please help us out here guys!

 

[ensoluna]

Ensoluna, I'm on to my next coffee brand and have done an amateur cupping. It's a Guatemala Huehuetenango. I've never purchased from this company before and they have pretty decent ratings as far as the product is concerned. One of my concerns is freshness and working with an online company how can I ensure that what I'm actually getting is fresh coffee? I've done that baggie thing as well and not much gas coming from these beans. So what do you do in cases like this?

there is no way of ensuring the coffee you get is fresh specially via on line. many cases, these on line companies buy "old beans" which means more than year old green beans, at much cheaper pricing and roast and sell them at slightly discounted pricing, but they will never tell you that they are selling bad old beans.

also, they try to hide the old bean flavors, so they tend to roast dark.

Getting the "freshly roasted beans" is one thing, but no one can tell those green beans are too old green beans.

 

[LoveCoffeeLife]

Make sure you don't have a hole in the plastic bag. Do the beans have a date on the bag when they were roasted? I decided I'm only buying beans that have a roasted on date, but also realize that's not a guarantee, they could put any date on there they want, so I'm interested in hearing some more on how you tell if the coffee is freshly roasted. I just started trying different vendors and this is a concern.

The other thing I never see on these sites is them mentioning how old the green beans are they are using.

Please help us out here guys!

The plastic bags don't have any holes. I did more than one pouch to be sure. Also, there is no roasted on date: only a "074" on the bottom of the bag not sure what that means then there's an expiration date of 03/01/2018. That's the extent of it. While I was cupping there wasn't much of that fine foam either. I think I may have gotten a bad bag. That's a good point on the green beans I'd been considering that as well. I was wondering if they are like other beans and considered to have a long shelf life?

 

[LoveCoffeeLife]

there is no way of ensuring the coffee you get is fresh specially via on line. many cases, these on line companies buy "old beans" which means more than year old green beans, at much cheaper pricing and roast and sell them at slightly discounted pricing, but they will never tell you that they are selling bad old beans.

also, they try to hide the old bean flavors, so they tend to roast dark.

Getting the "freshly roasted beans" is one thing, but no one can tell those green beans are too old green beans.

Ah.. ok so the green beans are viable up to a year? I was wondering about that when I started to get serious about learning coffee. As I mentioned to DuffyJr, there wasn't much of that fine foam during the cupping and read that that may be an indicator as well that the beans aren't so fresh. Maybe I need to give it more time in the bag it's only been in there since Friday and Saturday. So does that mean anything? I also bought an artisan roast called Dark Nebula and I placed it in a bag on Friday and the Guatemalan Huehuetenago in the bad on Saturday. There is a bit more gas in the Guatemalan bags than in the Dark Nebula bags. I'm at a loss as to whether I should say something to the company or not.