Group Buy 2011 - Coava

donnacha

Anyone keen on getting another group buy going?

RE*AC*TOR

always fun

rymus

+1

SeaSide

I have someone in San Francisco for a little while if we want to order from there. On Reactors recommendation I tried blue bottle, ritual and another i cant remember the name of

Clinker

Ahhhhnnnghghghghgh coffee!

Fajitas!

Count me in

smackyB

Yes!

Fajitas!

If there's anything interesting in Seattle, myself and Rymus know a chap over there that could investigate.

Mr Magnolia

I'm in.

RE*AC*TOR

Fajitas! wrote: »

If there's anything interesting in Seattle, myself and Rymus know a chap over there that could investigate.

Seattle is weird. But! I would like to get my hands on a couple of bags of Vivace's Dolce (if your peeps can help).

It's the best espresso I had last year, despite looking like a bag of ****.

Other than that though (actually probably including that), Seattle can to varying degrees be a bit stuck in the past, having been eclipsed by other cities like Portland, Chicago, New York...

adrian522

sounds good....

Cableguy

I missed the last one and up for it this time round

snollup

Would also be interested.

Regular Latte

Yeah, I'd love to join in again.

Anyone know anything about Stumptown?

http://www.stumptowncoffee.com

RE*AC*TOR

Regular Latte wrote: »

Yeah, I'd love to join in again.

Anyone know anything about Stumptown?

http://www.stumptowncoffee.com

last group buy from them was a bit of a pain

Doodee

I've coworkers heading to Seattle at the end of the month. A lot of the stuff I've had from there isn't worth singing about. I'm intrigued by this Dolce though.

San Fran would be cool, though we did go intelli, wendle, maybe somewhere else? (Don't we have a member who was praising oz roasters?)

Wigsy

Count me in

arabica69

Count me in... I know it's a little 'off piste' and would likely be a challenge, but I'd love to try a few more coffees from Japan's Kentaro Maruyama if anyone has any contacts in that direction.

But I'm pretty cool with wherever is chosen.

Fajitas!

Doodee wrote: »

(Don't we have a member who was praising oz roasters?)

I don't think it was me, but I did try some really nice Oz Skyberry a while back.


I won't get a chance to get into 3FE until Monday at the earliest, but if anyone is in for the cupping on Sunday, ask Jordan about it - her boss in NZ sent it over AFAIK.

Regular Latte

arabica69 wrote: »

Count me in... I know it's a little 'off piste' and would likely be a challenge, but I'd love to try a few more coffees from Japan's Kentaro Maruyama if anyone has any contacts in that direction.

But I'm pretty cool with wherever is chosen.

I think that would be fun (IMO). Putting the website through google translate gives a bit of an idea. The element of unknown is kind of appealing.

RE*AC*TOR

Maruyama would rock the box. I'm giddy at the thought...

Colin might have a contact...

ArcticFox

Count me in! Loved the Christmas batch.

donnacha

+1 for Maruyama if it can be arranged

Doodee

donnacha wrote: »

+1 for Maruyama if it can be arranged

+1

arabica69

So who speaks Japanese???

Dave, did you ask Mr. Harmon or will I?

RE*AC*TOR

I've asked. It shouldn't be a problem, but may be quite expensive.

So a call may have to be made on that front.

Doodee

RE*AC*TOR wrote: »

I've asked. It shouldn't be a problem, but may be quite expensive.

So a call may have to be made on that front.

Is the delivery the expense or exchange rate?

I'm still game either way.

arabica69

I agree with RE*AC*TOR. Kentaro Maruyama buys some of the world's best (and expensive) coffees. You'll often see his name at the top of many the Cup of Excellence auction winners lists. He is also considered by many to be one of the world's best and most progressive roasters.

Regardless of shipping - which won't be cheap - the coffee itself will come at a premium. It's probably a good idea to firstly see if he's interested and then get a sense of what coffee he has to offer at at what price.

Shipping costs will also be relative to how much is ordered (if we decide to move forward).

alastair

We could just transfer the cost of purchase and shipping to sovereign debt and then default. Surely Colin's previous financial services expertise could come in useful for this kind of thing?

Will opt out of this one and pay the mortgage instead - but it all sounds very exciting!

Clinker

I think this is exactly the sort of thing a group buy should be about... just not too often, OK?

Regular Latte

arabica69 wrote: »

I agree with RE*AC*TOR. Kentaro Maruyama buys some of the world's best (and expensive) coffees. You'll often see his name at the top of many the Cup of Excellence auction winners lists. He is also considered by many to be one of the world's best and most progressive roasters.

Regardless of shipping - which won't be cheap - the coffee itself will come at a premium. It's probably a good idea to firstly see if he's interested and then get a sense of what coffee he has to offer at at what price.

Shipping costs will also be relative to how much is ordered (if we decide to move forward).

If it does go ahead (and I hope it does) it sounds like we won't be buying bags and bags of the stuff. In the spirit of coffee community maybe a few people would be interested to get together for a tasting of each others coffee??

Will someone get back to us with ballpark costs?

arabica69

I have met Kentaro a couple of time in the past - albeit briefly on both occasions. I have just sent him a Twitter message looking for a stock list and prices.

There is no guarantee that he mans the twitter address that I have or that he will respond (given that his entire twitter feed is in Japanese), so if anyone else has means of contacting him please feel free to pursue.

If it does go ahead (and I hope it does) it sounds like we won't be buying bags and bags of the stuff. In the spirit of coffee community maybe a few people would be interested to get together for a tasting of each others coffee??

This sounds like a great idea!

arabica69

Just heard from Kentaro. He is going email me his current list of coffees (in English with prices). I'll post it here as soon as I have it.

A little bit more on Mr. Maruyama and his involvement in the Cup of Excellence program can be found here.

RE*AC*TOR

If this Murayama thing turns out not to work out I'd offer up MadCap coffee as an alternative - http://www.madcapblog.com/

They are the one roaster featuring at TED 2011 who I have never tasted (the others being Intelli, Terroir, Counter Culture, Stumptown, Ritual, Square Mile, Hasbean).

Prisoner6409

Count me in for the Maruyama if your going ahead guys.

EI111

interested

arabica69

I still haven't heard back from Kentaro yet, but I do know he is running one of his famous barista camps at the moment... I think we should give it a few more days before considering other options.

Clinker

No rush!

Cableguy

Clinker wrote: »

No rush!

Yeah just edit the title of the thread to "Group Buy 2012"

Dahtac

New about the place, but would definitely be interested in getting in on this

donnacha

Me thinks we should look elsewhere at this point ...

arabica69

Given recent events in Japan I would agree with donnacha re. looking elsewhere at this point. Maybe REACTOR's suggestion of Madcap???

Dahtac

I like the sound of that

donnacha

Definitely on for Madcap! Anyone interested in throwing in their hat as chief organiser?

lazlo

I am interested

Regular Latte

This one seems to have fallen a bit flat which is a shame.

That said, we've just received a couple of hefty bills and the wife has called a moratorium on expensive coffee for a few weeks. Unfortunately I'm going to have to drop out at this point. If nothing has happened by the time I'm sorted I'll jump back in.

arabica69

I'm not sure if anyone has an appetite for a group buy at the moment, but I'm doing some business from the geniuses over at Portland's Coava.

I'll be ordering some of their coffee (along with some hardware - DISK's & KONE's - for our webshop) and thought I'd see if anyone is interested in adding further bags of beans to the shipment.

Their coffee selection is quite limited (which in no bad thing) and I have been hearing v good things. In addition to the two coffees currently in their webshop there will be a new Kenyan & washed Ethiopian available next week. I have just asked for confirmation on prices and any other details they have. As always shipping costs will depend on volumes ordered.

If anyone is interested, I'd be glad to organise (if someone could pass on the previous spreadsheet). I would like to place my own order early next week, so if anyone is interested please let me know.

Dahtac

I would be on board for that. Keep us posted?

Mr Magnolia

I'm very interested thanks arabica69. I'll take a look now.

donnacha

Hi arabica69. Count me in - I dropped you a PM there.

You can access the last xls here:

https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AkfhrrPTbym0dDJZWXlQeFlZb0xuMmlaVHZLMkFfZGc&hl=en&authkey=CJ6ixrYJ

snollup

Also very interested.