aboutferguson.com

Today I celebrate 11 years in the coffee industry. Don’t worry if you did not received an invitation, I am the only guest, and the celebration itself consists of good coffee and an absence of things that make me fat (I love carrots, I love carrots, I love carrots, I love carrots).

Eleven years ago I received a job offer for significantly more money than I had ever earned before that time and I told them I needed to think about it. I didn’t really need to think about it, I was waiting for a different job offer from Ted Lingle, then Executive Director of the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA). The call from Ted came and I took the job at SCAA, even though it was for less money than the other offer. Why? Because I knew I would love working in the coffee industry. I knew I would love the people.

Eleven years later, I can do a lot of the things that coffee people do. I can cup coffee, but I’m not a cupper. I can brew coffee correctly, but I’m not a retailer. I know my way around a coffee mill, but I’m not a coffee farmer. I can even pull a shot of espresso or roast a batch of coffee if you hold a gun to my head (though I’ll probably do a better job at it if you put the gun away), but I’m no barista and I’m certainly not a roaster.

No, even though I know an awful lot about coffee, the coffee industry, and coffee history, I am not a coffee professional. Even during my “sojourn in Seattle,” helping run a coffee company, I did not think of myself as a coffee professional. I was then, before then, and am now, a coffee people professional.

I wouldn’t have it any other way. And as I celebrate my 11th year as a coffee people professional in my own quiet way (except for the part where I write about it on this public blog thingy), I let my mind drift, stream of consciousness-style, and it spit out the randomness below.

Yes, they are unforgivably “inside” and represent only a small smattering at best. It is a desperately incomplete version of the pages and pages and pages of notes and memories I have gathered over time. I took them as they came at me and, except for a handful that are recoded somewhere in writing, allowing me to check my memory, I took them as remembered. I have the worst memory for names but an excellent memory for things such as this. Still, I will not claim they are verbatim if someone wants to take exception. I will insist that something very very close was actually said or written at some point in time and space. Stopping at 30 “items” was completely arbitrary. I mean, I have to save the rest for the book, right?

Don Holly: “We should have stopped at five stores.”

Paul Katzeff: “If I find out you went for the money and not your passion, I’ll find you and kick your ass.”

Jim Reynolds: “Don’t carry an umbrella.”

Steve Colten: “I haven’t been on that road in ten years. We use a helicopter.”

Mayor Willie Brown” “I can hear him, Mike. I’m not deaf. Now where are the Brazilian dancers you mentioned?”

Christopher Schooly: “We were like the panther.”

Mike Ebert: “I’m tired of the wine analogy. I’m in the coffee business.”

David Griswold: “Can you believe the front desk just let me into your room?”

Christian Wolthers: “I just got lucky, that’s all. I was in the right place at the right time…well, I should say, my containers were.”

Bruno Souza: “It’s called caipirinha…very little alcohol. You can drink many more.”

Paul Bassett: “The kangaroo meat adds a savory flavor that compliments the espresso.”

Marty Curtis: “There’s no such thing as a smokeless roaster. A smokeless roaster is a bomb.”

Ted Lingle: “Hire compassionate people. We can teach them about coffee, but we can’t teach them to be compassionate.

Martin Diedrich: “He’s probably right. We should have stopped at five stores.”

Duane Sorenson: “If this is not the best Papua you’ve ever tasted, I’ll pay you to drink it.”

John Gant: “It is about rogues, the elephant, the coffee, the business, the search, and about us coffee people.”

Geoff Watts: “A great cup of coffee is more than just a riveting sensory experience. It is in fact a small miracle.”

Peter Giuliano: “He asked me if I believed in fate.”

Rob Stephen: “I was fairly disappointed to discover that I was suddenly part of the second wave.”

Ward Barbie: “If I thought they would actually fire you, I would have never demanded it, you know what I mean?”

Erna Knutsen: “Write it all down, tell all the stories, don’t keep any secrets.”

Paul Songer: “What is defective to the constructionist may be interesting to the romantic.”

Lindsey Bolger: “I love you but it sounds like you’re blaming the farmers.”

Alf Kramer: “Someone has taught you to toast like a Norwegian, I think.”

Terry Davis: “The first question I’d ask them is, Do you have access to the capital you need to grow the company?”

Laura Sommers: “Well, I think we all thought you would be the one.”

Ellie Matuszak: “You see, there it is again, The Paradox of Choice.”

Mark Prince: “Ice is a legitimate part of the taste experience.”

Dismas Smith: “No, we want to start a barista guild…the coffeehouse owners can start their own guild.”

Mark Inman: “Ferguson knows where all the bodies are buried.”

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