Tag: Events and Tastings

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Success is More Than Money

Success is More Than Money

During frequent small talk between customers and us, inevitably the questions come up: “How’s business? Are you feeling the recession? Are you keeping busy?”

We are always happy to say that we are indeed thriving amidst this slow economic time. Part of this is due to the local events that encourage visitors onto Camano Island and the surrounding areas. A few weeks ago CICR held a geo-caching kickstart party for over 100 local geo-cachers, which was catered by Westside Pizza. Another great attraction to our area is the Great Northwest Glass Quest that started towards the beginning of the month and continues until this Sunday, February 28. Several local businesses are participating in this treasure hunt and it is attracting people of all ages from all over Washington.

That said, we do not judge our success by the profit that we make but by the lives we change. People are recognizing the value of supporting a company that creates change through their purchases. Our “Prosumers” realize that by spending their “coffee money” at Camano Island Coffee Roasters, they are not just purchasing  healthy coffee but also providing the coffee farmers a way to continue growing a quality crop on land that they own and can pass on to future generations.

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Serving Stanwood and Camano Island at the Community Fair

Serving Stanwood and Camano Island at the Community Fair

Well, the time as come and gone. Every year we look forward to serving our healthy coffee to our community (and yes, hoping to pick up a few new prosumers). It’s amazing the connections we make each year. Some of our longest lasting customers are those we’ve had the pleasure of meeting first hand at the different local fairs around Washington.

For us, the Stanwood/Camano Fair is a “getting back to our roots” event. Dan and I have been sampling our coffee at fairs since the beginning of CICR. It’s the perfect occasion to spend time with the loyal customers that gave us our start. Many of our coffee subscription customers around the nation stem from a group of very loyal, local customers. We uploaded a few videos to our YouTube account and will be adding them to our blog shortly. The coffee booth was hopping with activity. We “tweeted” live when possible and even involved some customers in a project we are working on for our sister company, Frozen X-plosion (Blend On!). Also at the fair, many great local companies were involved such as The Everett Herald, Del Fox Custom Meats, Sahara Pizza, Windermere Reality, and our Local Fire and Police Departments. I’m sure I’ve left many out (feel free to add them in the comments) as there were many, many vendors and businesses present.

The big hit around the fair with most of the workers was the CICR Acrylic Commuter mug. Many saw a sea of commuter mugs topped off with CICR’s Papua New Guinea Medium Roast Coffee throughout the whole fair.

All in all, we made over 200 airpots of our fresh roasted, Papua New Guinea Coffee. We gave away over 1,000 samples and had people purchase over 100 commuter mugs (filled with coffee of course). Our coffee wouldn’t stay on the shelves and we ended up selling over 300 pounds to the local community and visitors.

“Thanks!” to all who came and/or followed our event through our social media sites.

Jeff – CICR

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Coffee, The World in Your Cup – The Burke Museum

 

Wow! This was a great time. First off, to those of you that showed up because of our Twitter messages, Facebook updates, or word of mouth, “Thanks so much!” This was an awesome event and the Burke Museum did a great job setting up the story of coffee from plant to cup. We were able to meet so many new people and tell the story of CICR, our focus on breaking the cycle of poverty through ethical coffee and teaching some Coffee 101. We gave out over 200 free lattes and cups of drip coffee! The response was incredible!

My lovely wife gave out cups of our Brazil Coffee (March 09’s coffee of the month) and showed interested parties the difference between green coffee and unroasted Swiss Water Processed coffee.They were able to handle the green beans and taste the finished product. Jeff, pulled 1 shot of espresso for a gentleman and then went into “talk mode” (which I got to tease him for)! All teasing aside, it was great because he was really able to explain the mission of our company and help people understand that there is more to “Coffee, The World in Your Cup” than just a beverage. It tied the exhibit into our ethical coffee very well.

Myself? Well, I made a bunch of lattes, macchiatos, cappuccinos, americanos, and straight espressos and pulled all the shots after Jeff’s token espresso in the picture to the left (haha… I can’t give it up!) I was also able to explain more of the technical details of flavor characteristics of coffee as well as some of the best extraction methods (eg. Varietal Supremo is best used in espresso). Oh yeah, and as the company “geek”, I had fun Tweeting the event live (with pictures) and shooting images with my camera for use on our blog and Facebook page.

All in all, we had a great time and got to meet a lot of new people as well as see some familiar faces. Most importantly, we were able to explain how our customers were able to break the cycle of poverty in many coffee growing villages just through purchasing ethical coffee.

Thanks for supporting us! Your support helps us continue forward!

Dan -CICR