Good opened its doors in Portland’s Southeast neighborhood in 2014. Since then, the multi-roaster cafe transitioned to a roaster and opened a second cafe (with another on the way). The company is now braving the exciting, adventurous world of bottling coffee beverages for the ever-growing ready-to-drink category. In a sea of cold brew bottles and cans, Good’s choice of bottle shape and minimal (yet colorful) label stands out. We talked to owner Sam Purvis to find out more.
Good Coffee now bottles RTD beverages. What are you currently offering?
Yes we do! We are currently in what we are calling Chapter One of our RTD program. We’ve built out a small warehouse here in Portland for brewing and packaging RTD drinks. We’re offering only cold brew for sale at this time. We wanted to venture into RTD slowlyโproduct development is expensive and mistakes costly. Chapter Two is something we’re just now starting to venture into (planning, design, etc) and it will involve a lot of new product developmentโa number of new beverages in the coffee category, and a couple beverages not coffee based at all. Chapter Two will have an emphasis on forced carbonation. We love sparkling drinks and are very excited to give our guests access to some take-away beverages that are fun, refreshing and spritzy.
Where is it available?
You can buy bottled bevi’s from us at either of our stores, we’ll also have them on offer at our new NW Portland cafe when it opens in May. While a small distribution strategy is in the works, we’re going to be slow moving on this… and most likely won’t push on it until we have 2018 growth projects finished and stabilized.
What’s the price?
We sell 12 oz. bottles for $4 and and have four-packs available as well at a discounted bulk price.
Any plans on new flavors/milks?
Yes! Lots of fun ideas we’re kicking around as we start to get into Chapter Two. We’ll lean into our current cast of collaborators on new beverages: Superjugoso, Portland maker of DELICIOUS natural/seasonal reductions; Jacobsen Salt, whenever we can integrate their products; Mizuba Tea Co, Song Tea, etc. Alt milks are a must on milk beveragesโbetter shelf life too.
Who designed the bottle?
This was kind of a hand-off project. General layout concept was developed by Kylie Freeman who had done some really great brand work for us prior. During this project, we were in the process of moving design fully in-house. Shawnie Fortune worked in our cafes and is a really talented designer and we were able put her on part-time salary for design work. She put the final touches on this project and has been on point with everything we’ve done moving forward, new store, new packaging concepts, web, etc. She rocks.
Is RTD the future?
I don’t think I know enough to know. I mean, it is interesting the part RTD has played in coffee companies (both growth and acquisition) in the last number of years. I have a friend who is in restaurants and he goes to these big conferences where they talk about macro trends. They were saying that packaged goods are definitely a big growth market for specialty brands right now, yes. I think for us the push into RTD came out of a desire to be a diverse company, and a desire to make things. Our company is built on one thing: creating delight. There are two ways we’ve said we’re really focused on doing this in the future: creating really great hospitality experiences for our guests in our own stores, and creating and making really delightful things (products). In both scenarios the guest is the hero. They’re the bar we’re trying to raise to. We really want to give them a good time.
Zachary Carlsen is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network.ย Read more Zachary Carlsen on Sprudge.
