A bit of a shake up in the Portland coffee scene, as industry veterans Ryan Willbur and Laila Ghambari will be acquiring Guilder and Junior’s Roasted Coffee.
Announced Friday, April 26th, the husband-and-wife duo are set to take over the sister brands along with their roastery and three Portland cafes. Per the press release, Junior’s Roaster Coffee began on the other side of the country, in Tallahassee, Florida, all the way back in 2014. Then, three years later, owners Mike and Caryn Nelson moved to Portland to team up with Toby Roberts, whose credits include restaurants like Pok Pok, Gado Gado, and Thaan Charcoal, and Carrie Lind. Over the coming years, they would open three cafes around Northeast and West Portland.
And now they turn over the keys to Willbur and Ghambari. Combining for more than three decades of industry experience, the pair have worked for some of the biggest names in specialty coffee, like La Marzocco, Stumptown, and Intelligentsia. The 2014 US Barista Champion, Ghambari grew up in coffees shops, working at her father’s chain of Seattle coffee shops Cherry Street. She has recently transitioned into coffee consulting, where has helped create a de-escalation course for coffee shop workers, amongst other cafe-focused initiatives.
“We’re excited to keep Guilder and Junior’s Roasted Coffee an independent, community driven company,” Willbur states in the press release.
There is no word on what, if any, changes will be made to day-to-day operations under new ownership. In a world of mergers and acquisitions, with smaller coffee companies getting swallowed whole by larger ones, it’s a nice change of pace to see a beloved Portland cafe changing hands laterally, with local owner-operators still steering the ship.
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
