It's Been Awhile

Man, it's been a busy time. We are in full bootstrap mode. I have been thinking about writing a blog for weeks and finally have a minute to do so, partially thanks to a stomach bug that took down our entire family. Take it from me, if the barf train hits one of your kids, get some activated charcoal and start taking that stuff immediately to ease the situation. 

Anyway, I wanted to fill the world in a bit. I just have to say how crazy the past 4-5 months has been for Cat & Cloud. The support has been amazing and we feel so blessed to have the opportunity to impact the industry. 

So what have the past months looked like? Cray, to say the least. We are loving the podcast. It has been so fun to get amazing guests into the studio as well as our individual Q&A rant episodes. We plan to keep this bad boy going and have so much we plan to talk about in the future. If you haven't listened to it yet, here is a link and please, tell your friends. We hope to take the podcast on the road and expand our horizons if all goes well. We gotta give love to Pullstring Press & Patrick Melroy. He convinced us to start the podcast and supports us in it. If you want help getting a podcast going in any avenue, email him. He can get you set up. 

Baca & I have been so into roasting and theory we can't wait to get our own. We have so many thoughts and ideas on how to manipulate coffee to taste how we want that we are nearly jumping out of our skin. Our coffee continues to improve and our selections are delicious. We have Limu Seka from Ethiopia burning hot fire and getting a 96 point review from Roastratings.com, Guatemala Benevante sourced through Cafe Imports which we just were loving as Elixir Specialty Coffee, a late harvest Hondo, two Colombians & maybe even more Elida Estate coming your way soon. While we hope to keep ourselves from any boxes we do find that Sweetness & Finish are two things that Baca & I strive to have in all of our coffees. Those are the things we have always loved and those are part of what we would love to achieve.

Did you guys know that we design all of our gear in house? Baca has decided to become even better at Media and is kicking all the buns there. So, all photo, video, our website, etc. Pretty much all him. I get to have opinions...ok, i have taken a photo or two. 

Ok, if you didn't know this already, we have a lease signed. It is in Santa Cruz where Chris & I came together to start our journey. I lived there for seven years, Chris six, investing in the East Side Pleasure Point community. We have so much love for them and that area. We can't wait to get back there and open. Our shop is going to be small, with a pretty legit amount of outdoor seating. We have been approved to roast there and have a little space to do so. It's going to be an amazing launch point. We are set two blocks off the beach between two of my favorite surf spots and have our own little parking lot. It'll be a humble start, but an amazing community space. We designed it to feel open and accessible. Can't wait to show you.

The logistics of all of this are a little crazy. Did you guys know that Baca drives down to Santa Barbara to work at the French Press with me? At first he was sleeping on our couch but what a lot of people don't know is that Baca had back surgery when he was younger and couches aren't the best for him. He currently commutes 90 minutes to and from work 3 days a week. You may ask why he doesn't just work in San Louis Obispo but that's another story for him to tell. So, he commutes down here. Cray.

Castle Coffee Roasters has been incredibly gracious to allow us to roast on Sundays so we can share some of our first fruits with the world. This means every two weeks (relatively) Baca, Charles (more on him later), & myself roast and package all day to ship out Monday (thanks Baca). These days are so fun. Seriously though, big shout out to Julia & Todd who own both the French Press & Castle for being our biggest supporters. 

As  you may imagine, to start a business in Santa Cruz you must have meetings in Santa Cruz. Needless to say, we are in the car a lot and there aren't many restful weekends or days off. We couldn't be more thankful though. We wouldn't be able to even start a business if the cards hadn't fallen the way they have. We have so many supportive people rooting for us. We can't give enough love to our families for believing in us to start, but the community, you guys are encouraging. Thank you. We will continue to need your support and love.

We really believe in Coffee and have a vision to hopefully allow for Cat & Cloud to give in such a way that it grows our industry on multiple levels. I plan to write more about Cat & Clouds Mission, Vision & Values at some point but for now you can just know that our foundational pillars are People. Passion. Perspective. Coffee. 

For me personally, this past year post Verve has been the best for personal & professional growth. It's easily been the hardest and most taxing. It's too easy to sit and neglect all the good that has come from a year and only focus on all that needs to be done or what could have been done better. I can with confidence say that this year with Castle & The French Press has been a great success. The chapter there ends at the end of the year and then its onto a period of planning and writing all we want to accomplish as our doors open this summer at Cat & Cloud. It's going to be a funny time where I will be "unemployed" but not really. 

I know we are both so happy to have you all and can't wait to be able to serve you in our own way. 

Thanks for the support and we will hope to get to writing more for you soon.