I had heard of Ruby years ago, but it wasn’t until last April while attending the Specialty Coffee Expo in Portland where I got the chance to meet their team and enjoy some of their coffee! Let me just say that both impressed me greatly.
So much so that I knew I had to keep in touch and find a time to feature them on my blog. Well, on the eve of the next SCA Expo coming up later this month in Chicago, I am thrilled to share the story of Ruby Coffee Roasters as our Coffee Roaster of the Month for April.
Huge thanks to Jared Linzmeier (co-founder of Ruby) for being willing to do this.
Hey Ruby, so great to have the chance to feature you here on the blog. Share with our readers a little bit more of how you got started.
Hi Tyler, thanks for sharing our story! I’m Jared Linzmeier, co-founder of Ruby Coffee Roasters, and I’ll be answering your questions. I am from Wisconsin originally and my first coffee job was on State Street in Madison in 2006. I moved to Los Angeles, CA, in 2007 and began working in Specialty Coffee there.
How long have you been around?
My wife Deanna and I started Ruby in the Fall of 2013 and I roasted our first batches in early 2014. During those early months we were based out of the garage of the house I grew up in! In 2015 we moved our operations nearby to the small town of Nelsonville, Wisconsin which is where we are headquartered today.
How did you come up with the name?
Ruby is my grandmother’s name. She’s 95 now (March 2024) and still drinks our coffees at home everyday. To me, the name also feels classic and nostalgic, a little bit country and a little bit precious.
Anything else?
I first visited coffee farms in Latin America in 2011 to source coffee and visit producers. These early experiences really helped lead to the development of our sourcing ideals and purpose as a business.
While our readers may be very familiar with your coffee brand, they might be surprised to know that home—for you—is the state of Wisconsin. Can you share a bit more about what the coffee culture is like there?
Like a lot of places, coffee in Wisconsin is a driving force for bringing people together and building community. When I think of the culture here, it has a lot to do with gathering. Now there are more places in far flung towns where people can seek out tasty coffee so that’s really exciting to see. I find personally that the coffee shop is a great place to learn about an area and things to do while also enjoying a tasty brew.
Along with the social element, there is a tremendous amount of appreciation for great coffee and a lot of engagement with learning about the factors that contribute to producing those coffees. We get a lot of inquiries about tours and tastings so we’re starting to offer more of those experiences!
Speaking of coffee, what are you drinking/enjoying these days?
It’s March (as I write this) so this time of year I’m pretty excited about Colombia. Right now I’m loving Aguacate from Narino. It has such a wonderful balance of crisp, delicate acids and rich, complex sweetness. I sourced this coffee first in 2013 as Ruby’s first offering and we’ve had it back every year since. A few years ago I also had the opportunity to visit some of the producers of this small association, tour their farms, and get to know them. I like this one on espresso or Kalita 185. We also just launched our second iteration of this really delightful Pink Bourbon coffee from Luz Divia Fierro Calderon. It’s super juicy and tropical.
I have always been curious to know the origin of your slogan “colorful coffees” that I see everywhere on your bags/site. Can you share the backstory on that, and how what you do reflects that slogan?
Colorful Coffees is a subtle way that we try to invite customers to celebrate the unique and exciting flavors that we find across our offerings list. I have always leaned heavily into colors as flavors when I cup coffee, so in my mind our menu is a blend of purples, reds, browns, yellows, greens, and so on. Taste the rainbow!
Speaking of colorful coffee, could you share a bit more with our readers about your
philosophy/approach to roasting coffee? What equipment do you roast on?
We work with a number of producers directly year after year so these make up a large portion of our menu. Throughout the year, as growing seasons shift, we adjust our offerings to highlight the freshest coffees from either Northern or Southern Hemisphere.
Our roasting approach is to develop every coffee to be sweet and balanced while drawing out the flavors that make it distinct. Consistency, repeatability, and planning are absolutely essential to the success of this program so we track everything meticulously. Currently, we use two G25 Probat’s from 1979 and 1993.
Getting back to home being in the state of Wisconsin. You’ve got a cafe located in Stevens Point, but also now your recently renovated 4000+ sq. foot HQ located in Nelsonville. Tell our readers a little bit more about what all goes on at each space.
Stevens Point is the hub of activity in Portage County and our cafe is located in the historic downtown area. We love this city and wanted to build a space to create the kind of food we like to eat to go along with our coffees being brewed and prepared to our specifications. This space is always bustling with activity as our full kitchen prepares nearly everything from scratch, including many bakery items and more elaborate rice bowls, crepes, tacos, burgers.
Our Nelsonville cafe is about 2000 square feet and is in a really cool historic brick building directly adjacent to our roastery. This cafe is quite large and spacious, allowing for more room for groups to meet up and for us to create a different atmosphere. We have a number of pop up events happening soon along with roastery tours, tastings, and more.
It was great to meet up last year at SCA Expo in Portland. And I hear you’ll be back again this year in Chicago. Can you share what that experience was like for your team? Why are these types of events important for the specialty coffee community?
There’s truly something for everyone at SCA Expo! Whether it’s ideas for new packaging, meeting up with producers or importer partners, cupping coffees, networking, or just generally finding inspiration, it is such a great event.
Being relatively remote here in Central Wisconsin, one benefit for the team is the opportunity to see different equipment for both home and commercial up close and personal. Being able to try some brewers, grinders, espresso machines, etc., allows us to make better recommendations to our customers and for ourselves in our cafes.
We always like coming home with some coffees to share with the rest of the team too.
If people are heading to SCA Expo in Chicago and want to maybe take a quick road trip up to Nelsonville, can you share more about what people can expect when they visit?
Nelsonville is a village of 200 people, so the setting is pretty rural and very quiet. It’s a great spot to go for a walk along the Tomorrow River and let your mind unplug a bit.
Lastly, your website shares so much about the many countries, producers, and other partners that you work with. Why is it so important to you as a company to share these stories?
Our sourcing program is at the core of what we do and what inspires us. From the beginning, those experiences visiting producers and understanding coffee production have shaped our menu and our approach to roasting.
The next best thing to being able to visit producers firsthand is to read about their work, see photos, and understand what makes their coffees unique!
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Contact Info:
web: www.rubycoffeeroasters.com
instagram: @rubyroasters
facebook: facebook.com/rubyroasters
email: ruby@rubycoffeeroasters.com
Find their beans: If you’re looking to get your hands on some beans then definitely check out their web-store for what they’re currently roasting.
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I just want to say a huge thank you to Jared at Ruby Coffee Roasters for being such a huge contributor to the coffee culture in Wisconsin. Check out their site, grab yourself some beans, and enjoy!
Stay Caffeinated,
Tyler
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