It all began with a Google search. Like many great things in life do. Last summer, heading home from summer vacation I quickly typed “coffee roaster” into Google Maps before making the 8 hour drive home. I was hoping for the coffee-gods to be in my favour and find me somewhere good to caffeinate myself. What happened next was a ping for “Lore Coffee Roasters.”
But this ping wasn’t in a major city centre. It was in a small town, called Bonners Ferry, in what seemed like the middle-of-nowhere Idaho. So I quickly check their images, and after seeing a Slayer Steam on their bar, and roasted coffee from some of the most notable producers in specialty coffee, I knew I had struck gold.
So I plugged in the coordinates in my phone and off we went. The rest as they say is history. After discovering Lore Coffee Roasters, I knew I had to share their story…so here it is. So let’s kick off 2026 with the story of Lore Coffee Roasters, as our Coffee Roaster of the Month.
So great to get the chance to connect with you Graysen! Help our audience get to know you a bit better… What’s your personal backstory in coffee? How did you get started? What keeps you going in coffee?
Likewise, and thank you for the question. My personal backstory in coffee is the same as my wife’s we didn’t drink coffee before starting the business. This was in part because we were only presented with typical dark roasted commodity coffee brewed in all sorts of different ways. It wasn’t until tasting specialty coffee brewed right that our eyes shot wide open and knew that this was something worth pursuing, worth sharing. This is what keeps us going in coffee, sharing unique experiences with people anywhere in the world, providing our best practice as we pass along our craft for you to enjoy a deeply communal drink.
Before we go much further, share with our readers what you’re drinking/enjoying these days when it comes to coffee!
Great question. I’m deeply enjoying a Red Bourbon & Tabi from Nestor Lasso in Colombia that we’ve had for the fall season that tastes like rosebuds and honeysuckle. I love love love rose notes in coffees. I think that’s the most rewarding, delightful, and pleasant cups I’ve had in the floral range include a prominent rose note.
I am always fascinated in the origin story of how a roaster/cafe selects their name, so help our readers to get to know the story behind why you chose Lore Coffee Roasters? Is there a significance or symbolism about this for you?
Yes. Lore has a twofold meaning, about the coffees and about us. Lore, history, traditions, stories of each coffee set the tone when it comes to the first real facets of specialty coffee: quality and traceability… but even further into the people and projects behind what you are tasting and how they came to be.
That’s the first meaning, the second is that we belong to the Ancient Church, the Eastern Orthodox Christian Church (Antioch), which the beauty of the Church inspires all that we do from our labels, bags, shirts, icons, logos, and general ethos behind our brand. We believe truth, goodness, and beauty are inseparable.
So, home for you is Bonners Ferry, Idaho (pop. 2,600). My guess is readers know Idaho more for potatoes than pour-overs. How did you end up calling this place home? Can you share a bit more about what you love about the coffee culture where you call home.
Northern Idaho is a remote, small strip of land between two mountain ranges that actually does not grow potatoes. Believe it or not, most of the potatoes in our stores are from just across the mountains in western Washington. My wife and I settled here because we are both from small towns, and we are able to be close to our Church and have the breathing room to enjoy some peace, quiet, and practise being an outdoorsman.
Coffee culture here is predominantly huts or drive-thrus, and we decided to opt-out of that experience with our coffee service. The best stuff is worth coming in for, and our customers tell us we’re just doing such a different coffee experience in the region that it’s hard to compare–underground 3rd wave coffee in the remote town between the mountains. It’s truly a blessing.
The first thing anyone who visits your site is likely the tag line “Nordic Roasted in North Idaho.” What has it taken to educate and excite people in and around your shop to this specific style of roasted coffee? And can you perhaps share a bit more with our readers about your roasting philosophy and what equipment you roast on?
a. Great question, to take a page out of Maxwell Dashwood’s book, “The Business of Specialty Coffee“, I wanted to make a space where the person that comes in will immediately know what I am doing with coffee, and then either opt in or opt out.
We not only needed to have the quality coffee, but we needed to look the part, too, since this is like living in the 3rd wave movement 10 years ago where people have heard of it but they haven’t experienced it themselves, and that’s a massive responsibility. You, Tyler, were right at home and even noticed the cups we used which is a way of signalling that we really mean business with how we source, roast, and prepare coffee. Those are the little details that round out the greater picture of what we would like to do.
b. Our specific roasting philosophy follows the Nordic Trend, backed by data. We get the highest quality beans that we have access to, and we roast them to optimum development, but we do it light, hot, and fast. We do this on a heavily modified 2023 Diedrich manual IR12 (bought new from the factory down the road), and the next mod is going to be rigging up water-cooling on the external components. We increased the drum speed and custom placed another thermocouple where we can read off two data streams as we see necessary during operation. I’m looking forward to a mountable laser that will give real-time Agtron data to help us approach trickier beans, but that’s mid 2026.
These are not hard rules, however, and over time our aggregate roasting data has found a fitting trend of its own as we approach certain beans, known densities, and even specific genetics, but I’ve never heard a second crack–and I don’t ever intend on doing so.
You share that your purpose is to “to bring you into the journey”. How does Lore practically do this? Why is this value so important to you?
Lore brings you into the journey not only by setting you up with our best foot forward, but offering to you insight as to why it was selected, where it came from, who those people are and why they’re in coffee–ultimately leaving it up to you to finish the story.
As we look ahead at 2026, what are your hopes and dreams for the specialty coffee community? What would you like to see change? What is going well? And how is Lore Coffee helping to lead the way in some of these areas?
a. Hopes, dreams, praises, and challenges lie ahead. I am so excited that the C-market is fracturing commodity perspectives and pushing people (begrudgingly, strangely) into the realm of specialty coffee. If you are going to spend hard earned money on coffee, take the time to brew it and make it a part of your day, it might as well be something of quality done right. It’s a massive opportunity.
b. I do not know where the market will go, but timing things right only goes so far–people are ultimately going to need a reason to buy from you in this economy, that much is certain.
c. For what I would like to see change in the specialty coffee industry, I would say that I’m not mature enough to make any meaningful statements–but I’ll tell you that water chemistry ‘solutions’ and droplets during or post brew are a bit of a gray area for me, and I’m not sure where that’s going to land. In the short 3 year stint that I’ve been involved with coffee, I started with almost all the modern puck prep tools for espresso, modern filters, 3rd wave water, and other monumental changes as my operational baseline. But the water droplets, I’m not sure yet where that’s going to land. That, and co-fermentation practices/experiments/projects, I’m not sure where those belong on the spectrum and as of writing this we have turned down all of those projects thus far, but keeping my finger on the pulse.
d. Where Lore is going to lead the way in some of these areas will be honestly joining in on roasting via laser/imaging feedback with roast degree/Agtron values, I really think that tech in this sphere is going to be the next big push.
Thanks so much Graysen for sharing your story! Here’s your chance to say anything else you want to. Go for it. Is there anything else our readers need to know?
I’m glad you stepped in, and I would love to meet more people in the space from roasters to consumers to enthusiasts alike.
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Contact Info:
web: www.loreroasters.com
instagram: @lorecoffeeroasters
email: hello@loreroasters.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 wanted to say a huge thanks again to Greysen & Rachel at Lore Coffee for being a huge contributor to the specialty coffee community in Bonners Ferry, Idaho & beyond!
-Tyler
commonly coffee 