Postal Bloom is excited to present June's featured coffee roaster, MiddleState Coffee. Based in the back of Steadbrook, a small retail clothing store located in downtown Denver, Jay Louis DeRose and Dustin Roderick Pace roast and bag amazing specialty coffee. At first, Jay and Dustin were coffee brewing rivals in the Denver area. They eventually decided to partner up in hopes to push the envelope of locally roasted specialty coffee.
Both Dustin and Jay started from the bottom of the coffee industry. Dustin manned a small coffee kiosk in the front of a bike shop, while Jay pulled shots behind a coffee bar of a more established coffee shop. They both fell in deep with coffee and haven't seemed to look back.
Dustin had begun developing Steadbrook with some friends when he had the conversation with Jay about maybe opening their own roastery. They weren't very happy with the coffee scene in Denver, at the time, and they wanted to do coffee their own way. Dustin moved forward with Steadbrook and the empty room in the back turned into the perfect place to put MiddleState's coffee roaster. They hadn't planned on opening the roastery quite yet, but when Steadbrook's space became available, it pushed them to dive right in.
Early on, Jay and Dustin set up pretty tight guidelines when it came to coffee buying accounts. They didn't want to sacrifice their integrity to just make a sale. They have tried to grow organically and thoughtfully by only picking accounts that seem to do their coffee justice. These principles have really helped them along the way and have kept them happy as a company.
They have now partnered with Little Owl Coffee, MiddleState's coffee being brewed in their shop exclusively. MiddleState didn't really have a flagship store and Little Owl was looking to make a change. According to Jay, this partnership has really allowed MiddleState to become the coffee company they wanted to be. They now have the capacity to source and buy some really unique coffees, that otherwise, would have been much harder for MiddleState to purchase.
“Beyond coffee we try not to take ourselves too serious. We believe coffee is best served with a a good sense of humor and a smile.”
Aside from coffee, Dustin is a photographer and soon-to-be father. When talking about the business, he said "It feels really good to watch something grow. I'm about to be a dad and I feel like that is going to be the same thing - watching something grow into its own thing. That's really exciting to me." Jay spends his time outside of the roastery on his old motorcycle or a skateboard. He seems to be a really passionate dude, who really gets sucked into whatever he picks up - whether it's skateboarding, his motorcycle or even coffee. Dustin and Jay are two really inspiring individuals and we are proud to feature their coffee in this month's subscription.
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