603Podcast with Dan Egan
603podcast explores the people, places and things that create the culture of New Hampshire. From the Great North Woods to the peaks and valleys of White Mountains, in and around the Lakes, on and off the Seacoast, throughout the Merrimack the Monadnock Regions, to the Dartmouth-Lake Sunapee area. This podcast educates, motivates and discovers the stories that shape the "Granite State" and its impact on the country and the world.
Hosted by extreme sports pioneer Dan Egan, you’ll hear inspiring in-depth stories, from our featured guests that are the heartbeat of the Granite State through conversationally discussions with New Hampshire’s most notable, need to know folks and characters make New Hampshire truly special place.
603Podcast with Dan Egan
Coffee, Community, and Crafting a North Country Icon: Mad River Coffee
Ever wonder what it takes to build a thriving local business that becomes woven into the fabric of a community? Dave Levin's journey from basement coffee roaster to creating a New Hampshire landmark at Exit 28 offers a story in entrepreneurial grit, community building, and staying true to your vision.
When David first started roasting coffee in his basement in 2004, he had no idea his small wholesale operation would transform into Mad River Coffee Roasters—now a beloved gathering space with dozens of employees and a reputation that draws visitors from across New England. His approach was refreshingly straightforward: create delicious coffee, be open consistently, and foster genuine community connections.
What makes this story particularly compelling is how Dave transformed challenges into opportunities. When industry professionals warned him that without high foot traffic, he'd need to roast his own coffee to survive, he embraced manufacturing his product—eliminating middlemen and creating signature blends that remain community favorites two decades later. When competition moved in across the street, he focused on what made his business special rather than worrying about competitors. When lines formed at the counter, he taught staff to see it as part of the experience rather than a problem to solve frantically.
The success of Mad River Coffee Roasters reveals something profound about business and community: authenticity resonates. The cozy atmosphere consistently ranks as their most praised feature in reviews, followed by friendly staff—and of course amazing coffee and food. It's a reminder that while product quality matters, the experience and feeling you create are just as important.
Ready to discover the full story behind one of New Hampshire's most cherished local businesses? Listen now to learn how coffee became the catalyst for creating a space where locals, second homeowners, and tourists all find common ground in the heart of the Granite State.
For more information about the 603podcast visit 603podcast.com
Welcome back to Season 2 of the 603 Podcast, where we cover all things New Hampshire, from true crime and covered bridges to epic mountain marathons. We're excited to share another season of unique perspectives from across the Granite State with you. I'm your host, dan Egan, and this is the 603 Podcast. The 603 Podcast is sponsored by Mad River Coffee, celebrating 20 years of roasting coffee, legendary egg sandwiches, meals to go and live music right off of Exit 28 on Highway 93 in Camden, new Hampshire. It's also sponsored by Alpine Adventures, new England's premier thrill destination. Alpine Adventure has it all. Visit alpineziplinecom and let the adventure begin.
Speaker 1:Looking for summer fun? Whalestale Waterpark New England's favorite splash spot is your place, whalestale Waterpark, where the fun never ends. Visit whalestalewaterparknet. Today we're back on the 603. Excited to talk with my good buddy, david Levin, about, of course, mad River Coffee Roasters it's the king of coffee here in the North Country and, quite honestly, I believe, the state of New Hampshire right at exit 28 on your way into Waterville Valley front and center. David, how are you doing today? I'm doing great. When did you start?
Speaker 2:We opened our retail location in 2005, february of 2005. And at that point I had been roasting coffee in my basement at my house for a year. So the roasting company actually opened in 2004.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. So, from those humble beginnings of roasting in your house to what it is today, for those of few people who haven't stopped in at Mad River Coffee Roasters, Exit 28, describe for what it is the scene there, which is amazing.
Speaker 2:We are now a freestanding building and we have a roasting company in there. We have a full kitchen that does meals to go breakfast, lunch and bakery items. We have live music throughout the year on Friday nights and Saturday afternoons. We of course with our. Roasting is a wholesale division of the company and we have 40 or so wholesale clients throughout central New Hampshire, everything from the big ski areas, loon Mountain and Waterville Valley down to a little bed and breakfast, local restaurants and other coffee houses, and there's a lot that goes on there. We have 27 employees and a lot of people walking through our front door every day.
Speaker 1:Every day, you know, and of course one of the reasons why I stop in is for the community. I love seeing you and your wife, Melissa, and everybody working there, and for me it's my first touch in the morning of touching base with the community, Talk about this community and how important it is to you that really the community gathers at Mad River Coffee.
Speaker 2:It is definitely a community center. Over the years it's really been amazing to feel the local support that we get from individuals and from our wholesale clients. But yes, there's just a lot of meetings there every day and a lot of community have been humbled and a little shocked by the amount of community that goes on there. One of my favorite stories is we had a realtor come in and tell us that they had a client that refused to buy a house more than 10 miles away from the coffee house. That just blows our mind that people are really dedicated to it. They really love that spot. It is very comfortable, it is very cozy. You know, partly by design, partly by the real estate itself, that has existed for several hundred years that building has been around and it's really fascinating to see and feel that community that has developed there.
Speaker 1:Like you say, there's people getting together, there's business, there's socializing. They're hanging out, getting their morning cup of joe and moving on with their day. But I was wondering, you know, when you were first roasting coffee in your home, did you have this vision of community, did you have this vision of what it would become? Or were you just so ingrained in the business you were just trying to roast and sell and move your product?
Speaker 2:well, a little of both. Uh, you know the coffee house, the coffee industry has always, uh, strived to be the third place, the meeting place, so that is definitely a part of the specialty coffee industry. Me personally, I was wanted to live in the White Mountains and I needed a job and I wanted to own my own business and I fell into coffee, and we can talk about that a little bit later as to how that actually happened, but for me it was. I wanted to make sure that I had gainful employment and a living in this area. Then Melissa, who grew up in this area, really helped me fine-tune and ingrain that community aspect of the coffeehouse, that community aspect of the coffee house.
Speaker 2:And, as I said before, I was a little taken back and a little surprised by just how community oriented it became and what a community place it has become. Some of that caught me off guard. Some of that is just because of the great people that live in this area and they were looking for and they were wanting a community center, and that's something that's hard to identify in any sort of pre-opening research. But they certainly were a big part of it and Melissa has been a huge part of making sure that community is always front and center for the coffee house and has done a great job at developing that side of things.
Speaker 1:Well, tell us, how did you fall into the coffee cup? How did it happen? Was it something you've always loved, or how did that come about?
Speaker 2:I went to college for entrepreneurial management and always wanted to be my own boss and always wanted to have my own company, and that's really all I knew. I had some restaurant experience spattered throughout my upbringing, but not a lot. I was in retail management, um, for for many years. Uh, and funny enough, I was managing a shoe store in downtown Plymouth, New Hampshire, here right down the road, and there were several coffee shops in town and one spring they all closed. They were dirty, they were poorly run, the coffee was cold, Uh, they just weren't good. And coincidentally, they all closed in the same spring and I just said I'm going to open a coffee shop and it was just the opportunity that knocked and I just saw it and I was like this is a college town that suddenly has no coffee shops in it and my original intention was to buy a coffee like Green Mountain Coffee, buy some bagels and start slinging egg sandwiches and cups of coffee. Yeah, and I thought I was going to open within a matter of months. Yeah, I thought I was just going to do this.
Speaker 2:When I started doing all my research, all the professionals in the industry, the coffee industry, asked me if I had 10,000 people a day walking by my storefront and I said I don't have 10,000 people in the nearest five towns. And they said well then, you need to roast your own coffee or you won't make it. And so I reluctantly listened to them and I did it and I started learning how to roast coffee and I sat at my kitchen table for three years learning how to roast coffee and developing blends. I decided that I wanted to do blends, just to have my own product, my own brand and have something a little different than you could find at another coffee shop a roasted Colombian or a roasted Costa Rican. I wanted to make my own recipes.
Speaker 2:So that took three years and in that time a couple of coffee shops opened in Plymouth because I was not the only one that identified a coffee shop need, or a college town without a coffee shop in it needed to be addressed. So I bought a roaster and put it in my basement and started a wholesale company. So I was working full time and roasting coffee at night and delivering on the weekends and had a handful of wholesale clients. And then a spot opened up at King Realty and the funny thing was at that time I was making $750 a month in sales out of my basement and I walked into this location and the rent was $750 a month and I was like, wow, I was like, so I already have the rent was $750 a month and I was like, wow.
Speaker 2:I was like so I already have the rent covered, bingo, bingo. So the next day I walked in and quit my job and presto, we opened up in February of 2005.
Speaker 1:Jumped in just like that.
Speaker 2:Jumped in just like that.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about the blends a little bit. I mean, that's got to be hard to figure out getting a blend. So how did you know, and what was your first blend?
Speaker 2:and how did you know, okay, this, this is a blend that that will work and and has might have some demand well, a little dumb luck, I might say, um, but a lot of coffee upset my stomach and so the first step for me was to decide which coffees upset my stomach and which ones didn't. And because the goal was always to have an easy to drink, mellow cup of coffee that people could not be I know a lot of coffee is super fancy and they're chasing a certain flavor and there's certain notes they want to bring out, and I just wanted people to have a comfortable cup of coffee, again that just ties into conversation and community and being comfortable and and and for me personally, just not upsetting my stomach and just being easy to drink and mellow. And so I just started mixing all the beans that did not upset my stomach and just certain just chasing certain flavors that were were easy to drink and comfortable. And I have a bit of sweet tooth, so you know a little on the sweet side.
Speaker 2:And, um, and one of the first blends was our is to this day our house blend, the Mad River blend, which is just hilarious because it's pretty unorthodox if you look at how roasting is done currently, but we have never dared to change it because it has always been just so easy to drink and comfortable and so many fans and it's been the foundation of the company since day one. And a couple other blends are from day one Really, and you know I've always been a little nervous to change them because it has been so popular and people love it. And you know roasters today they look at my recipes and they're like, well, that's a little unorthodox. I was like, yeah, but it works.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. So you sort of have these blends. You found this space and that's what kicks it off. You knew what you were going to put on the shelves and sell as a coffee right out of the once you found that space in Campton, new Hampshire.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when I took that rent, I had my four basic blends already developed. They were already being roasted. All those recipes were done. And I had my four basic blends already developed. They were already being roasted, all those recipes were done and I had wholesale clients buying those blends, so you had some volume. Little volume, yeah, $750 a month.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but it was a coffee. I mean, it was a coffee shop more than a house at that point. Right there was a little. You could sit, you could hang out very few tables, as I remember it, yeah, and really you could sit, you could hang out very few tables, as I remember it, yeah, and really you weren't selling anything but coffee initially.
Speaker 2:No, we had the egg sandwiches right off the bat.
Speaker 1:You had egg sandwiches.
Speaker 2:Yep Right, we had some egg sandwiches right off the bat.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there was originally 12 seats. It was very small, yeah, and yeah, to call it a coffee shop would totally be fair. Um, it definitely was. Just because, I think, solely because of the footprint alone, um, be hard, hard to call that a coffee house with 12 seats and, um, I think, 700 square feet maybe in that neck of the woods uh, pretty small. But we did. We did breakfast. Um, we originally started with lunch too, but I had to cut lunch because I was running out of time to roast coffee. So we ended up cutting lunch pretty early on. So for a while there we were breakfast, egg sandwiches and coffee and I was roasting right in that 700 square feet, crammed right in there with my raw coffee beans, and you know I'd be roasting coffee, making lattes and egg sandwich and ringing a customer up. I remember Pretty much all at the same time.
Speaker 1:I remember, and I'll never forget, the day that I saw the display, the cabinet, you know the glass display, with the shelves empty. And I remember, you know, thinking OK, dave's up to something. And I came in for my coffee and I didn't say anything. And then one day I walked in and there was a donut in the display. I don't remember what type of donut it was, but Dunkin' Donut had moved in across the way. I remember saying to you they're scared, aren't they, dave? And you looked at that donut and said they're shaking in their boots.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's funny, that's funny.
Speaker 1:And so I just wanted for me. You've probably been very pragmatic about the business. You've always grown very steady and very planned, and it wasn't random. And I just wonder, as a business owner and an entrepreneur and somebody who walks away from their job, what's your reaction when a major competitor or you know chain moves in across the street? What was your mentality right at that moment?
Speaker 2:I always thought we were going to be fine. You know, I think it's a different customer. We don't have a drive through. We were never going to have a drive through. We never put cream and sugar in people's cups, so they were always able to make their coffee by themselves. There wasn't some nervousness. It's a small town, it's a small area, uh, and, of course, customers were happy to share their opinion that you know, I was doomed or it'll never work. Uh, and they've told me that a few times in in my career, whether it be when Dunkin' Donuts opened across the street or when I moved, uh, there were, there were plenty of opinions that that, you know, I w, I was uh either making a mistake or or it was going to be doomed. But I didn't really believe that. I think they are. They're, they're different businesses.
Speaker 2:Um, you have to earn your customers, you have to keep your customers, you have to provide the service and the products that they want to come back for and, uh, that's really the goal. You have to provide what your customers want in a friendly way and at a fair price, and as long as those equations are in place, then you should be able to keep your customers and grow your business and grow your business, and I have always pushed word of mouth. I've always asked my first customers to spread the word by word of mouth. We always depended on that. And that gets back to community and building community. We never had much of an advertising budget, so I think anytime competition moves in, you have to focus on what you're doing. You have to focus on what you're providing your customers and how you're providing it to your customers. I think you'll find loyalty. We've always found loyalty and I think that's pretty common in business that businesses that earn their customers' business will keep their customers' business.
Speaker 1:I mean and the proof is in the pudding the new location has been a smash for a number of different reasons. I believe One. You talked about it briefly. It was sort of a historic building in the area. It was a place that had people new and when you renovated it, when you kind of brought it back to life, so to speak, you had that in mind.
Speaker 2:Yes, we did. That's fair to say. There's definitely a rustic feel to the front of the house that we were not going to get rid of. We had no desire to plaster over all the old wood the building has. For those of you who don't know, the building has had several additions done to it over the years and the eave the original roof line is still visible in the dining room, which is just kind of hilarious. But yeah, we had no intention of getting rid of that and keeping that rustic feel. I remember going furniture shopping for the first location and Melissa asked me what are we looking for? And I was like we're looking for any stable chair. I don't want the chairs to match, I don't want the tables to match, I just want to find what we think is going to be stable and hold up and looks decent and we're going to put it in there and again, just for that comfortable.
Speaker 1:And again, just for that comfortable, comfortable atmosphere, very welcoming I think in general, and it's one of those spaces that's unique. So you know that has created this atmosphere and you know we've talked a lot about community but that atmosphere sort of breeds it, I think. And you're there, I mean the roaster's there you can smell the coffee down the street, and you're always there. It must be hard to get any work done.
Speaker 2:It definitely can be. Yeah, we've been well. First of all, atmosphere. We get a lot of Google reviews. There's a lot of Google traffic on our website and people driving up 93 looking for someplace to eat. Thousands of people find us on Google every month. It's truly incredible, and there's I don't know how many thousands of reviews that are on Google and by far the number one thing that's mentioned is Atmosphere. Number two is Friendly Staff. Number three and four are Food and Coffee. So, yes, atmosphere Staff, customer Service, are king Absolutely and they do drive the business and we do have excellent products and that's great too. But if you care to look at Google, you will see atmosphere, atmosphere, atmosphere all the time.
Speaker 2:Far as getting work done getting me getting work done, yeah, it's had its challenges over the years. You know staffing can be can be interesting. Over the years when we moved in, when we moved locations, our business almost doubled and we did not really expect that and we had, I think, 12 employees at the time and we pretty much instantly needed 17 to 19 employees. So those were some very, very challenging times. Interestingly enough, post-pandemic, staffing has been really good and we've got a great staff and a great team and we now have managers. We have a front house manager, we have a kitchen manager, we have a lead barista, we have a head chef and we have a roaster.
Speaker 1:So now I've grown to the point where I'm bookkeeping and HR and get to chit chat with the customers. Okay, that's the magic right there and it's authentic to me. I mean it's. You can't get reviews like that if it isn't authentic and and and that's what the place is.
Speaker 2:Yes, it is authentic from yeah, from the building to uh, to our way of doing things, to our staff. I definitely am who I am.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that's turned out to be okay.
Speaker 1:It's more than okay, dave. It's more than okay, of course, here in the 603, there's a lot of people listening that love and appreciate New Hampshire. When I walk into the Mad River Coffeehouse, for me it's New Hampshire, it's authentic, it's real people, it's our community in there. Talk about how New Hampshire kind of is the bedrock or the filler that supports this business. From hikers to ski areas, you've got people all around that are open-minded and want community.
Speaker 2:You know, for me I've often broken our customers into three categories. We have the locals that are there every day all year round and, like you say, we've talked a lot about community and they are the base of that community. They're really the ones that are walking in and seeing their neighbors and you know, or setting up meetings there and that sort of thing. The next layer that I see are the second homeowners that are here every weekend or maybe here all summer and on weekends in the winter, and they too run into people they know there and other second homeowners or their neighbors that might be year-round residents and they are a big, stable part of our clientele as well. And then the tourists that, as I mentioned a minute ago, just find us on Google and stop in as they drive up 93. So all three of those groups are part of our mix and they're all you know. I kind of think they're fairly equal as far as coming in the door and providing our income or our sales.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I think that's what's unique to me. You know, I think New Hampshire, because of our main arteries Highway 89 and Highway 93, people come right up and the businesses are right off the exits and our attractions and our hiking trails are right off the exits. That's unique to New Hampshire. You know, if you go up to Maine or Vermont that's not the situation. You got to drive 40 minutes plus to get to some of the ski areas or hiking trails off of in Vermont, but here in New Hampshire you come off the highway and boom, it's here. New Hampshire is right here. You know, Loon is right off the exit, Waterville is right down the road and you're sitting right in the hub of all that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's very true. Route 93 is a big, big driver for us. It's funny, when I opened people are they? Everybody assumed I was going to get people coming off the highway and strangely enough, my first customers were heading to the highway from the bedroom communities.
Speaker 2:That's true, and those were my first customers were the locals and heading to the highway. But over the years, yeah, definitely, route 93 is a big driver and even if people aren't skiing at Waterville Valley, they are still getting off the highway. There they're getting stopping at our shop, they're getting an egg sandwich and some breakfast and coffees and getting back on the highway. And that is true for going to Loon or Cannon or Bretton Woods. Even when Sunday River has specials and they do cheap skiing in the spring, we get customers heading to Sunday River. We also get Canadians heading down, you know, south, whether it be they're heading for the beaches or wherever they're headed. So Route 93 is a huge driver of this whole area is definitely true and we are definitely in that mix as well.
Speaker 1:I love that. So some things have started to change. You know, the dinner menu, the take-home meals and, of course, the music is all fairly recent. How has that helped? You've extended the hours. What's that all like now?
Speaker 2:It's been great. I think it has really helped move our products in a sense. You know our meals to go become lunch specials. We sell a lot of soup there at the coffee house. Tina, our head chef, makes all our soups and they're all fabulous and they they sell all the time in cups for people to eat there and so we started putting them in courts and putting them in our refrigerator case and they sell there.
Speaker 2:We have a lot of four o'clock traffic from, you know, parents picking up kids from sports activities, for example. So being open till six, you know we used to over the years we used to when we first opened we closed at two, then it became three, then it became four, then it became six and every time it's been because there's been more customers, more afternoon support, because there's been more customers, more afternoon support, better sales and the meals to go and people looking for options of a nice sandwich or well-made and fresh products later in the day and in the music the music end of things kind of my project, passion project, if you will.
Speaker 2:You know coffee houses obviously have a history of having music. I'm a musician and have always wanted to have that be part of the mix and I'm really glad that it is. And it's not an easy endeavor to get people in there in the evening and consistently, but it's a lot of fun. We have a lot of great shows. We've had a lot of great artists In recent years. We've gotten a lot of help from the New Hampshire Music Collective that have brought in bands and artists from other parts of the state.
Speaker 2:It's been really nice to have a little variety at the coffee shop and we continue to fine tune that program. This year we had dinner at five, opening act at 545 and main act at seven, and so people are really starting to catch on to come in earlier, have some dinner, sit down, have a watch an opening act while they're eating and then finish up their meal and watch the main event. And that's been really fun to kind of add that opening act because the opening acts have been kind of local kids. Oh, wow, some high schoolers, nice.
Speaker 2:Uh, we had um fiddle head orchestra come in and do an opening act for us, which is a local, um, fiddle and violin and I think there might have been a cello there and, uh, that group and that was a lot of fun, uh. So we continue to have a lot of fun with it, and when it works and when the musician's good and when the room is full, it is just, it's just great. So much fun and the community is having so much fun and, um, I just love it. I just love when it's when it's there.
Speaker 1:When it's jamming like that dude. That's amazing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, good times.
Speaker 1:No, it's good, and course you know you've raised your family, your kids have worked there over the years and everybody gets to meet the kids. And now you know you started in 2005 and here we are 2025. You know, when you look back at what you've created, what do you think about?
Speaker 2:Oh, it's humbling. We often, melissa and I, often sit back and look. We walk in there on a weekend or something and see the line and just the people that wait in that line and are there every weekend and the support we get and the fact that we have 27 employees and the products that move out of there. It is, it is it's just plain old humbling. It's amazing. I don't know how to describe it. It just happened and, yeah, we've worked hard, but it's been truly amazing and we feel lucky and we feel humbled and just couldn't be happier.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's amazing man and the line is part of the experience, right I? Mean it is Apparently. Yes, you know people, they're never bothered by the line no, and it's part of the experience. I think it's part of the community it is. I guess it is.
Speaker 2:And you know it's so funny. You know, over the years, as the line started to develop, the staff would get really freaked out, like they would just start rushing and saying, oh my God, we've got to get these people out of here, we've got to get them through, we've got to get their orders, we've got to get just, and they would just rush and rush and rush and it would actually become less friendly because it was so rushed and we have to emphasize that. No, listen, it's okay, you know it's okay. They are here, they know there's going to be a line. A lot of them live in Boston and Massachusetts and they're used to waiting in line and as time has gone along, we've refined our systems and we have ways to deal with these lines and we move very efficiently.
Speaker 2:But yeah, it's been really interesting over the years watching, watching. You know new staff in particular really get freaked out about the line and then we have to settle them down and say listen, just stay, do your job one customer at a time, be friendly. They know they're in line, they walked in the door, they see the line, um, and I guess, yeah, I guess maybe to say it's part of the experience, maybe that's true.
Speaker 1:What I've watched over the years is how you've handled the line and you've handled it exactly how you've described it. You've never been bothered. You've never said a word to me about, you know, customers being frustrated or anything like that, and you have been that calm. You know. I think as part of that experience and people appreciate that you know, I think you know. All in all, dave, I mean you've created this statewide attraction. In a lot of ways. People come from a long way around to have a cup of Mad River coffee and an egg sandwich or my favorite, the bagel sandwich. You know, and you know it means something to somebody when they see your wholesale product somewhere else. I think it really means something to them as well. They know what they're getting. What's next? Where do you go from here, my man? The kids are in college. You've got a successful business. What's the plan?
Speaker 2:Retire, stop working. Yeah, we are just going to keep going. We definitely are. Our kids are in college, they just started college, so they've got four more years, uh, or maybe five, uh, but then, yeah, we look forward to retirement. Um, we looked forward to doing some traveling.
Speaker 2:We are, we are hoping, um, you know, potentially, of of selling the place to to someone local and keeping keeping that, that, that local feel, um, that local feel. That would be great, that would be nice, that would feel good to have that carry on for the next generation. It will not be our kids. They have other endeavors in mind which I totally support and totally is fine. I know, as a child I didn't want to be told what to do, so but yeah, we're just, we're going to keep going, we're going to keep refining what we do. We, we like to, we always like to move forward. You know, we always like to try some new things and do some new things and refine our systems and make things more organized and cleaner and keep them profitable and and just just kind of keep going and then then retire and travel and not work not work.
Speaker 1:I love that there's a lot of you know sort of Yankee in you and Melissa. You guys are hard workers. You know you show up every day and you started your own business and you created this thing that has supported yourself and others. It's really amazing. But what do you think really? You know everybody wants to know when they talk to somebody successful, what's the magic when you look at it and summarize it, what's it take to go from you know, a small space with 12 seats for $750 a month selling coffee and egg sandwiches to now really a New Hampshire icon location at Exit 28?
Speaker 2:Well, first and foremost, it was the fact that the professionals were right I needed to roast my own coffee, needed to roast my own coffee. That was by far the first key to success, Because in the early days, when I was trying to pay rent and trying to sustain myself and my wife Melissa was helping me on the weekends and that was, it was the two of us, and then then then one employee, two employees, three employees. But in those first days I mean some days, you will the first two months of business I mean some days you have 10 people walk in Right, I mean it's a small town, and but on those days I'd go to the post office and, lo and behold, there's a couple of wholesale checks there. So my wholesale customers sent me checks and I took that and rang it into the register. The next day maybe I had a few more customers, but I only sold, you know, 20 egg sandwiches. But I also sold 20 pounds of coffee off the shelf and that was my coffee, that was my brand, that was my blend, and so there's a good profit margin there because I'm buying a green product, I'm manufacturing coffee. Coffee roasting is a manufacturing process. So I am manufacturing a product and I'm taking that product all the way to retail. So in a sense, you could argue I've eliminated the middleman. So that was certainly, that was certainly key number one. Key number two for me in the coffee industry and I think this carries on to many other things, but particularly coffee.
Speaker 2:Coffee is routine. People need to know you're going to be open every day period. So when I opened this business, I dedicated myself to working 365 days in a row. I was like we are not closing. I didn't make it. We closed on like Memorial Day and Fourth of July and Labor Day and a couple other holidays, just so I could essentially sleep, I think, at that point.
Speaker 2:But undoubtedly, when you have hours on the door, you've got to be there, and when you're in coffee, you've got to be there every day. It has to be consistent. You have to be open on time. You have to be open until you say you're closed, and I've emphasized that to our staff all the time. You have to be on time. That door has to be unlocked at 6 am and if someone walks to the door at 5.59, that door better be unlocked. So consistency, consistency, consistency is the other big key. And then, like I said, we've had good products, we've had good employees and those things and we have great customers. All those things have helped. But I think those are some of the keys.
Speaker 1:A lot of wisdom in there for hard work and consistency and controlling your own destiny with your product and right here in the 603, getting a masterclass and being an entrepreneur and kicking it off. And I love that, dave. It's really amazing. Congratulations to you and Melissa and your family. I know we got years more ahead of us here and I love it. I love coming by and grab my coffee and you know people are, of course. You know maybe we just close with this. What's your as we face some uncertain times and some fluctuations in the coffee market and you know it's hard to say what tariffs are going to do, but the reality of it is things could change and how. You know it's hard to say what tariffs are going to do, but the reality of it is things could change. And how do you navigate that?
Speaker 2:There's a lot of navigation going on right now. There is a lot of uncertainty Coffee industry as a whole has had a tough few years with growing coffee in certain regions and weather concerns and shipping concerns and there's been a lot going on in the industry in the last few years and the uncertainty of the tariffs and what that's going to do to all these imported coffee beans. Obviously, almost no coffee is grown in the United States. It is all imported. And the things we are doing we are working hard every day to identify opportunities to keep our costs the same. We are, dare I say, we are experimenting with some new blends. Wow, okay, can't wait. So we are.
Speaker 2:I've always, you know, like I said, consistency, we've been making the same blends for ages, but we are going out on a limb here. We are trying some new things to prepare for whatever might be next in the next couple of years. We will stay dedicated to the things that got us here, you know, an easy to drink cup of coffee, less acidic, comfortable, easy to drink, easy to drink and we obviously will keep our coffee house very, very cozy and comfortable and excellent staff and customer service and products. All those things will stay the same, but, yes, we are working hard. We are working hard every day to rise to the occasion of 2025 and the things to come and Dave, how do people find you?
Speaker 2:how do they? Well, madrivercoffeeroasterscom is our website. As you mentioned, we are right off exit 28 on Six Flags Road. You can order on the phone, you can order online. We have a connection right through Google to our ordering platform so you can order coffee as you're driving up the highway. You can order food now it's driving up the highway, crazy times and, of course, facebook and all the social media places Instagram, et cetera. We keep busy on those platforms as well.
Speaker 1:I love it, dave, and we appreciate your support here on the 603. Thanks so much for being part of the 603 family and supporting the 603 podcast.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, Dan, thank you very much for having me. It's a blast. Appreciate your time.
Speaker 1:Absolutely All right. Hey, we'll catch you next time right here on the 603 podcast.
