Latest / Coffee People Podcast / Grant Gamble and Suneal Pabari, Co-Founders of Leaderboard: The Coffee Game

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Grant Gamble and Suneal Pabari, Co-Founders of Leaderboard: The Coffee Game · Coffee People Podcast

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it's time for the show. Hey there everyone.
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Welcome to the Coffee People Podcast.
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our Coffee Smarter podcast, and so much more.
2:20
Our guests today are Grant Gamble and Sunil Pabari, the Co
2:24
founders of a Leaderboard, a worldwide educational coffee
2:29
tasting game and community, which you can find online at
2:33
Leaderboard dot Coffee. Of course, those links will be
2:36
in our show notes and in our newsletter.
2:38
And if you haven't poured yourself a cup of coffee yet,
2:43
you should hurry up because it's time for the show.
2:46
Cheers. Who wants to get get?
2:52
Why don't we start with that maybe?
2:54
We should do like like hands for for which one of us we'll.
2:59
Go for that. I I feel like I'm pointing, but
3:01
you don't know who's what's side of the screen.
3:04
Let's start with with you, Grant.
3:06
Introduce yourself, let people know who you are and what your
3:10
role is at leaderboard, among other things.
3:14
So I am Grant Gamble friendly Canadian coffee nerds.
3:18
I am based in Vancouver BC in the Pacific Northwest.
3:24
I am the Co founder of Leader Boards.
3:27
I am also the creative director of the World Air Press
3:31
Championship and the founder of Culture Coffee Project, which is
3:35
sort of my own events and marketing agency for everything
3:40
else that I do, just under one roof.
3:45
Sweet and my name is Sunil Pavare.
3:47
I am also a friendly Canadian coffee nerd based in Toronto,
3:52
ON. I'm the Co founder of
3:53
Leaderboard Coffee as well as the Roasters Pack and Coffee
3:56
Wallahs, a coffee roasting project focusing on specialty
4:00
Asian coffee. I like that you're on opposite
4:03
ends of a massive country and just showing that, you know,
4:07
there's there's peace and harmony, you know, depending on
4:10
which side of the border you're on there opposite ends.
4:14
Of the yeah, well, I, I was actually living in Toronto for
4:20
about a decade, which is where I met Sunil and, and when we had
4:24
actually started leader board, I was still based in Toronto, but
4:28
then moved out here back to Vancouver about 3 1/2, three and
4:33
a half years ago now, something like that.
4:35
In Vancouver, I will say one of my favorite places in the world
4:38
and somehow the only place that I looked at that was more
4:41
expensive than where I already live.
4:43
So that our move is is being delayed to.
4:48
Vancouver. Sunil, you know you both have a
4:52
lot of coffee experience and I there's going to be links for
4:55
everyone listening in all of our notes and in the newsletter and
4:58
everything. There's just a list of things we
5:00
do. We're kind of focused on leader
5:01
board today. But before I get to that, I'm
5:03
wondering if you guys could give us a little little background,
5:07
You know who who are you outside of coffee?
5:09
How did you get interested in coffee in the first place?
5:14
Yeah. So about 1111 years ago now, I
5:18
was living in a suburb of Toronto, about an hour away from
5:24
Toronto. And I had tried some good
5:28
coffee, but living in the suburb, there really wasn't any
5:30
good coffee. I had just graduated university
5:33
recently and I was living with my, my, my parents still.
5:38
And I don't know what the suburbs are like where you're
5:40
at, but the are the ones near Toronto are like quite, we'll
5:44
say like dull or lacking personality.
5:46
And so there's not really like good restaurants or culinary
5:49
experiences or cool cafes. So I tried good coffee and I
5:52
wanted to try more, but it was really hard to get my hands on,
5:56
like, really cool specialty coffee, especially like 11 years
5:58
ago, especially coffee was like happening, but it was not at the
6:02
level that it is today. And so my answer at the time was
6:07
like, let me check the Internet. And the Internet also like was
6:10
still pretty bare bones when it came to specialty coffee.
6:13
And so I figured, hey, why not try and like solve my own
6:15
problem. And what that led me to was
6:17
starting a coffee company called the Roasters Pack, which is a
6:20
coffee subscription here in Canada where you get to try
6:23
three different Canadian roasters, three different
6:26
coffees from three different Canadian roasters.
6:27
So it's a cool, really it's a really cool way to explore
6:29
coffee, see what you like, learn more about coffee.
6:32
And that was my start in specialty coffee.
6:34
It was just like trying to scratch my own itch and solve my
6:38
own problem of being like, hey, I want to learn more, I want to
6:40
try more, but there's no real good way of doing that right now
6:43
in Canada. And so that was my start, jumped
6:46
in the deep end. And yeah, it's been a fun eleven
6:50
years since. That's just an entrepreneurial
6:53
mindset where you go, how can I either make enough money not to
6:57
be spending money to do the thing that I want to do or
7:00
actually make more money so I can keep doing it.
7:03
And Grant, I don't want to ignore you, but Sunil, I just
7:05
want to clarify, you know, starting the roasters pack, was
7:10
it a challenge to find enough Canadian roasters at that time
7:15
in specialty coffee to continually be updating your,
7:19
your offerings? Honestly, no.
7:22
There were enough doing, I think interesting things back in the
7:25
day, but now it's obviously like exploded.
7:27
And every year like more and more, especially coffee roasters
7:32
come on the scene. I think Canada has like a
7:34
secretly really good coffee scene or kind of like a sneaky
7:39
good group of roasters. I think there's a lot of talent
7:42
up here in Canada that maybe gets like overlooked because
7:44
we're like, oh, we're just Canada.
7:46
But I've met a lot of really talented coffee people up here.
7:49
How about you, Grant, how did you kind of get started and any
7:51
of those first memories of coffee that that inspired you?
7:56
So working in coffee was actually my first job when I was
8:00
15 years old. So growing up my father was
8:05
always a really big fan of just beverages in general.
8:09
So wines, whiskeys, coffee, and from a very young age, we were
8:14
sort of like taught to respect the beverage.
8:18
You know, it wasn't really like a means to an end.
8:22
So drinking wasn't necessarily to get drunk.
8:24
It was to appreciate, you know, the sort of social aspects of
8:29
that, of that beverage and the flavors of it.
8:31
And so coffee kind of like fell into that for me.
8:34
And so when I wanted to get my first car, I was like, OK, I
8:38
kind of need a job to do that. I am nowhere near old enough to
8:43
work as a bartender, so let's do daytime bartending and get a job
8:46
at a cafe. So so I started working at a
8:49
Starbucks, and this was while I was in high school.
8:52
And I ended up actually managing that Starbucks while I was still
8:58
just a wee, wee little fetus, which was kind of a weird
9:02
experience, like managing people that were much older than me.
9:07
But yeah, I just, I, I really, really fell in love with the
9:12
whole culture around coffee, even though, you know, at
9:14
Starbucks it was quite limited, but it was still all very, very
9:19
new for me. And I just kept going down the
9:22
rabbit hole. So I started working at another
9:25
shop or a chain of cafes in Vancouver where they were
9:29
actually using manual machines and kind of fell in love with
9:33
that and just went farther into it.
9:35
And then I moved to Toronto in 2010 to actually pursue a career
9:41
in advertising. So I was going to school for for
9:46
an advertising degree and kind of while I was doing that, I was
9:50
also sort of music blogging at the time and had accidentally
9:54
fell into artist management and throwing events in the music
9:58
industry, which was like a really fun time in my life while
10:01
still working at cafes and then learning kind of advertising and
10:05
marketing. And through that, I just, I
10:10
mean, I really learned a lot through school, but I dropped
10:14
out of that program because this opportunity came up to help
10:18
start a chain of cafes and wine bars with, with some really
10:22
great folks in Toronto, which was Boxcar Social, which for a
10:26
while I think was, you know, one of the best coffee programs on
10:29
the on the continent. Really.
10:32
Yeah, I, I did that for a few years, but again, I was still,
10:35
you know, hungry to learn more and do more in the industry.
10:40
So I started working for coffee importing company after that,
10:44
which was kind of a huge leap. I sort of just skipped the the
10:47
roasting step and went right to kind of importing and trading.
10:52
And that was another really big learning experience for me.
10:54
But then through that I had an opportunity to kind of lean into
11:00
my education and events background and I started running
11:04
coffee festivals in Canada. And that was that was really
11:07
like the big aha moment for me where it was like this
11:10
encompasses everything that I love about this industry.
11:13
And I can, you know, provide this space for collaboration to
11:18
happen for, you know, enemies to be shoulder to shoulder, serving
11:21
the same customers and becoming friends.
11:23
And and like music is a part of it, food is a part of it, design
11:28
is a part of it and it just encompassed everything that I
11:31
love. So since that point, I've kind
11:33
of been on this path of more sort of events and experience
11:37
based, like an events and experience based career, I
11:43
guess, in coffee. Sure.
11:44
I mean, I think most people in coffee love coffee, the coffee
11:49
itself, but the experience is a major component of all of that.
11:52
And so you're bringing that together.
11:55
I'm going to throw back a reference here that most of our
11:57
audience is not going to know. I'm thinking that maybe you you
12:01
too will, but it sounds like what you were doing in coffee is
12:04
essentially what the founders of the Over the Top movie were
12:10
thinking about when they were doing arm wrestling competitions
12:14
with Rocky there back in the day.
12:15
If you don't know that one, I'm going to share the video of that
12:18
in the newsletter. Please.
12:20
Do you know when he turns his hat around he becomes a machine
12:25
and there's nothing anyone can do that he's going to win that
12:27
arm wrestling match? Retail is so weird in general.
12:33
Sunil, did you have retail experience as well before kind
12:36
of launching into the Internet area?
12:39
Well, funny. I guess my first job was at IT
12:42
was in merchandising and marketing at like Canada's
12:44
largest grocery store. So I was responsible for like
12:48
deciding what price certain items should be and like what
12:51
you go on Flyers. So I was like, it was I was in
12:53
retail, but more like helping manage like 60 produce
12:59
departments across Canada. Yeah, I think, I think a lot of
13:02
entrepreneurs get a start in retail and realize I don't want
13:06
to make a living doing this type of work at this amount of money.
13:10
I mean, I was 16 and an assistant manager at a Foot
13:14
Locker, you know, and I remember, and then I would go
13:17
and work at the Sunglass Hut, and then I would work at the
13:20
warehouse or whatever it was. And I remember thinking, this is
13:22
just not challenging for my brain, but also like, they're
13:27
not paying me very well. So what can I do differently?
13:31
You guys have all this other stuff going on, but you came
13:34
together to do leaderboard and so I'm wondering what what is
13:39
leaderboard? Well, all right, I'll, I'll
13:47
start leaderboard. It's an international coffee
13:50
tasting game. So I guess to answer the what I
13:55
can talk a little bit about like the why or the how to, but I was
14:00
always like a huge fan of cup tasters as like a competition.
14:04
I think it's really cool that there's this competition where
14:06
you can challenge each other and see like who can taste coffee
14:10
the best. However, the problem with cup
14:12
tasters is that it's really only taste testing one element of
14:14
your coffee tasting ability, questioning like can you just
14:18
figure out which one is different?
14:20
And I think like a really fun game to play with like other
14:26
coffee friends is just handing them a mystery cup of coffee and
14:29
being like, hey, what country do you think this is grown in?
14:32
Or like you, you just hand someone a drink and being like,
14:34
it's really tasty, right? And they're like, yeah, I love
14:36
it. And you're like, ha, ha, I got
14:37
you. It's a decaf.
14:38
Didn't see that coming, did you? And so knowing like this fun
14:43
game I used to play with coffee friends and then also my like
14:46
love of cup Tasers. I had this like concept in in my
14:49
head. And Grant and I were buddies
14:52
through an event that he had run in Toronto where I had a booth.
14:56
We got to know each other and just like started hanging out
14:58
more in Toronto. And I threw this like rough
15:01
concept at him of like, hey, what if there's a coffee
15:04
competition that tests more than just, can you determine the
15:08
difference between coffees? And we started like
15:11
workshopping, brainstorming and just kind of like riffing on
15:14
this idea. And that's what led to
15:16
Leaderboard Coffee, which is a, it's now an international
15:20
mystery coffee tasting game. So we send people 10 coffees
15:23
blind and they have to try and figure out which country the
15:26
coffees are grown in, whether it's a decaf or not, how it was
15:30
processed, whether it was grown above or below a specific
15:33
elevation, what varietal the coffee is.
15:36
And so we get to quiz people on their coffee tasting ability.
15:40
But more than just can they tell the difference between coffee A
15:42
and coffee B. It's more about like the stuff
15:45
that I think as coffee professionals, we really like to
15:47
talk about. And I think it's probably really
15:49
useful for you as a coffee professional to be able to taste
15:53
and figure out in terms of palate development.
15:56
And so now we've we're on season 17 of leaderboard.
16:01
We're shipping hundreds of boxes around the world to 50 different
16:04
countries, which is pretty insane.
16:07
And the top 20 scores make it on the leaderboard for each season.
16:13
So that's leaderboard in a nutshell.
16:14
Hopefully I did. I cover everything, Grant.
16:18
Yeah, I think that maybe the only missing element is, like,
16:23
visually and stylistically, the whole game is sort of
16:27
reminiscent of like an arcade game or a video game, just to
16:30
try to make this whole experience more approachable.
16:33
Because learning about coffee, like we all know this and, you
16:37
know, we are fortunate enough to work in coffee and have
16:39
education that way. But for everyone else, like
16:43
learning about coffee can be incredibly intimidating and you
16:46
don't really know where to start.
16:48
Or talking to baristas or roasters might be kind of scary.
16:52
So our whole our whole goal with the way that we make this game
16:57
feel is to just make it feel really fun, really approachable
17:01
that, you know, someone who's just interested in coffee can
17:04
still feel like they can join this game and be a part of this
17:08
world. And then sort of be incentivized
17:11
to learn by, you know, earning points and earning badges and
17:15
seeing your name up on the board and getting high score call
17:17
outs. So that's really been quite an
17:20
important part of this, of this whole project for us.
17:24
When you're asking your players to reverse engineer the
17:28
information that they would be looking for on a bag of coffee,
17:31
right? And so they have to come at it
17:33
with intentionality and start breaking those things down.
17:38
And I, I can just see how not only would you have to Start
17:43
learning more, but I think as a player, I'd have to start
17:47
becoming more confident in my choices to lock in these answers
17:51
that I'm giving to you. Because otherwise I could, I
17:54
would just go over a million times.
17:56
I'd lay awake at night thinking about, well, I said, you know
17:59
this, but what if it elevation was 1500, not 1600?
18:02
I don't know. Were you friends before you got
18:06
started on this project? Yeah, we were.
18:11
And and we'd, we'd always kind of wanted to do something
18:15
together, but we never really had I guess the time to, to
18:21
really work on something. And so, you know, like leader
18:25
board started in the pandemic when we did have a lot of time.
18:30
Like certainly I had a lot of time having my career, you know,
18:33
entirely be based on large scale events which were no longer
18:37
happening. So we were able to, you know,
18:41
take this nucleus of an idea that Sunil had and then turn it
18:45
into leaderboard over the span of about three months.
18:49
Wow, that's really fast. What's what made you think that
18:53
because you're friends doesn't mean you're going to be good
18:55
business partners? What made you think that the
18:59
other person and either of you can answer this, but had the
19:03
right personality to make this work?
19:05
Obviously like you can talk about this is what I have a
19:08
skill in, but a business is a whole nother animal.
19:12
And so you're both kind of making decisions here.
19:14
How did you did you think there was a risk there that maybe the
19:19
friendship wouldn't allow for a business partnership and vice
19:22
versa? That's a good question.
19:26
Yeah, good question. Go ahead, Grant, if you got
19:28
anything. Yeah, I, I think like putting
19:33
putting friendship aside, I think that this, this business
19:37
really works well and we recognize the potential for this
19:42
because Sneil and I have very complimentary sort of skills
19:46
and, and approaches to, to finding solutions for problems.
19:51
So, you know, with, with his experience in, you know, like
19:54
OPS and logistics and running coffee subscriptions, and then
19:57
my experience in, you know, marketing, branding and doing
20:01
events and experiences, those two complements each other
20:04
really well to kind of bring this project to fruition.
20:09
And then also Sneil just kind of being much more of an analytic
20:13
like calculated mind. And, and I sort of I, I run a
20:16
bit more on informed vibes. I would say that's pretty
20:20
complimentary. But before we we actually
20:23
started this project, we had, we had many very long conversations
20:28
about ensuring that, you know, the friendship wouldn't be
20:32
destroyed by this and just having really open communication
20:36
about everything. Like, you know, we have like an
20:40
even split across the board on like how this, you know, project
20:45
is, is owned, I guess from like an equity standpoint, which
20:48
again just sort of takes away any risk of one person feeling
20:52
like they're, you know, getting more out of this than the other.
20:56
I would kind of interrupt there and say, and this is a little
21:01
bit of I'm bringing some of my own baggage here, but having a
21:05
similar motor or a similar bandwidth for attention on this
21:09
project. Since you both have other
21:11
careers and other things that you're working on, how do you
21:14
avoid resentment if one person seems to be doing more at any
21:17
given time versus another? You know, you know what I mean?
21:20
Like if you had different motors, some people are like, I
21:23
can go 20 hours a day. Some people need time to
21:27
decompress differently. And how do you manage that?
21:31
Or how do you look at the other person and say, no, this is what
21:33
works for them and this is what works for me, and we're making
21:36
it work together. I, I can go 1st and say for me
21:41
personally, I think that it works because we both understand
21:46
each other and are in very similar places with our, with
21:50
our time and available time for this project.
21:52
So it's, it's like a give and take like this.
21:55
Sometimes I'm, you know, really focused on the World Airpress
21:59
Championship and then I need to rely on our team for leaderboard
22:02
to kind of pick up that slack. But then there's other times
22:05
when, you know, the Roasters pack goes through, you know, the
22:08
ebbs and flows of really busy seasons when Sunil is just
22:12
totally unavailable because he's so buried and in managing that
22:16
that that growth at that time. I think this is really
22:21
interesting questions. It's been fun to actually just
22:23
like ponder what the answer is sitting here.
22:26
I think we both, I think how we run this business is like very
22:31
much like empathy for each other.
22:33
First. I think that like it's for the
22:35
other person, like we put the other person's priority, I think
22:38
over the business, like we understand each other and it's
22:41
like that mutual respect, which I think is really important.
22:45
And I think that's maybe like where things can go arise.
22:48
Like I think how we built this business from the beginning
22:49
where we did have long conversations, like how do we
22:51
make sure this friendship stays around?
22:53
And it was like, that was important from the very
22:55
beginning, not just like, how can we make sure this is a
22:59
success or like only focusing on the project.
23:03
Yeah. And I think we, like, also
23:05
understand that like the other person, I think this is like the
23:07
empathy side where the other person is like trying their
23:09
best, like everyone is doing what they can.
23:11
And so like, I know that like, Grant will work super hard when
23:15
he can. And I think Grant knows that
23:17
about me, too. And we we're both like, aligned
23:20
on the goals and the vision of what we want this to potentially
23:23
be. And I think, yeah, it feels like
23:26
there's this really nice mutual understanding.
23:29
Understanding. I would also add trust.
23:31
You know, which is always the biggest thing that it takes time
23:35
to grow that and then you have it's not something that I think
23:39
some partnerships they forget that trust is something that you
23:42
sure, it's earned, but it also has to be maintained.
23:45
And from what I'm hearing from you is like that's a lot of the
23:47
work that you do as partners is to maintain that understanding
23:51
of the other person and that trust. 17 seasons is an
23:55
incredible accomplishment. So congratulations.
23:58
Thank you. I would assume more players now
24:03
than at the beginning, but how has that community of people who
24:08
are excited to play this game or excited, you know, how do you
24:11
cultivate that? Did they engage with each other
24:13
or is it just back and forth with you?
24:15
I mean, how does that process work?
24:17
Where? OK, cool.
24:19
Like I'm doing this thing and on my names in that top 20, what
24:23
does that mean to the person on the other side of this?
24:32
I'll, I'll, I'll go first. I'll just those are the the
24:36
little clips I will edit out 10 seconds of they're there.
24:41
People don't want 10 seconds of silence of us waiting for what,
24:44
for the other to answer. I think I, I can talk about kind
24:49
of the, the community of, of players.
24:53
So leaderboard is very much I think for for players, it can be
25:01
an individual experience, you know, like players get their
25:04
boxes. And it was sort of the whole
25:07
point of, you know, making the competition run this way is that
25:12
you're not forced to compete on a stage with a time limit where,
25:16
you know, nerves can take over and, you know, you, you feel
25:20
like you might mess up in front of all of your peers.
25:23
So there are definitely a large amount of players that sort of
25:27
do this isolated on their own and don't talk with anybody.
25:31
But then there's another section or another sort of, I guess,
25:35
cohort of players that get that box and they play in real time
25:41
in real life with people around them.
25:43
So it could be either, you know, playing as a group and they get
25:46
together every weekend to do this together, or it's a team
25:49
building activity for a cafe or roastery, or, you know, an
25:54
office for a coffee business. Or it could be, you know, we
25:59
have a few cases where, you know, there's a multi venue
26:03
business and they'll get a box for each of their locations and
26:07
all of those teams will compete against each other to see which
26:10
team scores higher. And then we have this other, you
26:16
know, cohort or section of players, which I think I feel
26:20
like is the majority where people are playing this either
26:23
on their own or in a group, but then they're actually connecting
26:27
with other players online. So we have a, a Discord server
26:31
where we put all of our players from around the world into one
26:34
place and they can discuss the coffees and, you know, come up
26:39
with their wild theories about, you know, what, what, what does
26:43
this clue in, in, in the mix tape mean like?
26:46
And how does that relate to potentially being this, this
26:49
coffee or, you know, leaderboard follows these six roasters on
26:52
Instagram. So it means that one of them
26:54
must be in this game. So we do, you know, provide this
26:58
space for players to actually connect with each other and sort
27:02
of have this shared leaderboard experience without us really
27:05
needing to stoke the fire, so to speak.
27:07
You're cultivating conspiracy theories, that's what you're
27:10
doing. 100%, absolutely. We're we're reading, reading,
27:17
reading the next generation of conspiracy theorists through
27:20
coffee. Absolutely.
27:22
How much are you, the two of you, engaged with this
27:24
community? Or do you really just send out
27:26
the coffee and then stand back and then hands off, let them go
27:31
to town? I mean, we, we, we do like to
27:38
get involved in the Discord, but it's usually like letting them
27:41
discuss amongst each other. It's funny, like I've been to
27:45
real life cuppings where people are tasting leaderboard and
27:48
people will like say something and then they'll look at me like
27:50
as if I'm like, my facial, facial reactions are going to
27:52
give them a hint, you know, like, oh, this is city really
27:54
reminds me of the Colombian. And then like see how I react.
27:58
And so you kind of need to be poker faced specifically, like
28:02
in real life, but also online where we can't say too much
28:05
because we want them to just like play with the coffees, try
28:08
them and make come to their own conclusions.
28:10
Generally we step in when it's like a way to have a fun
28:14
conversation or like give some information about the game.
28:17
Yeah, that's generally where we step in.
28:19
And we let like the players, tend to talk amongst themselves
28:23
around their theories of what the coffees could be.
28:26
You mentioned earlier, Sunil, the sneaky Canadian coffee
28:31
culture. I find that I interact with a
28:33
lot of really incredible Canadian coffee people just sort
28:38
of unintentionally, it's just they're, you're everywhere.
28:43
We're everywhere. What, what do you wish people
28:48
knew about the Canadian coffee culture?
28:50
What makes it unique? One thing, you know, when you
28:53
live in a a country like Canada, a country like America, where
28:56
it's such a wide swath of geography, there's going to
28:59
naturally be distinct regional differences in how people treat
29:04
a product. You know, how do you know what
29:06
are things that we should know or that we should think about
29:09
when we're thinking about the differences?
29:13
I mean, that's a really good question.
29:15
I think Canada for some reason has like a really strong
29:19
competition culture or at least like certain areas of Canada do,
29:24
and I think that's really pushed the industry like to just
29:27
continue like improving. If there's so many people really
29:30
trying to compete in different competitions like barista comp,
29:33
then there's so many people just trying to pursue this goal and
29:36
push their craft as far as they can.
29:39
I know that Canada has had like many times a top six competitor.
29:44
I don't think we've ever won in the barista competition, but
29:46
we've had people get like fairly close and quite consistently,
29:49
which to me is interesting because it's not always the same
29:52
person, frequently different winners for barista competition,
29:55
which shows that there's many people who are capable of being
29:58
the winner. And I think that's like pushed
30:01
our coffee culture forward. That's like one side of it, but
30:06
that's, that's just one side of the coin.
30:07
It's interesting. I, I don't know, I don't know if
30:09
I have like a great answer as to why we have like some really
30:12
awesome Canadian coffee culture. You got you got a theory grant.
30:20
Nope. I, I, I, I think, I think that
30:24
we maybe need to need to tag in our conspiracy theorists as they
30:29
might have some, some explanations.
30:32
I think like for, for me personally, I don't know if I
30:35
have an answer why, but I think what I would really love people
30:39
to know is that we have incredibly high quality coffee
30:44
roasters here in Canada. And I feel like in the United
30:49
States, there are a lot, a lot of a lot of cafes that are very
30:54
aware of this and feature those roasters quite often.
30:58
Like Luna as an example, I think is really present in sort of
31:01
your, your neck of the woods, Ryan.
31:04
Yeah, I I think, you know, make your dollar go a little bit
31:08
farther and buy buy Canadian roasters you.
31:12
Banned that currency, yeah. Grant, you lived in on, you've
31:17
lived on both sides, You've lived in Toronto and Vancouver.
31:20
Do you see differences in the culture of coffee?
31:23
Yeah, I definitely do. Like I, I, I can't necessarily
31:27
comment on the communities across the entire country, but I
31:32
spent, you know, a fair amount of time in Toronto and Montreal
31:36
and then now kind of back here in Vancouver.
31:39
And I feel like in, in Toronto and Montreal, the community is
31:44
very tight knit and there's, there's always, you know, things
31:47
going on, even if they're small. But in Vancouver, you know,
31:52
there's this great potential for such a strong community, but it
31:56
feels really disjointed. Like everyone has this unspoken
32:02
sort of competitive nature. And, and I feel like if
32:09
everybody just kind of got together, they would realize
32:11
that they don't have to be that way.
32:12
But there isn't like a catalyst to get everybody together in the
32:16
same room here in Vancouver. So that's sort of one thing that
32:20
I've noticed is, you know, the the community is it just feels a
32:23
little bit, yeah, a little bit more disjointed out here.
32:27
But then also another thing that I notice is in Vancouver, I, I,
32:35
I feel like the cafes here, there's some incredible concepts
32:39
like you, you walk into the space and right away you, right
32:42
away you get it. You know, like everything from
32:44
the branding to the design to, you know, the pastries,
32:47
everything that they do is very intentional and on a very high
32:51
level. And I think that that happens
32:53
because it's such a high barrier to entry.
32:56
Here in Vancouver, it's really expensive to open up a shop.
32:59
So if you're going to do it, you kind of have to go all in.
33:01
Whereas in Toronto you can get away with opening up places a
33:06
bit more on the cheap. So you have these like really
33:09
fantastic cafes that, you know, might just feel a little bit
33:13
scrappier than some of the shops in Vancouver, but you'll have as
33:17
incredible, if not more incredible coffees in in places
33:22
in Toronto. And then Montreal is just on a
33:24
totally other level. I think Montreal is one of the
33:27
best coffee scenes in the world, especially if you love, if you
33:31
love cafes that you know, have incredible design, amazing
33:36
pastries because they're French. So they really know what they're
33:38
doing and food and you know, spirits are a very big part of
33:44
cafes there. So you can go to these places
33:46
and sort of have this incredible multi sensory experience.
33:52
I always respect somebody who can or a team of people who can
33:56
commit to a theme or an idea for their cafe because I am always
34:01
so worried that like, what if this isn't the thing and I've
34:04
just put all my eggs in this basket?
34:08
The show Coffee People podcast is sponsored by Rostar Coffee
34:11
Packaging, and one of the things that they've asked me to to do
34:15
this season is really try to help other people learn from
34:19
other coffee people. And so I'm wondering in this
34:22
question for both of you, if you have kind of a piece of advice
34:26
that you'd share with somebody watching, listening that either
34:30
you've taken and used as an entrepreneur or specific to
34:35
coffee if you prefer. Why don't we start with you,
34:38
Sunil? I think.
34:41
The really cool thing about specialty coffee is it still
34:43
feels like a relatively new industry.
34:46
I think like I talked about 10 years ago, 10 years ago, I guess
34:50
I don't know, it feels like a long time, but also it really
34:52
isn't that long. But I think the industry has
34:53
evolved so much in 10 years. And I think we can even look at
34:56
like coffee trends. Let's say like 3 years ago, what
35:00
the most common coffees were or the cool coffees were are very
35:03
different than what they are today.
35:05
And I think that means the industry is like changing
35:08
constantly. But I think my advice would be
35:11
like, look at other industries, see where like they have taken
35:17
things. You don't necessarily need to do
35:19
what has done been done in the past.
35:21
And it also means that there's like, you can just make stuff
35:25
up. Like you could do whatever you
35:26
want. Like it's still so new.
35:28
It's like you get to decide what where this industry can go.
35:32
I think like like leaderboard is kind of an interesting example
35:36
of that where it's like there wasn't anything like this and we
35:41
kind of were like, I wish there was.
35:43
And so we did it. And I think like if you have
35:45
some sort of qualms or issues with the industry, like there,
35:48
there's probably so many problems still left to be solved
35:51
in the specialty coffee industry.
35:53
So I guess my like, my real advice where I've gotten myself
35:56
to now here after this little ramble, is that like look for
35:58
all the problems because they still probably haven't been
36:00
solved because of how young this industry is.
36:02
And so you can put your stamp on our industry still because it's
36:06
still so it feels, it still feels like it's still really
36:08
early. How about you, Grant?
36:13
Sunil stole by answering. OK, well, it's I understand.
36:21
Yeah, we're we're we're actually just one, one mind.
36:26
First off, I I really understand the importance of sponsors, so
36:30
shout out Rostar. Thanks, Greg.
36:34
I should point out while I let you think of another piece of
36:37
advice, that with this new season, I'm supposed to do a
36:40
read in at the beginning of every episode.
36:42
And I already forgot to do it with you guys.
36:44
So we're going to go back and read it and we'll we'll get it
36:49
in there at some point. Yeah, yeah, I, I, I think, I
36:54
think what, what's Neil said about looking outside of the
36:57
coffee industry for inspiration is really important.
37:02
Like beyond just beyond, just like ideas for what you do.
37:07
But I think also for inspiration in terms of like design, I think
37:12
is really important. I think that coffee has this
37:15
tendency to become so saturated and everything starts looking
37:19
the same because when people are starting a company, they look at
37:23
what other successful companies are doing and then just, you
37:26
know, modify it a little bit. And I, I think that, you know,
37:31
if you're starting a new business, don't be afraid to try
37:34
something completely different and, and just look at other
37:38
industries to pull your inspiration from.
37:41
I think, you know, to maybe give a different answer then Sunil is
37:47
don't be afraid to ask for help. I, I think that that's something
37:52
that I learned the hard way from, from trying to do, you
37:57
know, massively ambitious projects completely on my own or
38:02
trying to juggle multiple things completely on my own.
38:05
I didn't realize how willing people would be to, to help
38:11
either, you know, volunteering their time or to actually, you
38:15
know, find a way to financially support what you're doing or
38:18
even just for advice. I think that we're really lucky
38:21
in this industry that coffee people are really good people
38:24
generally and really fantastic and really interesting people.
38:28
So if you are ever feeling, if you're ever feeling lost or, you
38:32
know, have doubts about anything, just reach out and,
38:35
and talk to other people and, and ask for help.
38:37
I find that people are, you know, very willing to to help
38:41
you in whatever way that they can.
38:43
I think through the first, you know, several seasons of me
38:46
doing this show, one of the things I heard from guests a lot
38:49
was that they felt, at least when they started in coffee,
38:53
they felt a little bit alone. Maybe they were weren't a lot of
38:57
roasters in their area. Maybe there weren't a lot of
38:58
specialty coffee nerds to connect with or they they
39:01
struggled to find their community.
39:04
You know, I think we're lucky as now that we are 10 years in,
39:07
there are more forums, there's more platforms, there's more
39:10
ways for people to connect. But I still hear that enough
39:13
that, you know, it's it's great advice to let people say, hey,
39:16
just throw your flag out there and, you know, see who's going
39:19
to going to respond. What comes next for leaderboard?
39:24
What's the future look like for you guys?
39:26
Are you on cruise control? You know, where are you guys
39:28
going with this adventure? We, we actually made like quite
39:35
a lot of changes even this past season.
39:37
It's funny, like we're seventeen seasons in and we're still
39:39
evolving the game, like like taking us back.
39:43
Like when we started this season 1, Grant and I sent each other
39:46
mystery coffees and like tried to test how this game would go.
39:49
But there's only so much testing you can really do.
39:53
And when you put this in the hands of like hundreds and
39:55
hundreds of people, that's when you really start seeing like,
39:58
how does the world interact with this, this crazy game that we've
40:01
created? And what we sort of noticed is
40:06
that like it was maybe diverging from what we had originally
40:09
planned or thought. And so we're like, cool, let's
40:12
tweak the game just a little bit and.
40:16
Like see how people interact with the game this time.
40:19
So like for leaderboard, our goal is we want to create a fun
40:23
competition, but it's based around learning.
40:25
And what we noticed is that people were often spending a lot
40:29
of time like researching who were following on Instagram
40:32
rather than tasting the coffees. And we're like, hey, this isn't
40:34
how we like want this game to be played.
40:36
So we, you know, we made a little bit of a tweak to how we
40:41
give you hints in where the coffees could be grown.
40:45
And so we're really excited to see how this plays out.
40:48
So I guess like the future of leaderboard is like continually
40:52
evolving the game to make sure it's a really awesome
40:54
experience. And that comes through, like
40:56
with the feedback that we get from our players every single
40:58
season, we get like a lot of feedback on how people found it
41:01
and we're just going to continue evolving this game probably
41:04
forever to make sure it's like a really, really good experience.
41:09
I think like jumping on to what Sunil said, this actually ties
41:14
back to our earlier conversation around interacting with that
41:18
community. We keep a very open line of
41:21
communication with our players and are always asking them for
41:25
feedback. Like we have a little feedback
41:28
form when people actually submit their answers and most people
41:31
provide us with that feedback or they're e-mail us or, you know,
41:35
they'll be chatting with me on social media through it or
41:38
through our Discord. And we often just take that
41:40
feedback, you know, really into consideration because they're
41:43
the ones playing this game and try our best to actually
41:46
implement, implement that into the game.
41:50
I think you both kind of pointed out a little bit in different
41:52
ways, but something that is a real value add that I would
41:56
offer as advice to people, which is you, you're not so locked
42:01
into this is what it has to be that you're willing to adapt as
42:05
the people, as your consumers are adapting, as they're
42:08
changing things. It becomes a relationship
42:10
between the between the two of you and that other group pushing
42:14
back with their thoughts and ideas.
42:16
And that's, that type of flexibility can be a challenge
42:20
when you've put your whole idea and your whole heart into
42:23
something investing into like this concept that you might have
42:26
to say, Oh, well, maybe what I started with isn't what it's
42:29
always going to be. That's a challenge.
42:32
It's a challenge for anyone's ego, mine included.
42:37
We've been doing for the last couple of years, we've been kind
42:40
of doing this quietly supporting various charitable things that
42:44
we find value in here at the show.
42:46
I wanted to open that up more this year.
42:48
So I'm asking you guys, are there any sort of charitable
42:50
efforts or non profits or just programs that you think are
42:53
valuable that we can share with the audience and maybe add a
42:57
little bit of support to them? I mean, at least here in
43:03
Toronto, one that like we try to support is just the local food
43:07
bank. It Yeah, it like honestly, yeah,
43:10
I don't know. It's kind of heartbreaking when
43:12
I drive past it and I see like a huge line.
43:15
And so usually on like a weekly basis.
43:19
So my partner has a bakery and so we'll like drop off some
43:22
coffee or baked goods for people at this food bank.
43:25
And so, yeah, that's kind of the one that we or myself
43:29
personally, like I'm trying to prioritize just food bank feel
43:32
like people, people got to eat, you know?
43:35
How about you grant anything for you?
43:38
I think like being here based in, in Vancouver, there's always
43:43
sort of like there's, there's always been a, a housing and
43:47
sort of homelessness crisis. But I think that it's, it's,
43:50
it's really like when people come to Vancouver, they're kind
43:55
of shocked by the disparity of wealth that you see in this city
44:00
because they're incredibly wealthy people.
44:02
But then, you know, there's the Downtown Eastside, which is, you
44:05
know, a very concentrated area and community of, of, you know,
44:10
folks that are down on their luck and sort of stuck in, stuck
44:14
in this, this system which is working as it should, which is
44:19
really frustrating that we're kind of stuck in it.
44:22
So I feel like for me, like growing up, my, my mom did a lot
44:26
of work on the Downtown East side as a nurse.
44:28
And so we would be down there, you know, every major holiday
44:32
just helping people out, like donating as much as as many like
44:36
warm clothes as we could and as much food as we could.
44:38
So I think being aware of organizations that are, you
44:43
know, supporting, supporting homelessness or supporting sort
44:46
of finding a solution to homelessness and you know,
44:51
policies that will will change that is really important.
44:54
So that'll be that'll be my answer for that.
44:57
And a special and especially a challenge right now where we are
45:01
having homelessness due to certainly economic and, you
45:06
know, political social problems, but also then randomly like I'm,
45:11
you know, we're, I'm here in Southern California, we had a
45:13
whole bunch of people of various economic levels displaced by
45:17
fire, wildfire. And I spent I, when I first
45:23
moved to California, I lived in Altadena.
45:25
If anyone's listening, the, the people that are displaced from
45:28
the Eden fire there, it's not, you know, you think of Los
45:32
Angeles and people think of celebrities and famous people.
45:34
And certainly there are that and the Palisades fire is drawing a
45:37
lot of attention to the celebrity side of things.
45:40
But these other communities are blue collar communities that
45:44
have just kind of grown up in that area and, and, and are
45:48
suffering just as much. So we'll certainly share some
45:50
links as well to those. How often do the two of you guys
45:53
get together in real life? Not often enough.
45:57
Not. Often enough it's nice.
45:59
I mean like it sucks that we don't get to see each other, but
46:02
it does force us to like go on a little trip whenever we do so it
46:05
like it's nice that I get to go visit him in Vancouver this
46:08
summer. We like both met up and just
46:10
hung out in Montreal, which was kind of fun because it it like
46:15
it make we make we get to make a little trip out of it.
46:18
That's awesome. When you are together and you're
46:20
walking down the street and you pop into a coffee shop, coffee
46:23
roaster, someplace you've never been.
46:25
What are you going to order off the menu?
46:30
It's a good question. For me personally, I will, I
46:34
will always get a batch brew if they have it on because I feel
46:38
like it's a great barometer for how much, how much care that
46:41
place puts into into their coffee program as a whole.
46:46
So I'll usually get a batch brew and then like a little, a little
46:49
flatty so I can have a little little sweet Milky treat.
46:52
And then if there are pastries, I will get many because I have
46:55
such a sweet tooth. I'm always like, this is like
47:01
maybe the peak, peak specialty coffee nerd answer.
47:04
I'm always like the poor verse you got, you know, I'm like
47:07
looking for something interesting.
47:08
I think the cool thing about specialty coffee shops or coffee
47:12
shops in general is they also do have like funds like signature
47:15
type beverages as well that you can't necessarily make at home.
47:18
So I also get excited about those.
47:21
Yeah, that's usually my go to go to order.
47:24
What did I miss today? I should have asked you
47:26
something. And we're running out of time.
47:28
Anything that you want people to know?
47:32
I think like something something that we've actually been doing
47:35
since Season 1 with leaderboard is like education is really
47:40
important for us, like providing open source education and really
47:44
fun ways for people to learn about coffee.
47:47
But we've also recognized like this, this game is unfortunately
47:52
really expensive to put together.
47:54
Like it's if we didn't have the roasters pack is our backbone
47:57
for doing this. Like it would be just utterly
48:01
impossible to do. So.
48:03
The price of the game can be a barrier for for people to play
48:06
it. So since the very first season,
48:09
we take based on how many boxes, you know, we can put together
48:14
and sell, we take a percentage of that and we put them aside
48:17
for our scholarship program. So we we open up applications
48:21
every season for people to either nominate someone or apply
48:24
themselves. And, you know, just tell us a
48:27
bit about how having access to a sort of sensory exercise like
48:32
this could be really helpful for them.
48:34
And then we send these boxes, send these boxes all around the
48:37
world every season. And we've been fortunate enough
48:40
to send them to a lot of coffee producing countries, which has
48:45
been really great because, you know, a lot of countries have
48:48
restrictions on what coffee they can import into their country.
48:52
So that, you know, there might be a producer in El Salvador
48:57
that hasn't been able to experience coffees from many
49:00
countries in Africa or different processes before.
49:02
So that scholarship program has been like really, really
49:06
important to us to, to, to keep going.
49:09
And maybe something would be great if if viewers knew so they
49:12
can spread the word so that so that we can, you know, get get
49:16
more people into this program and provide the box for free.
49:19
So if you're a barista listening to this, who's like trying to
49:22
push their career forward, but like this is a challenge with
49:25
coffee education in coffee, I think it's also like still
49:28
pretty early days. There's not like great pathways,
49:32
you know, there's like the obvious one, which is the queue,
49:34
but that one is like thousands and thousands of dollars.
49:38
I think a lot of coffee education is just like hoping
49:40
you have a good manager who like is wanting to teach you, but
49:44
it's not necessarily possible for everyone.
49:46
And so if you're looking to, you know, learn more about coffee
49:51
and, you know, further your career in coffee, but maybe
49:53
don't have the means or like the structure or resources around
49:57
you, please do apply to our scholarship program.
49:59
We'd love to hook you up with the box and help your coffee
50:02
career flourish. To both of you, thank you for
50:05
being here. I really appreciate getting a
50:07
chance to meet you for the first time, even virtually.
50:10
It's just been a real pleasure kind of learning about leader
50:12
board and I feel like both of you should come back on the show
50:15
to just talk about all the other stuff at some point that you do,
50:20
because I think it it just seems like such an an interesting, you
50:24
know, coffee life that you're leading.
50:27
Thank you. It's great to meet you too,
50:28
Ryan. Appreciate it.
50:29
Appreciate you having us on. Yeah, and thank.
50:32
You so much, Ryan. Since I am going to do my job,
50:35
I'm going to do the readout so I don't have to record that.
50:39
Maybe we should all read it together.
50:43
Everyone listening, you can find all the links that we chatted
50:45
about today in the episode, including the one to leaderboard
50:50
in our show notes in our newsletter, which you can find
50:53
online@coffeepeoplepodcast.com. This show, the Coffee People
50:58
podcast, is part of our Roast West Coast Coffee network and
51:02
can be found on all your favorite podcast platforms.
51:05
Apple, Spotify, just search for coffee people, search for
51:08
Leaderboard. You might find us there now by
51:10
doing that. Shout out to our presenting
51:12
sponsor, Rostar Incorporated. They're a coffee packaging
51:15
company out of Wisconsin that helps small businesses, medium
51:18
sized businesses tell a really big story with their package and
51:22
that's all. That's it everyone.
51:24
Thank you for listening to share some stories of coffee people,
51:27
please tip your baristas and be sure to drink the coffee.
51:33
OK? I did that part of it.
52:18
The. The way we got Rostar started
52:35
was looking at and discovering who coffee roasters were and
52:39
what their problems were. You're going to get unmatched
52:42
legendary customer experience here from start to finish.
52:48
Rostar has evolved a ton over the last few years.
52:51
We've invested in new equipment and technologies.
52:54
We have really put a lot of effort into continuous
52:56
improvement out on the shop floor.
52:59
What I'm most proud of with Rostar is I love how they seek
53:04
cutting edge technology. We also make things that are
53:07
really cool for really cool customers too.
53:10
We're really interested in getting to know our customer and
53:14
discovering what we can do to help them out.