Latest / Coffee People Podcast / Chris Deferio, Keys To The Shop Podcaster and Consultant

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Chris Deferio, Keys To The Shop Podcaster and Consultant · Coffee People Podcast

0:53
Music. Hey everyone, welcome back to
1:09
the Coffee People podcast. I'm your host, Ryan Wolt.
1:13
This is the show presented by Roast, our Coffee packaging, and
1:17
is part of the Roast West Coast Coffee Network.
1:20
Please go to roastwestcoast.com to find recaps of our episodes,
1:24
our Coffee Smarter podcast, and so much more content.
1:29
On this show, we connect with guests who are part of the
1:31
coffee industry somehow, even tangentially.
1:35
We share the stories of entrepreneurship, motivation,
1:38
their challenges and inspirations, often with a great
1:41
cup of coffee. Today, I'm actually drinking an
1:43
Aeropress espresso like shot of Yeah, no, yeah coffee.
1:47
Just a reminder, Yeah no Yeah is our collaboration with Relative
1:51
Coffee Company in Minneapolis, MN.
1:54
I'm really proud of this coffee, which is a blend of Ethiopia and
1:58
Colombia. And if you'd like to give it a
2:00
try, you can find the link to the Relative Coffee Company shop
2:03
in this podcast, show notes in our link tree on Instagram, on
2:07
our website. It's everywhere.
2:09
And now we've got a show to do. Our guest today is
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Christopherio. He's a long time coffee industry
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gentleman who for the past eight years has been offering up his
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knowledge as a consultant for more than 80 coffee shop owners
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and businesses. And also, he's been hosting the
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Keys to the Shop podcast. There are more than 900 episodes
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that offer clarity and actionable tools for cafe owners
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and coffee industry members. It's a really good show.
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I'm a follower. And if you want to follow Keys
2:39
to the Shop, I'll share the links in this podcast show notes
2:43
or if you're listening in our newsletter found at
2:45
roastwestcoast.com, just Scroll down a little bit.
2:49
You'll see those links and much more.
2:51
You can also search for Keys to the Shop on every major podcast
2:55
platform. OK, we're past the details and
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I'm sure you filled your mug with a great cup of coffee.
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And we're ready to get this show on the row.
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So thanks for joining me for another Coffee People
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conversation, this one with Christopherio, the podcast host
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and business consultant behind Keys to the Shop, based in
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Louisville, KY. I actually like reaching out to
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other podcasters because I listen to podcasts, you know,
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hours and hours of them a day. And I'm always excited to to
3:34
hear other people and how they do things and their approach.
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And so I've been lucky to have a bunch of different podcasters on
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this show. I'd love to start this episode
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by having you tell everyone what your name is, kind of where
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you're located, and what it is you consider your role to be
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your job title. My name is Chris Deferio and
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I've been in the business of coffee now for 25 years and I
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live in Louisville, KY. I am the founder, president,
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host and everything else at Keys to the Shop.
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It's a podcast and consulting company and spend most of my
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time doing consulting and coaching for coffee shops and
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owners and operators and even management teams and of course
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producing podcasts. And we're at about 900 plus
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podcast right now over the course of about 8 years of doing
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it almost will be in January 7th is our 8th year.
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So yeah, it's another, another era, another phase of of my
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career that I'm excited to get to do.
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Well, I'm honored. That you're here with me, I'm
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only halfway through that eight-year plan.
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I'm on my own. So we're still, I'm still a
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rookie as far as that's concerned.
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I've been listening to your show recently and appreciating it
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both for its, you know, the quality of the content, but the
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content itself, the the discussions about hospitality,
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which I love to have and I've been through and experienced.
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But it's nice to hear from someone else.
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You know, you sometimes you think you're alone out there in
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the world. You mentioned you had this long
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career in coffee. I'm wondering if you could go
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back in time. Was there kind of a first
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experience that got you started down the coffee path that made
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you think, yeah, I'm, I'm into this?
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Yeah, yeah. I think it's historically been
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one of those questions that I've answered with a, you know, 20
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something year old Chris be in a small coffee shop, you know,
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reading philosophy and journaling and, you know,
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discovering the air pot in the corner of the cafe and figuring
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out that I could taste the difference between the different
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coffees there. But the vibe of the space and
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the the energy was what drew me because it was, you know, what
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they call joint solitude. You're with people.
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You can be with people in conversation.
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You can go over somewhere by yourself with your thoughts.
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And it was really attractive to me.
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I had spent a year in a ministry school in the Midwest and and I
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had nothing else to do afterwards.
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It was kind of a spinning wheels time for my my life.
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And before, though, I mean, I, I drank coffee because my
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grandmother had, you know, this habit of smoking a cigarette in
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her kitchen table and having a coffee for breakfast and
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cracking open the window. So if you know little Chris, you
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know was there. It was.
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I didn't really have a lot of coffee, but I did have some
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black coffee with her. She cracked the window open.
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And I think that's probably one of those core memories that
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helped get me started. But the real revelation was
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tasting the difference between the coffees, the Papua New
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Guinea, the Guatemala, and not knowing what to do with my life.
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I had time to research coffee and became kind of a coffee
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nerd. And this is the day, you know,
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time of coffee, where there were still some really active coffee
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forums like coffeed.com. coffeegeek.com is still around,
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but it was in its heyday around these times.
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And so you just plunge yourself into these alt dot coffee, early
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Google group conversations. And that's where I discovered
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specialty coffee, where I knew there was a guy named David
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Schomer in the Northwest who was doing this thing called latte
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art, where you make pictures with milk.
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And he had AVHS tape and I had his book and oh, yeah, it was
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great. And I was in the Midwest,
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traveling from Arkansas to Tulsa.
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And in Tulsa, I, I chanced an espresso at a cafe called
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Nordagios, who was serving Cafe Vida at the time.
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And this was, this must have been somewhere in the, it was
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like 2000 or something like that.
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I'd already kind of gotten a job in coffee and then got fired
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because I was just passionate but useless as a barista.
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But I was still pursuing it. But the the specialty part of
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this story is I had a macchiato at this place like one of these
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like traditional kind of poured with a little rosette on the
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top. And it was stunning.
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It was just unbelievable. I, I, I literally ordered four
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more of these things and it was, my constitution was much better
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for coffee back then, I think. But I, I, it was a ritual of
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mine to travel 2 hours to Tulsa to have 5 macchiatos and spend
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the whole day at the Cafe reading and drinking coffee and
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getting in my palate, in my heart, my mind.
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This taste mixed with this history of what I loved about
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the coffee shop environment that would guide me for a very long
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time for for my career in coffee.
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I just decided one day this is what I'm going to do.
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And I never looked back. And it's the only career I've
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ever had. I'm guessing at that time gas
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prices weren't six to seven dollars a gallon in Oklahoma,
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but that. No, for some reason it was much
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more reasonable to me to travel. So you make this decision.
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I'm going to have this career in coffee.
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Where does that lead you? You know you've already been
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fired once. You know what's the next step?
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Yeah, well, I was despondent at that, of course.
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And funny enough, all these years later in my career, I had
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the owners of that shop on for a Founder Friday episode of my
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show. This was a place called our
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Segas in Fayetteville, AR You know, I, I, I always say I would
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have fired me too. You know, it's just one of those
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things from there. I just popped around from mom
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and pop shop to little, you know, roasteries and grocery
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store coffee bar in Wegmans in upstate New York.
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I'm from Syracuse, NY originally, so I, I just got the
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odd jobs basically and brought with me a lot of coffee passion.
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And so obviously this, this is how it works often now, even
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with a saturation of, of coffee education, still, if you find
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someone super passionate about coffee, it's a green flag,
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right? You, you're like, OK, yeah,
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you're really passionate about coffee.
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Back then it was very strange. You don't find people like that.
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It's like finding another wizard on the road, you know, just like
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don't see those very often. So I I remember going to Coffee
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Fest on a sort of quest to learn more about coffee.
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It was a flight to Seattle. I stayed at a hostel and just
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was drinking it in and I actually brought my micro
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cassette recorder at the time. I still have it at my desk here
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to sort of corner David Shomer in his own shop and ask him
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questions about opening a coffee shop.
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So I interviewed him back then and he encouraged me to just get
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a job and specialty coffee because I was going to move to
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Seattle. And so I happened to run into a
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place called Gimme Coffee near where I lived.
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And they found out I was really passionate about coffee and
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latte are they gave me the job as a barista.
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And from there, my career started to get involved with
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lots of yard competitions. I won the first one I entered
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and I ended up teaching a lot of lots of yard at Coffee Fest
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afterwards and was a champion of that particular competition two
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more times. And I became a trainer and
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wholesale trainer. Gimme coffee and help them
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develop their first manual before the barista training.
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And from there I moved on. I, I quit that job and moved to
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Carriage House Cafe, which was a French bakery and cafe with
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dinner and a jazz club and also a coffee bar, which I was a
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director of coffee for. And it that really in, in that
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time of my life was a time of exploring what it meant to have
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sway as a teacher and not always a great teacher because I was a
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competition person and I could be belligerent, I could be
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demanding and I thought it was a noble cause.
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But at the time I, I wasn't, as I say today, really people
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first, I was technical first, I was tamp evenly first, that kind
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of stuff. And, and I thought it was all in
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a good 'cause but you're young, you're passionate and you learn.
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And I, I guess that kind of sums up my career up to that point
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was a very steep learning curve of passion developing into real
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skill, developing into a, a more human skill, a skill with people
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that actually got that knowledge and instruction.
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To stick. Long story short, I, I left that
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job to get married, moved to Indiana, had some more coffee
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jobs and got involved in operations management and CAFE
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management and continue to teach and compete. 2007, I was USBC,
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4th place in Long Beach and eventually just decided that
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after a long time of managing multiple cafes as an operations
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manager, like managing managers and developing systems for a
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place here in Louisville where I ended up staying now for 10
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years. I wanted to get back into the
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industry to give, get a creative outlet, but to give to the
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industry the thing that I really was helped by in all of these
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years of development, which was podcasts and resources that were
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outside of coffee. They were management podcasts
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and leadership books and things like that.
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But when I searched for coffee podcasts back in two, you know,
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2015 and 2016, there were some and of course, you know, the Cat
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and Cloud guys were out there and but nothing that was
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specifically focused on really strategic and actionable
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takeaways for operation of a coffee shop, so, so to speak.
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So that's where Keys to the Shop was born in those in the year of
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2016 and launched in 2017. That kind of sums up hopefully
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well. Enough some 20.
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Five years of coffee. You know, when you start going
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through it, you start to realize the weight of 25 years.
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There's a lot of experience there.
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And to decide where the turning points are is important.
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But at some point it becomes a collection of all these
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experiences that define who you are.
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And as I was listening, I was thinking about my own path and,
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and kind of seeing it through your words there.
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The transition from passion and energy and learning skills and,
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and driving, driving, driving, driving into transitioning into
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leadership, which is, you know, having a skill and being able to
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share it is not the same as being able to lead people to
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discover it for themselves or to retain it or to perfect it even
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more than you did. And it takes a different type of
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motivation And, and I think that takes a lot of time to, to learn
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that. You just mentioned there weren't
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a lot of coffee podcasts in 20/16/2017.
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I think even when this show started four years ago, if you
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googled coffee podcast, you come up with maybe four or five kind
15:26
of shows that were core shows. I just did that again this week
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and it, you know, the list was 5 Google pages long and you know,
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maybe 60 shows that have the word coffee in them just as as a
15:38
base. So there's certainly been an
15:40
expansion. I think of it like like coffee
15:43
shops. There's always another coffee
15:44
shop and there's generally a place for it and most shows
15:48
will. There's a place for every show
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and, and for me, I welcome that because it's someone else to
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talk to and and it's interesting.
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Keys to the Shop became more than just sharing your knowledge
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on a podcast, it's consulting. How did you put those two
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together? Yeah, you know, when I first won
16:09
that Lotzi art competition, I started to get people that
16:13
wanted me to like work their booth at the National Restaurant
16:17
Association show in Chicago and stuff.
16:19
And of course I'm like, you're going to pay me what, you know,
16:23
until the point latte art and, you know, just I'll do whatever
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I'm I'm like this, I'm like the coffee pool boy or whatever for
16:30
these these brands. And that was what I thought
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consulting was. You know, I'm an expert in this
16:36
field. And so I had like the Vista
16:38
print cards made and I'm just like not very experienced in the
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ups and downs and personal trials and triumphs that are
16:46
necessary to gain wisdom to be able to guide other people.
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But I tried it failed and that was a good thing.
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So after a lot more of a gauntlet, you know, in my
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career, I, I developed, you know, to, you know, through
17:04
through just life and coffee experience and management
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failures and successes. This podcast that taught me that
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it basically, when you do a podcast, I'm sure you can relate
17:18
to this. You realize after a little bit
17:21
that it's actually helping you as well to realize what you've
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learned, whereas without the thinking about what you have
17:31
learned, you probably would just undersell yourself and your
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experiences. But by even just interviewing
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other people and coming up with questions and then maybe I do a
17:42
lot of solo episodes as well, I started to realize that it
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wasn't really about the ego wasn't part of it.
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You know, as as far as why I started consulting, it was more
17:53
like I want to be more helpful than simply presenting a
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podcast, which is helpful. And we've had lots of people say
18:02
that it's been helpful over their careers or the starting of
18:05
their coffee shops, etcetera. But helping people now looked a
18:11
lot more humble, looked a lot more like being a servant to
18:16
their success through the failures and successes of my own
18:20
career, but also through my education of doing the show.
18:27
Because the show itself is a is an R&D tool that surveys that
18:32
are put out by organizations could only hope to accomplish
18:37
the aggregation of wisdom that you get over the course of
18:39
hundreds of episodes is is monumental.
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You know, the consulting part started with just what I think
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it was an inquiry about consulting and I said yes to it.
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And my wife had to convince me to even promote consulting on
18:53
the show because I was just so in this mindset of I really
18:56
don't want to talk about myself. I really just want to showcase
19:00
the best, you know what, I think it might be the best thinking
19:04
and ways to have this thriving coffee shop part of our
19:09
industry. Because I believe the coffee
19:10
shop is a very pivotal part of the supply stream.
19:16
Like the trade of coffee eventually ends up in the hand
19:19
of a consumer. And, you know, we don't always
19:23
get it right. And some of those things are
19:25
preventable. And so we try to get people on
19:27
the show to talk about, you know, what did we learn?
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And maybe you can start at a higher level from our wisdom.
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And consulting is like that, but times 100 because now it's me
19:40
and the the couple or the individual or the team really
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hashing out in detail over the course of many, many hours,
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specific things that are either issues or challenges or
19:56
opportunities that can be stewarded a certain way to
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produce a result that is good for every, it's good for
20:03
everybody as it possibly can be profitable, thriving for all
20:07
people involved. So that's the start of
20:10
consulting. And so I just started promoting
20:12
it. And of course, when you have a
20:14
podcast that you know has a larger listening bass.
20:18
In a very narrow range of professionals, a very niche
20:23
podcast, so owners and operators and management listen to this.
20:28
It started to produce more leads.
20:29
And so that's how it kind of developed.
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So that's about how we spend most of my time now.
20:34
I was going to ask you, you know, how you keep current on,
20:37
like what's working and what doesn't and what the state of
20:39
the industry is. But I think he kind of just
20:40
answered it. You have this collective
20:44
knowledge coming on your show, and as part of this show, you're
20:47
exploring things in real time, you know, and putting it, adding
20:51
it to the foundation you've already built over, you know, a
20:54
long career in the industry. Yeah.
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Well, I was going to say in addition to that is, you know, I
21:01
still for this will be my twenty 20th year speaking at Coffee
21:07
Fest, although these days I am speaking on leadership and
21:11
management and and other things in Cafe design and stuff like
21:14
that. But I've I've been at these
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shows maybe 70 some odd times over the course of 20 years.
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So you also get that perspective of you know, that shift in the
21:26
industry etcetera. So there's a that's the other
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aspect is staying actually active in the industry.
21:33
I think about. I think about.
21:35
Core things in hospitality, and I think a lot of those core
21:40
things haven't changed. You know, being being able to
21:44
provide an experience, being a place that people want to spend
21:47
their time when they're not at home or at work or wherever.
21:51
A lot of that has stayed the same over decades, periods of
21:54
time. How we get there has changed and
21:58
that's certainly something that we're all kind of growing with.
22:01
I, I do have a, a selfish question I want to ask you right
22:04
now. It's something I've been
22:05
thinking about all day, knowing this was coming and it wasn't on
22:09
any sort of list I sent you. And so you just holler at me if
22:12
you're like, I don't think so. But that being said, I was
22:16
having a pretty bad day this morning, you know, and everyone
22:19
has bad days, frustration days. But when you're in the
22:23
hospitality space, a bad day can cause more challenges than
22:29
merely just being frustrated for yourself in a cubicle somewhere.
22:34
When you are talking with your clients, when you are meeting
22:37
with hospitality people. And I know a lot of the
22:41
questions are going to be like you mentioned, cafe design or
22:44
creating a functional financial system, you know, so that they
22:48
are tracking things properly. But there's also this forward
22:51
facing part of handling the emotion of being a human being
22:57
working with other human beings. Does that come up in your
23:00
consulting? Is that part of it?
23:01
Is it or is it more about the nuts and bolts of what people
23:04
do? You know, I, I, I like to think
23:08
of this as we all saw a lot of us got into coffee because we
23:11
loved like the, the sugary drinks and it got us in there.
23:16
And then all of a sudden we start drinking black coffee.
23:18
And we're connoisseurs, right? A lot of times what gets people
23:22
into consulting or coaching is a felt need for something very
23:26
technical and practical. It might be a spreadsheet, It
23:29
might be, you know, what espresso machine should I get?
23:32
And in my conversations with people, almost 100% of the time,
23:39
the real issue that's at hand that feeds into either the
23:43
dysfunction in the burnout or the, the, the functionality and
23:48
the thriving is going to be the emotional side.
23:51
And we do talk about, it's not therapy.
23:53
You know, I'm not a licensed therapist, but I, but I, to your
23:57
point, you know, there's a lot of emotional labor that goes on
24:01
in coffee shops. You're dealing with the public
24:04
and not only are you dealing with their emotions, it's your
24:06
own and you have a limited supply of energy.
24:09
And so we talk a lot about the dynamics between people and
24:14
relationships. I and I mean a lot because
24:18
everything else that you have, the tools, the machines, the
24:21
systems, they're all servants to something that's not a machine,
24:25
it's a person, it's a system and that supports people.
24:31
And so we start often in our conversations with the idea of
24:34
or what are the, what are the values of this business that you
24:37
will uphold that will help you in the times where it's
24:41
everyone's low. But we have sort of an agreement
24:44
together and we've built trust together that we're supporting
24:47
one another to fulfill some part of this.
24:51
These values like kindness might be an aspirational value for a
24:55
coffee shop. We want to show kindness to our
24:57
community. Well, sometimes your community
25:00
sucks and it won't, you know, and you, you like to think about
25:06
that on paper is like, yeah, the kind, this looks amazing.
25:09
But then when you're face to face with the opportunity to
25:13
show kindness, it's much harder. And if you don't look that as
25:18
full in the face as you can before you actually get into it,
25:22
you're going to be so taken aback by it.
25:24
That's going to take all of your extra bandwidth to just adjust
25:28
yourself, let alone manage this thing that you've, you know,
25:32
agreed to do. You agreed to open a coffee
25:35
shop. You signed the lease.
25:36
You did this thing, you hired these people.
25:38
You said we will pay you. The pressure starts to mount and
25:42
the wheels of progress are so greased in the industry to get
25:46
you to open a coffee shop as quickly and easily as you
25:48
possibly can. And I am.
25:51
I see myself as a set of brakes or a throttle to get people to
25:56
at least take a second or a few months to think about what What
26:03
do you actually want to do? How can you fulfill the promise
26:07
you're making to the people who come in the shop and the people
26:09
you employ and the promise you have to yourself?
26:14
So I guess that's, you know, part of what I do is to coach
26:19
people. So there's two things.
26:20
Consulting is me telling you what I think you should do.
26:23
You know, in my experience, you should, you know, measure your
26:26
countertops to be ergonomically, you know, so high or so deep.
26:30
That's consulting. Coaching is more to the
26:34
relational side of things and helping people explore things
26:37
that often they already know, but because of hustle culture
26:41
or, you know, a, an inability to handle the unique kind of
26:46
pressure that entrepreneurship brings, they forget about those
26:51
things. And you often are finding
26:52
yourself having to remind them and they're like, OK, this was
26:56
really clarifying. So we clarify these things.
26:59
So yes, that is a huge part. I came across these terms people
27:04
1st and actionable and it's kind of the combination of those two
27:07
things. You know, we're engaging with
27:10
people and then we have a plan of action for how this is all
27:12
going to work in the long run. You hear a lot of people say I
27:15
want to open a cafe, I want to open a bar.
27:17
I want to kind of get into that world.
27:19
And the reality of that is it's great in theory and you have to
27:23
really fight through a lot of tough and stressful things to to
27:26
get there just to get the doors open.
27:29
So having as somebody who is deeply invested in his own
27:33
therapy, having an outside source to look at it and bounce
27:38
ideas off of and let you know when you're going off the deep
27:40
end is certainly a value add. I'm wondering, you know, as you
27:44
look back on this time and you know, I'm forcing you to take
27:48
the other side of the microphone here for a minute.
27:51
You know how? Things changed for you, you
27:53
know. Does does this experience you
27:55
have now change what it's like for you to go into a cafe or a
27:58
restaurant? Are you able to do that without
28:01
really thinking about how you would fix things, how you would
28:04
change things, how you would? Modify.
28:06
I don't know if I've ever been able to do that, but I have
28:11
resigned myself there. There.
28:13
The old version of me that was way more just agitated, I'd say
28:21
would have not been able to enjoy something that I thought
28:26
was off. But the show and experience and
28:31
just knowing that I have a limited amount of time on this
28:33
earth, you know, I don't have time to waste not enjoying
28:37
myself. And if people want help, they
28:39
can get that help. And if it's wrong, it's wrong.
28:43
But yeah, sometimes. And I, and I say, sometimes I'm
28:47
not perfect and I'm not always right.
28:50
And there have been plenty of times that I've made suggestions
28:53
to people to, you know, I'm just like this, this should be
28:55
something that we look into. And they say, I don't think
28:57
we're going to go with that. We have a coaching group called
28:59
Key holder Coaching groups. It's a mastermind for coffee
29:02
shop owners. And I remember all of us in the
29:05
group, including me, were like to, to 1 member.
29:07
I don't think we should you open this drive through.
29:10
I don't know if this is a good opportunity.
29:11
It's kind of weird. You're doing a lot right now.
29:13
She totally ignored us and we were also, and I was the first
29:18
one to say I was, and we all said it.
29:20
We're so glad you did because because ultimately she knew
29:24
whether she communicated all the information or not.
29:27
But I'm glad for that. And so sitting down in a cafe, I
29:32
can, if I get really bad service and I, you know, the places, you
29:38
know, like sticky tables and, you know, nasty bathrooms and
29:40
that kind of thing, I'd say it at this point, par for the
29:43
course. There's this like negative white
29:46
noise that we expect to be part of a cafe experience.
29:50
Oh, that's depressing. It it it is it is I used to
29:53
travel with a Shim, like a little rubber Shim in my
29:55
backpack for these tables and I I talked about it on the show,
30:00
but customers think that as well.
30:02
Dios talk about this like customers walk into coffee shops
30:05
and they've been hurt by coffee in the past, whether they know
30:07
it or not. And they bring that in with the
30:09
expectation that if you know that your cafe will be the same
30:13
thing now, if you remove those things, then they take notice.
30:16
They're like, something is different about this.
30:18
I I don't know what it is, but it feels eerily like good and
30:23
more hopefully more coffee shops are like that.
30:25
But I take also a lot of time now to really consider how just
30:34
like any other human being, I can be petty about my
30:37
experiences and try to think about what is the redeeming and
30:41
and praiseworthy aspect of this particular experience.
30:45
Because some of my favorite coffee experiences have not been
30:47
in the cleanest of places. You know, they haven't been in
30:51
the, the white tile walled succulent coffee shops of, of,
30:55
of Nordic fame. Nothing wrong with that.
31:00
But so, so there's something under the surface that is so
31:03
valuable that somebody walking in right away can't grab it.
31:08
And you might argue that that's almost better in some ways.
31:13
Yeah, first impressions are good.
31:14
But what's under the surface for the people who are regulars, the
31:17
value of the relationships and the history of an really
31:21
established and community driven cafe that doesn't take all of
31:24
the technical boxes of what a great cafe should be, still is a
31:29
great cafe. So I'm open to a variety of
31:33
expressions. I think what I don't like is
31:39
things that are lacking intention and are assumptive
31:44
that our people last, that are antithetical to certain values I
31:48
think coffee shops should have. And so that intentionality, the
31:53
humility, the servant heart toward people that work there in
31:58
a team spirit and excellence that comes in all shapes and
32:02
sizes. So I'm still shedding some of
32:04
the petty, you know that. Yeah.
32:09
Long answer to a short question. Sure, but some of the petty is
32:13
essential to being somebody who's on the outside looking in
32:16
as a, you know, and helping others get to the point where
32:20
when someone else walks in, they're not feeling that way.
32:22
I think you need to maintain that balance of petty and
32:26
generous. You know, the word that I think
32:28
it's OFT overused, but feels like what you might have been
32:31
describing is kind of a sincere authenticity.
32:35
You can feel that when you go into a place.
32:38
I, I liken it to being on vacation in a well touristed
32:43
area and the difference in service between a place where
32:48
they know that you're a tourist and they don't.
32:49
That's how they treat you versus this is how we treat everyone
32:53
that comes in regardless and whether they're local or from
32:57
far away. And you can feel that shadow to
33:00
a place called a doula that I was just at that that brought
33:03
that energy to to the table. Well, and the the other thing
33:08
I'll add there by the way, is that competitions and inter
33:12
Instagram and etcetera, they all, all the other places you
33:15
can kind of compare your concept against concepts.
33:19
They're inspiring in some ways, but they're also really they're
33:22
also really detrimental because the competition we should be
33:26
having, it sounds trite today is with yourself, how to be a
33:30
better version of yourself, but also how are you thriving in
33:34
your community? Because you could be a super
33:36
profitable, very well loved and thriving Cafe and never be
33:40
recognized and not fall in line with, you know, you're not going
33:44
to be voted the best coffee shop.
33:47
So it's a, it's a war between being, you know, recognition and
33:52
working for better reasons than simple recognition, because
33:56
recognition has created a lot of homogeneous coffee shop concepts
34:01
across the world. But is it effective?
34:04
Is it life giving? And yeah.
34:08
And I challenge people in coaching sometimes and when I
34:11
assess cafes, because often I will go to a cafe and we'll sit
34:16
there for days and just come up with some points and reports
34:20
that will help guide our coaching afterwards with the
34:23
owners and some things that initially are part of what you
34:29
imagined is what they want from their cafe.
34:32
You question it and they're like, yeah, we don't know why we
34:33
do that. And it's just it was never
34:37
something intentional. It just kind of happened and
34:41
that that's what we're talking about here.
34:42
How can you curate the experience so the things that
34:45
you're presenting to people, including yourself, is in the
34:49
form that you are proud of and is not just this, you know,
34:55
templated fill in the blank thing that you know, it's kind
34:59
of a cop out. But might get the recognition
35:03
that maybe you think is important and you know, there is
35:08
a, you know, a social media Internet age aspect to that,
35:12
where you can see instantly what people are doing around the
35:16
world and compare yourself. Whereas before you might have
35:20
been living a bit in a vacuum. And you know, the, the
35:23
expansiveness of your, your vision was maybe not limited.
35:27
You certainly could travel or explore or research and, and do
35:30
all those things, but you didn't see it in such mass quantity.
35:34
And at some point, I for myself and in all things that I do, had
35:38
to realize there's probably somebody else out there doing
35:40
this. They might even be doing it
35:41
better. So if I'm doing it, I have to do
35:44
it for myself. And if that doesn't work for me
35:48
or I can't make that work in my life, I can't just be doing it
35:52
because I want to be so and so on Instagram or, you know,
35:56
whatever platform, because I never, you never will.
36:02
You wouldn't know, there's no way and there's no award there.
36:04
There's no like, guess what? You know, Ryan beat someone on
36:07
Instagram. I mean, it just it doesn't
36:09
happen. But the other thing about this
36:14
is everyone has to realize is that you look at the people
36:17
opening all these shops and these palatial spreads of, of
36:21
equipment and countertops and weird shapes and sizes and
36:25
stuff, and you don't really know if they're making money.
36:30
You don't know if they're treating their staff well.
36:32
You don't know if they're happy. It's just as likely that they
36:37
might not be as they are. So we, but we fill in the blank
36:42
like, well, it must be nice to be like a super successful
36:44
coffee shop opening all these locations.
36:47
But what happened during COVID? Some of these places just closed
36:51
all of their locations because none of them were making money.
36:54
They were all liabilities. And yeah, emphasis on the lie,
36:59
right? Well, and and also they didn't
37:02
have a foundational support to keep them going to some extent.
37:06
They hadn't built that. If I've learned anything about
37:10
business finance from the last five years, it's the goal isn't
37:16
to make money. The goal is to have the
37:17
potential to make money so other people give you money.
37:20
But I could be wrong on that. I like that.
37:25
I think that's an old Silicon Valley TV show bit.
37:29
You know, if you make money, then people can say, oh, you're
37:32
not making enough, but if you don't make any money, then you
37:35
can say, oh, we have the potential and people will invest
37:39
in you. That being said, there's more to
37:43
the world, I think, than hospitality and and coffee
37:46
shops. I believe you mentioned you, you
37:48
were partnered. What?
37:51
What's your life like outside of consulting, outside of the
37:54
industry? You know, who are you?
37:56
Who? Who am I?
37:58
Well, I am a person of faith. I belong to a local church here
38:04
in Louisville, KY and I have long dabbled in the guitar of,
38:10
you know, nothing. Nothing crazy, nothing amazing.
38:13
But those who don't play the guitar tell me that it's great.
38:17
And so I take, I take solace in that I do a lot of hiking and
38:23
what I consider a lot of hiking in between when I can do it.
38:27
So whenever I'm traveling, I like to get out into nature as
38:30
much as possible. I'm married, my wife is a
38:34
artist, Potter, awesome person and my son Roman is 10 going on
38:41
11. We are reading a lot together.
38:45
We're making our way through all the Red Wall books.
38:47
It's in a series by a English author named Brian Jakes.
38:51
Fantastic fantasy series about mice that live in an Abbey,
38:55
defend themselves against rats and stoats and stuff. 22 books.
38:59
We're on book 16 now. Christians.
39:02
Yeah. I was going to ask that I see
39:04
quite a few books behind you and on the shelves if you were to
39:07
grab one and if you, they were to look at that shelf and say
39:09
this is the book that stands out to me.
39:11
Oh wow. What would it be?
39:14
OK, well I'm going to turn around here and and see if I can
39:17
just grab one. We'll grab 2.
39:23
There's always room for one more book.
39:24
Yeah, I know, I know there's a lot of like management books,
39:28
but there's also a lot of literature and there's a lot of
39:32
different like theology or, you know, kind of Christian books
39:36
and stuff. This one I picked up is a book
39:40
of poetry by Tennyson. It's a, you can, no one can see
39:43
this cause it's an audio podcast, but it's one of these.
39:46
Somebody gave me a gift card for one of those rare and antiquated
39:50
book websites, but this one was from 1882.
39:53
It's very ornate and beautiful and I like to read that kind of
39:56
classic poetry whenever I get the opportunity.
39:59
There's another book actually unintentionally by another poet,
40:04
modern poet named David White. It's a book called Crossing the
40:08
Unknown Sea. It's about the journey of
40:10
identity through vocation. And he has a lot of books on the
40:15
journey of the midlife. And he's a, he's a great poet
40:19
and I think a great thinker in these, these transitional states
40:23
of, of life. But this book I've recommended
40:26
to a lot of people as it was recommended to me in the
40:30
professional world because as you said in your question, you
40:34
know, there is the layouts and equipment, but then there's the
40:38
emotional side. There is something about keeping
40:42
in touch with your humanity and being rooted in something
40:46
greater than yourself that helps you find solace in the, the
40:51
waves and the the winds of, of you know, your, your
40:55
professional world and your personal world.
40:58
So the reason I, I walk and probably like four or five miles
41:03
in the morning, we live near a park to do that is partly
41:08
because there is a need, especially I'm 46 now and I, I
41:12
really need to be able to ground myself before launching into the
41:16
day and use that time. I'll speak into my phone.
41:21
I'll, you know, I'll pray, I'll think I'll have put down ideas.
41:25
And it's just invigorating to do so because it reminds you of
41:30
what's valuable in your life. What are you even doing this
41:33
for? There are years of my life that
41:36
I spent behind the bar surviving on nothing but, you know,
41:39
Raspberry oat bars and espresso and doing like double shifts all
41:45
the time. And on to what?
41:48
That's a good question to always ask, like, what is this?
41:50
What's this for? And so I find myself asking that
41:55
more often these days, especially as opportunities can
41:59
come up more and more with consulting or the podcast.
42:02
I, I have to sort through a lot of that stuff and figure out how
42:06
to best serve and not just serve the audience, but how do I serve
42:11
my family with what I'm doing. And if you're an operator of a
42:15
business or just a, a person with a career, what are you
42:19
doing it for? Is it serving you?
42:22
And if not, some action needs to be taken to get yourself over
42:29
the hump and take the brave step to change something so that
42:35
maybe you would do less, but you feel better and you're, you're
42:39
serving something that now gives life.
42:43
You're you're doing something that gives life to you.
42:45
So I that meandered a bit but. No, I, I relate to that idea of,
42:52
you know, I am somebody. I describe myself sometimes as
42:56
a, a creative raccoon. I see something shiny and I want
43:00
to grab onto it and not let go. But then I see something else
43:03
shiny and I try to grab onto that too.
43:05
And now I'm holding 5 things and none of them are really serving
43:09
each other or myself because I'm, you know, my attention is
43:12
split so far. You have to find ways to make
43:15
that work in your life if that's who you are.
43:17
But I certainly appreciate the idea of taking time to figure it
43:24
out. What is the thing that is
43:26
motivating me? Am I doing this because it's who
43:28
I am and because it's something I believe in or I'm passionate
43:30
about? Or am I doing it because it's
43:32
the thing that I'm supposed to do when I wake up, and is that
43:35
enough? And that's a challenging
43:38
question to ask. Yeah.
43:41
And to that, the thing that keeps me consistent with the
43:44
show, for example, is sometimes it in often is the idea that
43:53
there, there is a message to send out.
43:56
There is a there is a voice to platform and to talk about
44:00
something important to the most people possible that will
44:04
they'll give the most life and opportunity for success as
44:06
possible. And then there's some days where
44:08
I'm just like, man, screw this, you know, like I am so tired and
44:13
I have nothing. And it was a disaster that, you
44:16
know, and this week was terrible.
44:19
But then I realized I've got sponsors and they have a
44:23
contract. And sometimes literally the only
44:26
thing that would keep me going is the fact that there is a
44:29
legal obligation. That's exactly the way it is to,
44:33
to run a business, I think, because you can't always ride
44:36
high on the, the, the rainbows and sunshine of your aspiration.
44:41
Sometimes it's just the gritty duty that you have to do this
44:44
because you have to do this. And I'm so glad for that because
44:51
it we have an episode called In Praise of Long Term Employment.
44:55
And I get the feeling that a lot of the generation of baristas
44:59
that don't have the luxury of working in an imperfect place
45:04
for five years, we'll never get to see the kind of maturation in
45:09
themselves or their perspective on the industry because they
45:12
constantly reset the gauge and chase something that it really
45:19
could have been achieved if you had just stuck with something a
45:21
little longer. And not saying toxic situations
45:24
should just be put up with, but you know, long term employment
45:29
forces you to have to face yourself a lot of times.
45:33
Doing this now for eight years, which is wild to say, has shown
45:39
me that it's the consistency is part, you know, part of the
45:46
reason why I think I might be a better person today than when I
45:50
first started. I've learned so much and changed
45:53
so much. So it shapes you as much as you
45:58
shape it. And so when people start a
46:00
coffee shop, they say, you know, there's this business plan, this
46:04
is what we want to do. This is our 35 year plan.
46:08
And you just have to laugh. Not laugh, of course, but just
46:11
say your coffee shop will not look like that.
46:16
It is a Co created entity. It is a this.
46:19
The idea is a seed, but the environment is the thing that
46:22
shapes the tree. You, you you in a way you'll
46:25
never know. None.
46:26
Nobody has ever really reached their full potential.
46:29
You know the wind will push it this way.
46:32
You know it'll there be a forest fire.
46:34
There's going to be all sorts of things that influence the way it
46:36
looks. But when you look out there and
46:38
you see the wildness of of nature in the forest, in the
46:42
majesty of it all, you don't think, God, I guess it could
46:45
have been so much better. You just think that's really
46:49
cool. I have, if anyone would like
46:52
when I have scores of business plans in a folder somewhere,
46:55
you're welcome to have them. Good luck.
46:59
You know, we've, we've spent 45 minutes chatting already and,
47:02
and there's a million other things that we could talk about,
47:04
but I, I want to make sure that I get to this before we close
47:07
you. You've talked about the
47:08
longevity of Keys to the Shop, 8 years looking backwards.
47:13
What is looking forward look like for you?
47:17
Well, it's, you know, very good chance, Lord willing, it would
47:22
be, you know, we can get up to another eight years, could be
47:28
1020 years of doing this show. And by that time, what I really
47:33
hope to have accomplished is to take what we have put out there
47:38
in the form of episodes and curate it into something a lot
47:41
more manageable for people to enter into with with less
47:44
scrolling. It's really difficult to try to
47:49
aggregate all that stuff and and put it in categories.
47:51
So that's topmost in my mind is now that we've amassed such a
47:56
large library, what do we do to catalog that in a way that's
48:01
helpful like yet again. So it's, it's kind of iterating
48:05
on what we have and making it more available.
48:08
I want to start entering into more, you know, the webinar
48:12
space and offering more access to consulting and services and,
48:18
and products. We don't have any consulting
48:19
products right now, which is just me working with people.
48:22
That's all we do except for the key holder coaching groups,
48:25
which have been really great. We're on our third season of
48:28
those met. That mastermind group lasts for
48:31
six months and I see that community growing because the
48:36
community part of it is one of the most, it's one of the most
48:42
gratifying and life giving parts of it.
48:44
There was a lot of good information shared in our
48:48
mastermind groups. The they, they, they all support
48:50
one another. And I Ioffer some suggestions as
48:54
well from the sidelines. But I'm a facilitator of these
48:58
things. And owners are an isolated bunch
49:01
of people, you know, a lot like roasters.
49:04
And when you meet other people who can identify with you and
49:11
encourage you and push, maybe even push back and hold you
49:13
accountable and that stuff, it's really helpful.
49:16
So to me it feels like how can I create more value?
49:21
I'm not the type of person who says, OK, what's the starter
49:25
pack for an influencer? And I'm just going to plug keys
49:28
to the shop into that. And, and maybe that's holding me
49:32
back from something, I don't know, But I, I tend to be slow
49:36
to jump into the funnels and send all the other stuff.
49:39
So, and, and for good reason, because I think there's, I
49:44
always want sincerity and humility and, and proof of value
49:48
for the people interacting with this, this brand of, of keys to
49:52
the shop to be obvious. And yeah, so the future in some
49:59
sense, who knows? I mean, I'm just a better
50:02
version of what we are today. And it could take different
50:04
shapes, but I feel like it's been a a good ride and we'll see
50:09
how long it keeps going. Being a entrepreneur and a busy,
50:14
busy person with a family and and kids and all the hiking, I'm
50:20
assuming you still get out occasionally to order a cup of
50:22
coffee or stop at a coffee shop. What do you order?
50:25
When you're just stopping for yourself.
50:28
Espresso. Just a shot of espresso.
50:32
Yeah, anything I didn't ask today that.
50:34
You want to make sure that we share.
50:38
No, not necessarily. We're I'm always open to having
50:43
conversations with people and you know, if you if people want
50:47
to reach out, feel free. You know, it's Chris at keys to
50:50
theshop.com and just at keys to the shop on YouTube and also
50:56
Instagram. But yeah, I'm more conversations
51:01
is what I'm after and creating more good in the world of
51:04
coffee. So yeah, this was fun.
51:08
I'm glad, Chris, I certainly appreciate the time and, and
51:11
just, you know, sharing a little bit of your story and, and I'm
51:14
excited to go through all of that back catalogue on my own
51:18
time. OK, I'm going to give you a few
51:27
key takeaways here, but head to roastwestcoast.com to see a
51:32
bunch more in the newsletter. Chris is a long time industry
51:35
veteran and his role has changed over the years, but his
51:39
connection to coffee has remained constant.
51:42
Keys to the Shop is a podcast and a consulting company.
51:46
Listen to that voice. That's a true podcasters voice.
51:49
And the show is a direct result of his desire to give back to
51:53
the industry in the form of education.
51:55
I mean, he has 900 plus podcast episodes for you to catch up on
52:00
so. You better get started.
52:03
Just kidding, don't get overwhelmed.
52:05
Whatever level you're at or whatever question you've got,
52:08
Keys to the Shop probably has done a show about that.
52:11
So check out the archives on the Keys to the Shop website, link
52:15
in the show notes, or if you're listening, through the
52:17
newsletter, right below this audio stream.
52:20
Both the podcast and his efforts as a consultant offer Chris an
52:24
opportunity to be a servant to the industry, to expand the
52:27
general knowledge and success of others by sharing what he knows
52:32
and by sharing his platform, enabling others to OfferUp their
52:36
knowledge as well on a more individual, case by case basis.
52:40
He sees his role as being the throttle that ensures his
52:44
consulting clients are slowing down just enough to be moving
52:47
forward with intention, or on the other side of that, stepping
52:51
on the gas, enabling them to provide an experience that
52:55
creates successful relationships between them, their employees,
52:59
customers, community and themselves.
53:02
We also chatted about the dangers of comparison,
53:05
especially now in the social media age.
53:08
Before you compare your thing, your cafe, or your coffee
53:10
experience to someone else's thing, remember you don't know
53:15
what it's like in reality. You don't know if they're making
53:18
money. You don't know if they're
53:19
treating their employees well, or even if they're just happy in
53:22
general. Keep your focus on adjusting
53:25
your path so that it ends up being the right one for you.
53:29
And this is just a little bit of a note based on a comment that
53:32
we made near the end of the show about pandemic closures.
53:35
Businesses close for all kinds of reasons.
53:38
The pandemic and post pandemic related closures weren't always
53:42
due to a lack of foundational support or in some cases a
53:45
failure of any kind other than not preparing for a worldwide
53:49
shutdown which created the need for a much longer emergency
53:53
runway than most businesses or individuals account for.
53:58
The lack of transparency in the early days about the reality of
54:01
the shutdowns in particular the expected length, also slowed the
54:05
on the ground response at most cafes and restaurants.
54:08
No one had been through anything like that in generations, but
54:13
now we have. The risk of another pandemic
54:16
hasn't gone away, and the experience of living through it
54:18
may help those rising up in the industry now by making them
54:22
really consider their off ramps, support systems, and financial
54:26
needs. Finally today is Louisville, the
54:30
home to Keys to the Shop, an underrated coffee hotbed.
54:35
I'll let you discuss in the comments.
54:38
That's our show for today. Thanks to Chris for sharing his
54:41
time story and dropping some knowledge on us.
54:44
You can find a longer recap in our newsletter at
54:46
roastwestcoast.com and be sure to click the links to the Keys
54:50
to the Shop podcast and their website in our show notes.
54:54
It's easy to find online if you just want to search for it, Keys
54:57
to theshop.com. And if you're already there
55:00
following them, it really helps us if you tap the follow button
55:03
on our show too, or give us a few stars if you're already
55:06
following on whatever platform you happen to be listening.
55:10
If you want to go beyond to support the Coffee People
55:12
podcast, we always say the best way to support our show is to
55:15
tell a friend about us. Share an episode or one of our
55:18
newsletters on roastwestcoast.com.
55:22
We're always telling our friends about Rostar Coffee packaging
55:25
found at rostar.com. They are this show's presenting
55:29
sponsor and they've helped us tell the big story of a bunch of
55:32
small businesses and have been an incredible support developing
55:35
this platform where we share your stories, the stories of
55:38
coffee people. They also have a pretty
55:40
impressive new design lab. Again, check out rostar.com.
55:45
The show is also supported by some great coffee industry
55:47
partners Zumbar Coffee and Tea, Maria Coffee, Cape Horn Green
55:51
Coffee Importers, Crossings Coffee, Hasaya Coffee, Source,
55:54
Ignite Coffee Company, Ascend Coffee Roasters, me and my uncle
55:58
Coffee Craft 42 roasters, relative coffee company, our
56:01
partners in the yeah no yeah coffee we mentioned at the top
56:05
and Cozy Canine Coffee. Thank you for listening, sharing
56:09
this podcast, asking us questions, and generally just
56:13
being curious about coffee. The show the Coffee People
56:16
podcast is part of our Roast West Coast Coffee network and
56:20
this episode is was has been written, produced, researched
56:23
and recorded by me. Ryan, Walt, wherever you find
56:27
yourself today, I hope it's with a fine cup of coffee.
56:30
Thank you for listening to us tell the stories of Coffee
56:33
people. Cheers everyone.
56:47
If you are in the early stages of your coffee journey, we want
56:50
to support you. Check out the Coffee Smarter
56:53
Education podcasts. Coffee Smarter is designed to
56:56
enable coffee drinkers to brew a better cup of coffee at home,
57:00
and Coffee Smarter Pro covers industry specific topics for
57:04
baristas, roasters, shop owners and aspiring coffee
57:07
professionals. You'll find both shows on your
57:10
favorite podcast Latforms or on our website at
57:13
coffeesmarterodcastcom.