Newsletter #5: Roasters to the Rescue

We met with some brilliant Roasters, beginning a wonderful relationship. They are eager to expand the world of coffee and work together to develop something amazing.

The launch of the online store began with a secret development site that tested the workflow from landing on the site, to purchasing and delivering a customized coffee. It was an engaging process that was drawn out by tinkering with the workflow with constant focus on customer journey. These challenges are meaningful to ensure that customers have the best and easiest experience. Science, Sips, That’s it. Turns out it’s complicated, but more on that later. It’s as easy as the Version 1 image below makes it out to be.

Version 2 of the image clarified the process and added clickable links. Technical reviewers insist that signing in has a negative impact on the customer experience, however there isn’t an easy way to add a convenient no-login experience and deliver results. It is possible, but not without a complete site rebuild.  Ver. 2 of the website is a challenge for 2021.

Iterate Fast and Release Often

After 3 weeks of user experience testing we were approaching diminishing returns. After some coaxing, the hidden development site was brought over to the public beveragegenetics.com site that you see today. This launch was a springboard to phase 2 of our business plan which brings roasters in to see if there is interest. The response from roasters was overwhelming, with a 100% connection rate from a small email campaign. Rosters are wonderful people that are eager to push the limits within the coffee community to create something beautiful. We met with 3 roasters in 72 hours. Two of the three gave us more than 2 hours of their time to explain their craft, and how we can work together. 

“Okay, so how do we work together?”

- Roaster, 2020

We’re somewhat of a “have a plan” type company, but the iterate fast philosophy means that plans are built on the fly. Bringing the roasters into the fold was an expedition in gauging interest and forging relationships. Not having a plan, and knowing that any partnership we engage in should have a win-win outcome dominated the conversation and was well received. 

 
What’s Next

1. It’s complicated. Too complicated? Yeah... that’s the problem. 
2. Collaborating with roasters, and the premium product.