Welcome to Across the Bar
Welcome to Across the Bar, Honeybee Coffee Company's blog. Honeybee is based in Knoxville, Tennessee with a specialty roasting operation, two cafés, and a mobile airstream trailer. We started up in 2014 with our trailer and opened the doors to our cafés in 2016.
The purpose of this blog is to reach across the bar and extend a hand to anyone that wants to be involved in the specialty coffee conversation. The global coffee industry is massive, but the specialty coffee community can often feel closed off to outsiders. At Honeybee we want to reach out and include all people with an interest in coffee.
Achieving this goal will manifest in different ways as we recognize the diversity in our audience. We want this blog to be approachable to anyone, regardless of any prior knowledge or skill. That means sometimes you'll find an article here that reiterates things you're familiar with, and sometimes you might find an article a little more in-depth than you're currently interested in. That's okay. That's part of the process. Just know that if you're interested in coffee and the things that go into making it, you're in the right place. We are passionate about what we do and about what's going on with coffee, and at Honeybee we think the more people contributing to the conversation the better.
Honeybee wants people to know more about coffee, and we also want people to know more about us. On top of extending a hand into the conversation, we want to open our doors wide. We want to offer you a chance to see what we're working on, what we hope to accomplish in the future, why we do the things we do, and answer any questions you think of along the way.
On the front page of our website you'll see our motto: "Coffee is the platform we use to care for others." In all of the decisions we make, we keep this motto in mind. Our primary concern is to deliver a quality product. It is in this way that we feel we best respect all of the people involved in the coffee process. The three main groups in the coffee industry (farmers, cafés, and customers) all have different wants and needs, and we try our best to maintain a healthy balance that cares for everyone. This blog is meant to be yet another way that we can care for others through education and transparency.
Moving forward, Honeybee hopes to continue increasing the quality of all of our endeavors. We are seeking to make specialty coffee more approachable. We want to expand the confines of the specialty coffee conversation. We want to be a place that Knoxville can come for the best possible cup and the most up to date information. Honeybee hopes to grow and learn, and we want you to come along with us. If that sounds exciting to you, check back with us every other week for a new article that helps us accomplish these goals.
There's a lot to look forward to in this blog. Some of the things we have in store are brewing guides, coffee competition information, explanations of how coffee is graded, explorations of the different origins of coffee, theories behind customer service and café design, and more. If there's something you're particularly interested in, feel free to email us at honeybeecoffeeco@gmail.com or send us a DM on Instagram @honeybeecoffeeco. Also, at the bottom of each blog post we will include a few links to articles/videos/photos related to coffee that we found interesting over the past few weeks. A few of these links might turn into blog posts themselves.
We're excited about what this blog could mean to the coffee conversation, and we hope you are too. We appreciate your interest and attention, and we hope to see you again soon, whether that be online or in person.
The Weeks’ Links:
Lactic Acid Coffee Fermentation (Article)
Authors: Aaron Hill & Alex Wuethrich