Cooper & Co

You have the chance to win a fantastic handmade Ascaso Dream Espresso Machine for your home, complete with accessories and a 250g bag of freshly roasted Cooper & Co. coffee!

Through the carnage of the pandemic there has been one constant, the increasing interest is for premium freshly roasted coffee. It appears the longer you’re stuck at home the more coffee you need to get you through the day. As many regional coffee roasters will tell you on-line sales of coffee have jumped significantly, helped to some degree by the desire to “support local” but also because technology and logistics have made this type of purchase pain free whilst shops are closed. The coffee maker that has had a resurgence is the Bialetti stove top. Invented way back in 1933, it’s a design classic. Not only does it look good in the kitchen, it also makes great intense coffee.

The second COVID wave hit quickly causing further economic carnage for the hospitality industry as licensed premises were forced to close, 2 metre distancing came into force and a “work from home” edict was put out meaning that all offices cleared their desks. Being an entrepreneur in this environment is beyond tough; being a one trick pony is even tougher. If your sole source of income is from a licensed premises right now you are truly screwed. Who’d of thought in Jersey that selling booze could lose you your shirt!

On Wednesday 25^th November 2020 at 2 pm GMT the final piece of the jigsaw fell into place. We managed to purchase a limited edition coffee from the Brazil Daterra Masterpiece collection. I can picture a lot of blank faces right now, but rest assured there are only a handful of these coffees available in the world and one of these packages will be coming to Jersey in January 2021 forming part of our private collection of extraordinary coffees.

Time for big crystal balls!

As I write this blog Britain has just gone into its second lock-down and Jersey’s Chief Minister has called out our teenagers for partying too hard over Halloween. This has resulted in more COVID cases and as a result we’re all running for those dreaded masks.

It’s hailed as the champagne of teas, compared with the finest wines of Bordeaux and held up as one of India’s greatest exports, it’s the name that is synonymous with the very best of teas: Darjeeling.

I was sat having a late lunch in our Grand Marche café yesterday surrounded by the hubbub of life. It’s a stark contrast to 6 weeks ago when the silence was deafening. There is nothing worse than an empty café both for financial reasons and for the soul.

I finally did it, I’ve spent my £100 spend local card with the local artist Ian Rolls. It’s been sitting in my ‘phone wallet for weeks, staring at me and constantly begging the question “what shall I spend it on”? In the end I had a moment of inspiration, I commissioned Ian to decorate a very simple mirror that has been hanging in our kitchen for years. I dropped it off and a couple of weeks later the mirror was transformed, a permanent memory of a year that will go down in living memory for all sorts of reasons. Yes, I know so bloody middle class!

The ability to be able to get people’s attention has to be a major consideration. More so than ever before we need customers to be willing to make the effort to walk some distance to our Finance district café. There has to be a wow factor, something that makes an individual want to be in the space provided. There is a huge opportunity for great designers. Me-too designers who simply replicate every coffee shop you’ve ever seen have been made redundant. That means build out budgets need to be increased significantly. The need to create a sense of place is vital.

The text arrived at 6.30 am, “your coffee’s here”. That was from John informing me that a couple of pallets of coffee that we urgently needed had been tipped and were ready dockside.

Cooper’s is a brand that has been in Jersey for 130 years - we’ve survived two world wars, the Spanish flu pandemic, the great depression, the meltdown of global finances on numerous occasions and we intend to survive the extraordinary economic impact of the COVID crisis.

As I sit staring into the abyss having finished yet another podcast while pacing the confines of my flat, I begin to reminisce about my life before The Event. Going to the pub, meeting up with good friends, long moonlit walks on the beach, mindless rampant consumerism – Things we took for granted until very recently. For me, talking in person is something I really miss, being able to communicate with customers is a great asset when selling coffee. One of the most frequent questions I would be asked was: ‘How do I store the coffee?’