By Perry Luckett, CoffeeMan 1

In Part 1 of this series, I covered four large subscription services with 50+ choices of coffee suppliers and roasters across the USA. Some large outfits, such as Trade Coffee, connect subscribers to individual roasters, who then ship the coffee directly to your door. Others, such as Atlas Coffee Club, buy raw beans from coffee suppliers and roast them before sending the roasted coffee to you.

In this Part 2 I’m switching gears to discuss individual brand heritage roasters who get beans directly from growers, roast them, and send them to subscribers. The seven subscription coffee services covered here are

• Alma

• Black Ink

• Counter Culture

• Driftaway

• Intelligentsia

• Mustache

• Purity

Although you’re committing to a single roaster with these subscriptions, most of their operations are big enough to give you plenty of single origins and blends to sample. In talking to several people who subscribe with these single roasters, I’ve discovered folks commonly start with one of the large services to sample the widest variety of coffees and then switch to favorite roasters once they’ve narrowed their tastes.

Alma crop to coffee cup: a cozy deal

You can buy bags of beans from Alma, a crop-to-cup coffee producer, on Trade and MistoBox. But if you’ve decided you enjoy Alma coffee above others, you can also subscribe to their service directly. [LJ]

Co-founded by a disabled army veteran and a fifth-generation coffee farmer, Alma owns their own farms in Honduras, where beans are grown before being sent to their roasting facility, headquarters, and coffee shop in Canton, Georgia.

Alma offers eight different types of coffee including their classic blends, seasonally changing honey and natural process bags, plus a cold brew and two decaf options. I’ve tried Passion--medium-dark, smooth, chocolate single-origin—as well as Soulmate medium roast, which has notes of cocoa and clementines when I drink it black. Milk and sugar bring out the flavors of milk chocolate and candied walnuts.

Alma roasts to order and ships bags of whole beans or in one of three grind settings (Keurig, pour over, French press). The bags start at $16 when bought individually or in a subscription for one bag per week. If you’re looking for a larger subscription, expect discounts as you increase the number of bags sent per week. Subscriptions always ship free.

Black Ink Coffee covers blends and roast levels

Black Ink offers a simple subscription service. Just choose any of their high-quality coffees and get it automatically shipped to your door on schedule. By subscribing to their coffee service, you’ll get a cozy 10% discount and can choose from weekly, biweekly, triweekly, or monthly delivery. They offer different blends, single-origin beans, and roast levels to suit most tastes, plus pods if you use a Keurig. [TK]

Black Ink also has an interesting origin story related to the owner’s military service. The owner says his idea for the enterprise came while on deployment to Africa. After interacting with local people and seeing the types of living conditions many experienced, he better appreciated America’s freedoms and opportunities. But he also recognized many of us never realize or take advantage of these opportunities, so he committed to pursuing his own dream while motivating and empowering his “tribe of dream followers” to tackle what they’re passionate about. He continues to support our troops by shipping free coffee to those serving in uniform overseas. [BIC]

Another part of their mission statement helps us understand why they’re called Black Ink, rather than Black Bean (for example). Every coffee bag they offer features the word “Begin” across the top because they believe we should all ink our own stories and want their coffee to be the catalyst for our beginnings.

Whether or not you intend to pursue dreams or ink stories while you’re drinking Black Ink coffee, you can cozy up to the knowledge that the brew itself is of high quality and has excellent taste. For example, their Inkwell Blend is a dark roast and a favorite with subscribers. In this case—as the owners say—you needn’t be afraid of the dark. It’s actually medium-dark and is not over-roasted as certain brands can be. It’s particularly robust for espresso and develops a lovely crema. Their Maineiac Blend is a medium roast that lends itself well to drip coffee, and their Ethiopian is a light to medium roast that brings flavors of fruit, herbs, and sugar to your cup.

Counter Culture: Any coffee, any brew philosophy covers everyone

Counter Culture has storefronts in cities like Atlanta, Chicago, Seattle, and New York which, in non-Covid times, double as coffee training centers that host cuppings and tastings. Until those reopen, you can test different beans through a subscription and may even decide to stay with this approach if you want to avoid traffic and parking hassles.

Counter Culture believes in the “any coffee, any brew” idea, meaning they don’t specify which bags are best for espresso, pour over, and so forth. They do tend to roast single-origin beans lighter to showcase their unique flavors, so you may want to steer clear for espresso. Also keep in mind that lighter-roasted coffees tend to be more acidic, so if that’s an issue for you Forty-Six might be your best choice.

Their subscription signup page asks you to choose the type of coffee you want—either by cozying up to one of their standard whole-bean coffees from a list or by signing up for one or two single-origin, 12-ounce bags, with frequency ranging from every week to every four weeks. [CC]

Each listed coffee includes brief flavor notes, so you’ll have some idea whether your coffee will be, for example, “caramel, nutty, round” (Big Trouble); “dark chocolate, roasted nuts, berry” (Gradient); or “dak chocolate, smoky, full-bodied” (Forty-Six). Their subscription selection walks you through these flavor profiles and how many bags you’ll need. The starting price, for a single bag at a time, is $17.33. Each bag is roasted to order and always shipped whole bean.

Driftaway Coffee’s cozy starter box lets you taste before you select

Driftaway Coffee offers a subscription with a slightly different approach. Instead of choosing the type of coffee you think you may like, Driftaway sends you a cozy “starter box” that contains five different single-origin coffees with different profiles. You try each one and then pick which profile is best according to the coffee’s actual taste, rather than from a profile description on a selection page.

Driftaway describes their process this way [DA]:

1. Start with a tasting from five coffees selected from around the world and roasted in Brooklyn, NY every Wednesday and Sunday. Use our cozy self-guide or participate with us in a Zoom tasting.

2. Set your preferences by completing detailed ratings of our five color-coded coffees. Your ratings establish a taste profile that enables us to select the right type of roast for you.

3. Choose from a variety of bag sizes (8-, 12-, and 16-ounce) and replenishment frequencies so you can customize your subscription to how much you consume. Then sit back and enjoy the coffees coming to your mailbox!

Driftaway uses data from your reviews to send you coffee covering each week, every two weeks, or each month depending on the level of service you choose. Ted Kallmyer says he sampled Driftaway’s starter box and received four freshly roasted coffees that tasted as described on each label. He used them in his espresso machine, and all four produced a well-extracted shot with a lot of flavor and crema. Driftaway has since expanded their tasting kit to five coffees for better coverage of subscriber tastes. [TK]

Under their motto, “Coffee good for You and the Planet,” Driftaway sources coffee only from farmers who use sustainable and fair trade growing practices. They include information about the grower in each shipment. As a subscriber, you can even send comments to growers through Driftaway’s website. [DA] Their coffees are roasted every Sunday and shipped out fresh for free in the USA. The company even adds a personal touch to their service by printing your name on the label of each bag.

Plans start at $14.40 for 8 ounces of coffee shipped monthly. Their best seller is a 12-ounce bag for $17.10 per shipment and paid 12 months in advance. If you pay for each shipment (not in advance), the cost is $19 per 12-ounce bag. Driftaway also offers cold brew subscriptions, a decaf, and gift subscriptions.

Intelligentsia: a pioneer in direct trade coffee covers Chicago and more

This Chicago-based, 27-year-old company is one of the pioneers of direct trade coffee. Their website describes how the owners, Doug Zell and Emily Mange, shaped their business, starting with their first store in 1995 [I]:

Roasting their coffee in-store with a Probat L12, they honed their coffee worldview one bag of Black Cat at a time, building slowly and seeking nothing less than perfection in every aspect of the business. Little did Doug and Emily know they were launching what would become a sea change in specialty coffee in the United States.

By placing a deep emphasis on sourcing the most exquisite coffee available on Earth, paying a fair price for that coffee, roasting it with purpose and precision, and connecting with the community—both in Chicago and around the globe—their scrappy little coffee company would grow and help shape an entire industry.

Through coffee bars, cosy training labs, and roasting facilities in Chicago and Los Angeles, Intelligentsia has a unique and growing presence in five American cities—Austin, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York—with more to be announced in the future.

Reviewers of Intelligentsia give it high marks. For example, Lauren Joseph—commerce editor for Epicurious.com—said last year at BonAppetit.com that she has loved every bag of Intelligentsia coffee she’s ever tried and felt good about buying it from them. She selected Intelligentsia's Choice subscription, which sends out a rotation of single-origin coffees on a delivery schedule that works for you, or you can customize your subscription by choosing your favorite blends. [LJ]

Subscriptions start at $16.50 per bag and always ship free. Single-origin coffees from Columbia and Peru go for $20 to $22 per 12-ounce bag ( a cozy default size). Or you can try their Black Cat Classic Espresso blend—with flavor notes of Dark Chocolate, Raw Sugar, Marshmallow—at $16.50 per bag. For those of us whose tastes cozy up to dark roasts, Intelligentsia offers a wonderful blend: El Diablo Dark Roast—with flavor notes of blackstrap molasses, cola, cacao, and raisin—at $16.50 per bag. Another good dark option is El Gato Blend, with notes of dark chocolate, baked apple, and plum.

Again, buying whole beans is the way to get the freshest cup of coffee at home. At $20 to $22 for a bag of single-origin, it makes sense to let them shine by putting beans through the grinder each morning! But if you don’t have a grinder and prefer pre-ground coffee, try Intelligentsia’s cosy list of eleven different grind sizes. They offer Chemex, Hario Dripper or cold-brew, French press, and even cover stovetop espresso.

The site does a good bit of hand holding and offers a quiz (similar to those at other subscription services) that nails down your best choices, based on various tastes and preferences. (For what it’s worth, I took the quiz, and Intelligentsia matched me perfectly to dark roasts, such as El Diablo and El Gato.) Each bag comes with brewing method suggestions and instructions, so you can dial in your ideal cup even if you don't have barista-level skills.

Mustache Coffee Club: covers your grounds from French press to cozy pourover

This subscription service allows you to pick from about eight different single-origin coffees sourced from ethically grown coffee and independent growers. They roast the beans to match your preferences and ship them fresh after roasting. And no, you don’t have to grow a mustache to subscribe—the name being a bit of whimsy from founder Sean.

From Moustache’s website, their process works much like that of other subscription coffee services, with a cozy three-step approach:

1. Create an account, pick a plan that works for you, and add some of our current selections to your subscription schedule. If you can't choose (we know it's hard), we'll ship you our favorite, no worries.

2. Brew your coffee with confidence, knowing we'll roast your beans to order and ship day-of-roast, so your coffee arrives at peak freshness, ready to enjoy. We'll also include all the details about each coffee and the people who produced it.

3. Review your coffees, so we can use your feedback to select new coffees just for you and then ship them on your schedule. If you see something you like, or would like to get a specific coffee again, you can add it to your schedule for shipping. Either way, a new and exciting coffee will be headed your way to cover your established plan.

Ted Kallmyer testifies to Mustache’s quality in his review at caffeineinformer.com: “I tried out this service and received a bag of medium-roasted, single-origin coffee from Kayanza, Burundi. The coffee was fresh and made a delicious latte when I used the beans in my espresso machine. It had fruity and sweet notes just like it was described on their website.” But he points out the roast was a bit on the light side of medium, so you may want to keep that in mind if you like medium-dark roasts. [TK]

Moustache offers a free trial of their service but you’ll be charged for the next shipment automatically if you don’t email to cancel before the date outlined in their email.

Plans start at $14 per month but the most popular plan is $22 per month for a bag of coffee shipped for free every other week.

Purity Coffee brings the “healthiest coffee on the planet” to your door

Purity Coffee’s mission is to bring customers the healthiest coffee on the planet, so they’re very focused on the health standards that set them apart from others. As their website points out, conventional coffee from your local grocery store is one of the most chemically treated food products found worldwide. Purity claims to be the only organic coffee company in the world who maximizes health benefits throughout every production step.

The coffee Purity sources has to meet rigorous criteria, and only about 1% of the world’s beans meet their standards. Their coffee is 100% organic, sustainably farmed, high in antioxidants, and tested to be free of pesticides, mycotoxins, and mold. Keep in mind that you can buy lots of organic coffee beans online, but not all coffees are created equal. Even organic coffee grown without pesticides falls short when it comes to standards that make a truly healthy coffee. Purity’s organic coffee is defect-free specialty-grade, which is a standard of bean used in only 1% of the coffee produced worldwide. They also rigorously test their coffee for mold and mycotoxins, roast to reduce unhealthy byproducts like acrylamide and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and nitrogen-flush their packaging to boost antioxidants. Simply put, they say, Purity Coffee is organic coffee done right. [PC]

As with other services, they offer different levels of subscriptions depending on how much you drink each month and some free coffee if you prepay your subscription 6 months or 12 months in advance. They also offer decaf as an option and have pod subscriptions for those with Keurig brewers. The only downside to Purity’s subscription is the lack of variety in the coffee shipped each month. But if you’re looking for consistency, Purity fills the bill.

Ted Kallmyer says he has tried their dark roast and medium roast and both were enjoyable to drink and made a great shot of espresso. He liked their dark roast, which wasn’t very dark and thus didn’t taste charred like many dark roast coffees do. He found Purity’s coffee flavorful and fresh. [TK]

Purity’s subscription plans start at $18 per month for a 12 oz bag of 100% organic Arabica beans. Pods start at $16.20 per month.

Whichever coffee delivery service you choose, you can enjoy your coffee more if you keep it hot with a French press cozy, a cup cap, a coffee carafe cozy, or a coffee sleeve for your take away cup. And your best source for all of these coffee cozy applications is Koffee Kompanions.

See you next time for Part 3 of our coffee-subscription coverage: services that make charity an integral part of their programs.

Resources

 “About Black Ink Coffee Company,” https://blackinkcoffee.com/pages/about, 2022.  [BIC]

“Coffee Subscriptions,” https://bit.ly/3Kr1q0C and “our Story,” https://bit.ly/3OAWgTf, 2022. [I]

“Delicious Coffee, Delivered Fresh,” https://bit.ly/3OFYfpk,

2022.  [MC]

“Driftaway About Us and Home Page,” https://driftaway.coffee/, 2021.  [DA]

“Five best coffee subscriptions (2022),” https://bit.ly/3vRCREQ, April 19, 2022. [Favy]

“Fresh roasted coffee on repeat,” https://bit.ly/3F1Td24, 2022. [CC]

“How is Purity Coffee Different from Other Organic Coffee Brands?” www.puritycoffee.com, 2022.  [PC]

Scott Gilbertson and Jaina Grey, The Best Coffee Subscriptions We've Savored,  https://bit.ly/3OK2WOY, April, 2022. [SG]

Matt Giovanisci, “19 Best Coffee Subscription Boxes,” Roasty Coffee, https://bit.ly/3FBZnEG, Updated April 8, 2022 (quick summaries with links to fuller reviews). [MG]

Lauren Joseph, “The Best Coffee Subscriptions to Buy Online Right Now,” https://bit.ly/3vL94hi, Sep 24, 2021.  [LJ]

Ted Kallmyer, “Coffee Subscription Delivery Services Put to the Test,” Caffeine Informer, https://bit.ly/3LogpK1, October 26, 2021.  [TK]