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Interviewer:Thanks for making the time. So to start, tell me a little about what you do and how you got here.

Guest:Sure. Um, so I run a small coffee roastery in Amsterdam, just east of the Oosterpark. We roast, uh, twice a week, and we supply about thirty cafes around the city. Before this, I was an accountant, which, you know, surprises people.

Interviewer:An accountant. That's quite a jump. What made you leave?

Guest:Honestly, it wasn't one big moment. I'd been doing the books for a cafe client, and I kept staying after the work was done, just asking about the machines, the beans, all of it. At some point, the owner said, "Well, if you're gonna hang around anyway, learn to roast." And that was it. I, I couldn't stop thinking about it after that.

Interviewer:So when did it become a real business?

Guest:About six years ago. We started with a tiny five-kilo machine in a shed. First year, we lost money. Second year, we broke even. And, um, by the third year, we could pay two salaries. Now there are seven of us.

Interviewer:Seven people. Is there a coffee you're especially proud of?

Guest:Yeah. There's a lot from Huehuetenango in Guatemala that we've bought from the same family for four seasons now. When it lands each spring, it's, uh, it's a bit like a harvest festival in here. Everyone stops to cup it together.

Interviewer:And what's been the hardest part of growing?

Guest:Hiring, without a doubt. I mean, roasting, you can learn. The machines are honest with you. But finding people who care about the boring parts, the cleaning, the logging, the consistency, that's rare. We got it wrong twice before we got it right.

Interviewer:What does a normal Tuesday look like for you these days?

Guest:Earlier than you'd think. The roaster gets switched on at seven because it needs a, a good forty minutes to warm up. Mornings are production. Afternoons are the unglamorous half: packing orders, answering wholesale emails, calibrating the grinders. And honestly, twice a week, I still do the deliveries myself on the cargo bike. You hear things from cafe owners that never make it into an email.

Interviewer:Is there a mistake from the early days that still makes you wince?

Guest:Oh, plenty. The worst one, we once shipped a whole batch that I'd roasted a full minute too short. It tasted like, um, like grass and peanuts. A customer called and asked very politely whether we were okay. We replaced everything, and I printed that invoice and hung it above the roaster. It's still there.

Interviewer:Last one: What would you tell someone who's sitting where you were in the office thinking about it?

Guest:Don't romanticize it. The first winter, I was loading sacks at six in the morning wondering what I'd done. But, like, if a thing keeps pulling at you for years, that's information. You can go back to spreadsheets. You can't go back in time.

Interviewer:That's a good place to end. Thank you.

Guest:Thanks for having me.