Today we’d like to introduce you to Tyler Fivecoat.
Tyler, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
Our journey started in Assam, India in 2008 and here we are now just outside of Chicago still driven by the passions birthed almost 8,000 miles away. We spent time running around to different tea garden villages building community through tea & biscuits, riding around town in auto rickshaws (our little car logo) & ultimately falling in love with the laid-back culture we experienced in these tea gardens. We had a simple desire.
Bring this experience to you through the avenue of freshly roasted coffee. We hold to 3 values as a company with focus within each value. Coffee, Connection, & Community. We believe in roasting coffee to the best of our ability with the focus of roasting the coffee to bring out the inherent flavors of each origin. We partner with farmers all over the world and share their coffee with others. We exist to bring people great coffee so that they can connect with others and with their community.
We got to where we are today by trying our best to live out our mantra and bring people along on that journey.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
I wish it had been smoother! We had growing pains along the way ever since the beginning. Thankfully our struggles have been obstacles we were able to work together to overcome. We started in a farmers market in Yorkville and had our first brick & mortar there as well. Construction in the downtown area essentially decreased our foot traffic 100% because streets were closed and no cars could get to us easily. This is when we found our space in Wheaton.
We took over an existing coffee shop and it was a struggle to help customers transition to third wave specialty coffee from what the shop used to serve, which was more of a traditional Italian take on coffee. We have been encouraged with the response to our approach to coffee over the past 4 years in Wheaton. We love our community and cannot thank them enough for helping us get where we are now as a cafe & coffee company.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Five & Hoek Coffee. Formerly River City Roasters – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
We are a coffee company. We roast all of our own coffee that we ethically source through importers & our 3 direct relationships in Honduras, Burundi, & Colombia. We focus on roasting coffee in a way that reflects the original intent of the farmer.
We roast everything light to medium so it accurately represents the region the coffee comes from. We roast on a beautiful brand new Diedrich IR-12 and roast in small batches of 10-15 lbs. This gives us an incredible amount of control when it comes to roasting coffee. Again, this allows us to roast beautiful coffee that accurately represents each region we purchase coffee from.
We are incredibly proud that our coffee is able to impact everyone who touches it, starting with the farmer all the way down to the customer who sips & enjoys it. We are so thankful that we have a cafe where we can highlight the entire process from farm to cup, and that people can enjoy our coffee while connecting with their community.
Our delicate stance with roasting and our rigorous approach to quality control sets us apart from other coffee companies.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
Our future plan is more cafes. At the end of the day if we are not sharing our coffee with others, then why even roast in the first place? We desire to have many more cafes throughout the suburbs and city of Chicago.
We plan to expand wholesale within the year and have goals of visiting our partner farmers more often. We don’t plan on making any drastic internal changes because we believe our formula is working and people love being part of what we’re trying to do with coffee, connection & community.
Pricing:
- We have an online coffee subscription $18 free shipping
Contact Info:
- Address: 114 N Main St. Wheaton IL 60187
- Website: fiveandhoek.com
- Phone: (630) 909-3480
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fiveandhoekcoffee/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rivercityroasters/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/fiveandhoek
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
