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Hey, Green Future Growers. Welcome to Season 4! I'm your host, JackieMarie Beyer. If you're new to the show, I hope you'll subscribe on iTunes for free or follow on your favorite podcast app and let's get growing. Hey everyone this is JackieMarie Beyer, your host here to help inspire you on your journey to create, grow, and enjoy a green, organic oasis. So let's get growing!

28s

JackieMarie

Welcome to the GREEN Organic Garden. It is Friday, February 18th, 2022, and I am super excited to bring you my guest today. It's a little off topic as far as like, we're not actually going to talk about gardening. We are going to talk about something you can put in your compost pile, and it's something that I'm super passionate about because these guys have a policemen for those little cured plastic coffee cups that I'm sure you hate as much as I do because what do we do with them? We just throw them away. So here today, tell us about the amazing steeped coffee is neat upheld. So welcome to the show, Nate.

1m 6s

Nate

Great to be here.

1m 8s

JackieMarie

Did I say your name right?

1m 9s

Nate

You did. Yeah. Yeah. You nailed it.

1m 11s

JackieMarie

Oh, cool. Obviously there was like, is that apple? Where, where are you at? What's your weather like today? I live in Northwest Montana, so we have snow and mostly ice. Okay.

1m 25s

Nate

Yeah. So I'm just a little bit, a little bit west I'm up in Washington state out on the coast and usually it would be raining, but today it is quite beautiful. Partly cloudy shaping up to be a nice day.

1m 41s

JackieMarie

Sweet. So why don't you give us a little background about you and then tell us how you got involved with

1m 49s

Nate

Yeah, so I, I work in marketing, I'm the marketing director for steep, and I came to that position. I I'd been working in startups for a little while in, in brown. The Silicon valley area lived out in Santa Cruz, California, and took from my, from my job before this, I took a little break and decided to take a month or two to travel around the country, work on some photography and just mostly, you know, decompress from my last job. And while I was on that trip, you know, doing a lot of camping and spending a lot of time outdoors, a friend of mine started working for steeped coffee and he's like, Hey, I have this coffee for you.

2m 37s

Nate

That's going to be perfect for your travels. Let me send some to you, try it out, let me know what you think. So he did. And when I first got the coffee, I was like, oh wow. You know, it's essentially coffee and a tea bag. You just put it in the cup, dip it and dunk it. Let it sit at first. I was like, you know, this, this can't be incredible. If it was, it would have already been done before, you know, why hasn't this been done before?

3m 5s

JackieMarie

Yeah, it is incredible. It's so good. I never expected the quality was, and I'm a pretty, I wouldn't say I'm a coffee snob by any means. I mean, brand is olders. Although I kind of tend to buy this Walmart organic stuff that I've been finding, but, but I definitely like a darker coffee and definitely drink a lot of

3m 29s

Nate

Coffee. Yeah, yeah.

3m 32s

JackieMarie

Totally met my standards.

3m 33s

Nate

Abs. Absolutely. And, and, and I had the same thought going into, I, I w I wasn't expecting much, but then I was just totally blown away because not only was it just really good, but like from cup to cup, it was really easy to keep the flavor consistent. And, you know, especially when I'm outdoors and, you know, I don't want to waste time cleaning stuff up or rinsing stuff out. I had a French press before this, which was great, but, but this was just so much faster and less cleanup. There's no cleanup. Really. You just, you just throw away the bag when you're done with it. But yeah, it, it, it, it it's really makes great coffee and the best part about it is that like inside the bag, there's, there's no additives.

4m 18s

Nate

There's no like dehydrated instant coffee voodoo going on. It's just ground coffee inside the bag. So, you know, you're just steeping in it. And the, and the magic is actually in the filter to allow it to hold the grounds in the bag, wallet steeps. You know, if you just try that with a regular tea bag, it's not going to work. The grounds are gonna are gonna fall out. So, so yeah, I, I tried the coffee and then I started doing some photography for the brand. And then one thing led to the other. And after that, it was back in Santa Cruz and, and working for steep. It was, it was really, it, it, it kinda just fell right in place.

4m 60s

Nate

It was great.

5m 3s

JackieMarie

So my listeners are wondering, I'm sure they know I'm going to ask this question meet, are you a rock star millennial born between 1980 and 1995? Or you don't or you're?

5m 15s

Nate

I am a millennial. Yes, I am a, I'm a, a 1985 millennial.

5m 25s

JackieMarie

Awesome. I I'm working on a book called rockstar millennial, that the amazing I call you kids, because my stepdaughters are both millennials that I've interviewed, because I feel like you guys are socially minded and you're hard workers, and you have a bad rap. And all the ones I talked to you are some of the hardest working people I've ever met. I mean, may have like just incredible work ethics and they, and they care about the environment. And that's one of the things I love about this product, because I've worked so many places where those little cured coffee machines and they just drive me crazy. And like I did the first time I made it, I put it in my automatic drip machine.

6m 6s

JackieMarie

It just like in the little, you know, coffee filter things that I haven't just poured the water through it. And that was great. But then I wanted to try it the regular way. So I actually boiled water and put two bags in my Yeti mug speak that way. And I set the timer five minutes to make sure, and it was so good. It was way better than the Folgers that I had been drinking that morning and just a super easy, and I love being able to do that, you know, in my mug. Cause it just put the lid on top and it makes the cup out of that. Or I'm a very Microsoft now I'm a very mobile person. So having coffee to go for me is huge to just be able to like boil that water and not have to worry about anything and just put the tea bag in my mug and head out the door.

6m 51s

JackieMarie

And that is like, it's, it's so easy. It's so dreamy. And like all those stupid cured coffee machines with those plastic. I hate those.

6m 60s

Nate

Yeah. Yeah. It's that, that, that was one of our, our founder who kind of, you know, put all this together and, and did all the, the initial experimentation and kind of, kind of invented this. He, you know, he was the same way he was watching this single serve coffee pod wave kind of come up and he's like, man, like, look at all the plastic, you know, every time there's just this plastic shell that you have to discard and not only the plastic from the, from, from the pods, but also from the machines themselves, you know, those aren't recyclable either.

7m 46s

Nate

And, and, and, and the pods have gotten so out there that, you know, there's a lot of those machines out there. So, you know, he looked at that and he's like, there has to be a better way to have a simple cup of coffee, like a single simple mobile cup of coffee. And yeah, this is, this is what we came to the best part about the AR the steeped brewing method is that everything from the, you know, the tab to the string, to the filter, to the, to the bag that the filters in, it's all different degrees of compostability. So right now, as far as our certifications go because of the outer packaging is considered commercially compostable.

8m 32s

Nate

So you need a controlled, you know, commercial components, composting environment. And, you know, the only thing that makes that different than what you may have at home is that there's water and temperature being added to the, to the mix in a consistent way, our outer packaging. It's not quite to the point where you can throw it in your home composting bin yet, but that, that is definitely a goal that, that, that we're working towards. It's not like it's going to contaminate anything. It's just not going to break down at a speed. That's going to be, that's going to match everything else that's in there. But then as far as the inner filter, the grounds, the string, the, the tab, that stuff, you could actually put it in a home, a home composting environment, and it's going to break down.

9m 23s

Nate

So there's a little bit of a difference there. We're kind of working on both simultaneously, but it's really exciting, especially when you see people adopt this and, you know, people that have had pods, pod machines and whatnot, you know, they adopt this and pod machine sits. So, so it's, it's really exciting.

9m 44s

JackieMarie

Cool. Well, what else do you want to tell us? Do you want to tell us about the

9m 50s

Nate

Yeah, yeah, for sure. So our founders, Josh Wilbur, and, you know, he, he's kinda like this, this perpetual kind of tinker thinker, you know, idea, strategy kind of all wrapped up into one, but, you know, he, he, he looked at this as a, when he w when he brought the steep brewing method forward, it was like, okay, how do we not only do this as a company, but how do we, how do we can use this to contribute to the rest of the coffee industry?

10m 30s

Nate

And how do we use this, this brewing method as a way to, to give back, you know, to the things that we care about and that the company cares about, you know, how do we do essentially business without compromise? So that's kind of, one of our central tenants of the company is, is basically we want to do business and we want to be profitable and wanting to be good, but we also want to give back. And we also want to contribute to other causes that we care about. So one of the big parts of the company is our PACS for good program, where we partner with different nonprofits and allow them to essentially get a kickback from our sales to, to help them out as well on causes that we care about.

11m 27s

Nate

So, you know, as, as far as that goes, that that was a big kind of founding tenant of the company. Was that okay, if we're going to do this, we're going to give back as well, not just, you know, look at the bottom line and profit and all that other stuff, like, like we wanted to be, to be, to be active in, in, in that role, we're certified B Corp, which we were early on. So that that's fantastic. That's a, that's a benefit corporation. So basically our giving mandate is written into the bylaws of our company, essentially. So it's, it's about as far as you can go with, with giving tenants.

12m 11s

Nate

So John Jo Josh definitely felt that was super important, very, very early on, but then yeah, go going forward. So it's not just the brewing method that, that Josh has developed. It's also the packaging, and this is, this is the part where he gets really technical and really, you know, kind of interesting in that all the research that he did in order to essentially create this compostable packaging. And also our packaging is less use, it uses less material than most other compostable packaging.

12m 52s

Nate

So not only do you have to look at, will it break down in the hole, you know, sustainability, compostability conversation, but you have to look at, is there how much material goes into it, right? So you ideally you'd like it to compost, but also have as little initial material to compost as possible. So that's kind of what he achieved with this packaging, with the fineness of it, with the sealing of it, with the way it breaks down, because it's a funny problem, compostable packaging, because it's, it's essentially packaging. That's, you know, it's breaking down, you know, it's, it's breaking down when you hold it, but the trick is, is to get it so that it lasts for the lifetime, that it needs to protect the coffee and use the patch for the coffee.

13m 40s

Nate

And then when it's in a certain environment, it, it, the, the breakdown accelerates and it composts. So tricky problem. He got through all of it and, yeah, right, right now it's the, the goal, I guess, is to share this method with as many people as possible and not just, not just consumer customers, but also we partner up with, gosh, we probably have over 300, 400 roasters now across the country that we work with, where we, they send us their coffee, we package it in the steep brewing method and then send it back to them.

14m 21s

Nate

It's a co-branding opportunity for them. And it gives them an opportunity to participate in a method that's, you know, much more environmentally sound much more sustainable, super easy, super convenient, but have their coffee in it. So they get to have a piece of that. And then they also get a method where it makes it really easy for them to sample out their coffee, to send single cup samples to people, to, you know, and, and just sort of participate in that, in that single serve realm. So it's, it's been really fun. Like the collaboration part and the giving back part of my job are my favorite are my favorite parts by far.

15m 3s

Nate

For sure.

15m 5s

JackieMarie

And I saw on your website, like you also, like, do you work with like hotels or something? Cause there's another place that you see like that plastic, you know, and like, go see if they have a copy of maker in the room and it comes with the little plastic coffee

15m 18s

Nate

Things. Absolutely. It's

15m 20s

JackieMarie

Working to replace though.

15m 22s

Nate

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And it's funny that it's actually, it simplifies the in-room coffee process. Not only for the person staying there, but also for the staff, you won't believe how dirty the, the pod machines can get after, you know, that type of use that type of heavy, you know, day in and day out different people. And they're really hard to clean. So with the steep brewing method, all you have is, you know, the pattern is deeper impact and then water, you know, a, a hot water kettle. And then that can be used for the TMS.

16m 4s

JackieMarie

Be places could use it to, like, I just stayed at an Airbnb and Missoula, and it was just like, so heavenly to have the little coffee maker there, but that would have been in the event better solution. Like Airbnb might be somebody you should talk to about it. Cause imagine if they had like Airbnb coffee that they sent around to all the

16m 22s

Nate

Absolutely all

16m 23s

JackieMarie

Their different hosts, people could get it and they could get like their little name or something on there. They could design a little. And one of the reasons I switched to buying that are going to copy, I was talking about it at Walmart is because I did it in 20 with the 20 18 22, I don't know, like two years ago. And maybe it's been four years now. We quit recycling plastic. You know, whenever China stopped taking plastic in Montana. And I was just like, I hate those red folder cans. We have like my hands when I reuse them and we use them for compost and we use it, reuse them as much as we can, but with two pretty heavy duty coffee drinkers in our house, we go through a lot of coffee. And the only thing I hate about the folders, things is like the bigger ones are more expensive.

17m 5s

JackieMarie

You're forced to buy the smaller size container. And then, and so then I found this organic, supposedly we're getting coffee at Walmart that comes in like a plastic coated metal. I don't know. It seems like it's less environmentally hard on the, you know, at least it's not this big red plastic container open up. It makes a little bit less room and supposedly it's organic coffee. So I've been buying that cause it's, it's, it's almost, it's just a little bit more expensive than the Folgers, but it's not like something that's like, you know, $10 a pound or $15 a pound, which I can't afford. But anyway, but then, you know, then I'm shopping at Walmart.

17m 49s

JackieMarie

I don't want in it. And pretty much that's about all we have anymore,

17m 54s

Nate

That's it? Right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I live out on the coast here and that's, that's all we have.

17m 58s

JackieMarie

It was cool. I worked at, we were teachers and we couldn't afford to shop at target. So we had to shop at Walmart and that's basically where it comes down to. So anyway, so those are the things we love about this. And coffee grounds are so good for your garden listeners. I mentioned this already. I mean, my husband always talks about the three big views. If you're not going to save anything else, eggshells, banana peels and coffee grounds. Like those are huge for having your garden grow. And like when I in the classroom and I have a coffee maker, there's been a lot of classrooms where I've had a coffee maker right. In my classroom and there's always coffee left over. Sometimes. I'm like, why didn't even bring my cup in?

18m 39s

JackieMarie

But I pulled that right on my plants. Like I have never had a problem with plants, not only thriving, but I never had a problem with them dying from the coffee grounds. Like I think we're really good. Or just even the plain coffee. So in classrooms where I didn't have a sink, oftentimes that was the only liquid they got.

18m 57s

Nate

Yeah. It, it, it's, it's funny. We, we, we say sometimes that the biggest, the biggest consumer of coffee in America is the kitchen sink because you're like, everyone always has that, that half a pot left. I used to always have that afternoon. Like three quarters of the pot is left in there and it's burning and you just got, pour it out.

19m 18s

JackieMarie

I go to New York, my brother and my mom are both like, how can you throw that out? Save that for tomorrow for tea or something. And I'm just like, Nope, but

19m 27s

Nate

One

19m 27s

JackieMarie

Thing like coffee wise, it just doesn't do the same for me the next day. And I'm going to make a pot of coffee the next day. And so I might as well, just most of these, I drink it a pod. Anyway, if I'm more often too, like it's the second part. So I drink my first one instead of trying to make a whole nother pot of coffee I've been using, using the ones that you guys sent me. So why don't we tell listeners about the different flavors and brands? Cause there's more than the dark roast and the French roast. And there was a decaf in there and some other like breakfast blend, I think.

20m 5s

Nate

So we have everything it is, let's see, light, medium, dark, French, and even tide, which is the decaf. So there's five, the, the light roast is it's kind of a classic light roast. It's very bright, the light roast. So this is tricky. Some, some people out there think that like, oh, the darker, the roast, the more the caffeine, the lighter, the roast, the less the caffeine, that's actually not true across the board. And I won't get into the, the, the technicalities of how that, that all that can change basically.

20m 48s

Nate

But generally speaking, when you account for weight and, and there, isn't a great way to just like, you know, instantly measure caffeine levels. And they vary even within the same, the same bean, but you know, lighter roasts can actually have more caffeine content than darker rose. So the, the light roast we have is, is, is it's, it's, you know, pretty, pretty caffeinated. So you don't have to worry about that. Like, oh, I'm drinking a light roast and this isn't going to do anything for me. If you're, if you're in it for the caffeine, this one definitely, you know, it's got a lot of caffeine in it, but it's, it's, it's very bright.

21m 35s

Nate

It's, it's, you know, really floral. I like doing a light roast, like just to change it up every once in a while kind of, you know, not get stuck in the same, in the same roast all the time. Then we have our medium roast or our medium roast is our most popular, our California blend. It is, it's just your kind of your go-to. I I'd call it pretty close to like, you know, what could be called, like breakfast blend, I guess, but it's right in the middle of the road. It's, you know, it's the one that I drink the most. And it's usually the one where if you don't know which roast you want, go for the medium, start with the medium, see how you like it.

22m 16s

Nate

If you, if you like your coffee more bold and flavorful and darker than, you know, you go to the dark side. If you want to try a light roast, try it. I actually never tried to light roast before I worked at steep. So, so that was really cool. And that's the other cool thing about the method is that you don't have to commit to a whole, like, you know, a one pound bag of coffee. If you want to try something, you can just get the pack, you know, you can just buy a single pack, try it out, see, see what you like, keep going forward. Then we have our dark roast, which is our Odyssey blend. The dark roast is very, full-bodied obviously, you know, dark color, lots of boldness to it.

22m 58s

Nate

I do like that one maybe in the afternoon, maybe not evening, but like afternoon, like second cup, or, you know, maybe that after lunch cup of coffee, the darkness are really good. And then we also have our organic French roast, our Breakwater blend. And that one is very popular. That's probably our second, most popular. I would say it is USDA organic. And it is one that, you know, super popular for those that are just like, oh, I like my coffee black. I want it as bold as possible. You know, that that's, that's the go-to for there.

23m 40s

Nate

And then finally, we've got our decaf. Our even tide decaf decafs are really interesting. And this one is probably one of the best I've ever had. And I don't drink a ton of decaffeinated coffee, but if you want all the flavor, like, like really, really good deep coffee flavor, but no caffeine, this even tides the way to go. It, it it's decaffeinated using what they call a Swiss water process, which just basically allows the coffee to decaffeinate, but it doesn't take away any of the, any of that in flavors. So if you've had to caffeinated coffee before and you've been disappointed, I would strongly recommend trying the Eventide decaf because I really think it's like the hidden gem in our entire lineup, as far as compared to other decafs out there.

24m 37s

Nate

I really think it's a standout, but yeah, we have those five Glens and then we also work with a lot of roasters. We we've partnered with a whole foods. Whole foods has their own set of blends now available. And let's see counter-culture, we've got just, just a whole bit, like, depending on where you're at in the country, we were probably partnered with a roaster nearby and a lot of them will have the packs, you know, right by the register as kind of a grab and go, or they'll have our retail boxes displayed with the, and they come in packs of eight on those.

25m 24s

JackieMarie

Do you want to tell the smears about some of the cool stuff you guys have on your website that they can buy, like the coffee mugs and they're like, what was it that I saw? There was a standard year. There's like electric kettles. I don't know what that jet foil thing is.

25m 42s

Nate

Yeah. So I actually not on the portrait. I actually just made my coffee this morning on my Jetboil. So yeah, we've, we've got a lot of, a lot of different items on the website, so you've got the coffee and then you've got, you know, the gear to make the coffee. So, and there's not a lot required. Really. It's, it's just a method to heat your water, you know, at home, I would say my favorite kettle is the EKG gooseneck electric kettle. This thing's the single greatest little morning device. I think I've ever bought.

26m 22s

Nate

It's a, so it'll heat the water to an exact temperature and about 205 to 207 is, is perfect for steep coffee in tests that we've run, we've actually found that the temperature of the water is probably one of the most important things. If you're not in the right temperature range, you will, the coffee won't extract in the time that that you have there, that, that, that five to 10 minutes that you have it in your cup. It's not going to extract as much if the water isn't hot enough, if it's too hot, if you go, if you, you know, if you just pour just straight boiling water in there, it tends to burn the coffee.

27m 5s

Nate

I I've gotten a little bit of a harsh, some harsh flavors in certain roasts. When, when I, when I use water, that's too hot. So, you know, 2 0 5 to 2 0 7, if you don't have a thermometer, that's just off boiling. So, you know, if I don't have it tomorrow, like on the jet boil, I'll bring it up to boil, drop it off, let it sit for just a minute. And then I'll pour. And usually I'm pretty good there. So we've got the EKG kettle, which I'm great, you know, for, at home or at the office to have a kettle there, we've got our mirror vacuum insulated mugs. And I'll tell you if your struggling with your coffee staying hot long enough through the day you need one of these mugs.

27m 53s

Nate

Because if I, if I make my cup of steeped coffee, and then I put the lid on and I dip and dunk, and I put the lid back on the mug, I could come back to an hour later and it's still going to be like, you know, almost burned my tongue hot in, in these mugs. They really are amazing with how long they can keep, keep your coffee hot. And then finally

28m 16s

JackieMarie

Reached out to Yeti. Cause that's what my Yeti mug is like, like when I first I got it from my bank account, when I opened it, got a car loan and I was like a month or you go serious, no idea. Like I will never other way. They are amazing. They are totally like, your coffee is hot. I live in Montana. My coffee can sit in my car for an hour and I will go back out and it will still be hot.

28m 43s

Nate

They

28m 43s

JackieMarie

Would, they would be a good partner.

28m 45s

Nate

If, if anyone out there hasn't tried the, the double wall insulated, you know, Yeti mirror, you know, all the others, any of those, go try it because it works.

28m 58s

JackieMarie

Prizes, mugs look like they're like the same design.

29m 1s

Nate

Yeah. Yeah. It's a, we work with a company called mere, which is w which is pretty similar to Yeti and like, you know, cork, sickle, there's a lot of them out there, but the, the idea that they all kind of employed a different degrees is this, this double, double wall vacuum, insulated containers, vessels mugs, you know, you can't, you can't put them in the dishwasher, but, but boy, they do their job and they do it really, really well. So highly recommend those modes. We also have diner mugs, which, you know, if you've ever been your favorite diner and wished you could have a few of those mugs in your, in your cabinet, the heavy, you know, classic ceramic diver mugs, those are super popular.

29m 51s

Nate

Those, those fly out people, people really, really enjoy those and then pew a little logos on them. So he, yeah. And, and that's another fun part about the brand is, is that there there's a lot of, there's this, you know, kind of theme with all the, with all the artwork and the logos, and we get to use them in fun places. And yeah, it keeps it really interesting. And then we have the, the, the Jetboil system. So if, if you're on the go and you camp and you get out there and you know, you want a method for heating water and making your coffee essentially anywhere, I would highly recommend the jet boil.

30m 35s

Nate

It's more than just a camping stove. This is a system where the, the burner fits inside everything that you need fits inside the Jetboil canister. So it's, it's, it's very compact. You don't have to worry about losing little parts and stuff like that. You just need a can of, of ISO butane fuel to, to plug into it and fire it up. And you're good to go, but the jet boil will boil water, you know, almost as fast as the time that it takes me to get the water, I'll get the water going on, boil.

31m 16s

Nate

I'll open up my steeped pack and I'll get it in my cup and I'll throw a little sugar in there and, you know, kind of get everything prepped by the time I do that, water's boiling. Like, it's good to go. It's like, it's like, you know, a minute maybe on, on full speed. So, so that's really nice. I, I tend to keep that in my backpack with a couple of packs of steeped, just in a backpack that I keep in the car so that, you know, if I'm on the road, if I'm, if I'm doing meetings or, you know, I'm, I'm going from place to place, it's nice to show up somewhere, have a spare, you know, 20 minutes and just make yourself a cup of coffee, you know, good quality cup of coffee.

31m 57s

Nate

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And not, not just something that gonna, you know, get you by, like, this is something that like you can enjoy. You can kind of, you know, we talk about taking your moment, you know, that, that moment with a cup of coffee, that moment of reflection, just to pause, enjoy it, take it in and then get going again without having to, you know, clean up afterwards or anything like that. That's, that's kinda what this is about. So, so yeah, it's, it's super convenient. It keeps, it keeps it very, very mobile. Well, I'm a mobile girl, so it works.

32m 39s

JackieMarie

It works for me for sure. Well, anything that we haven't talked about that you wanted to share with us? I feel like we should have a lot of things.

32m 48s

Nate

Oh, let's see. Well, wait for this airplane to go by here, like right in a flight,

32m 57s

JackieMarie

You guys need like some steep t-shirts with the little logo of the guy drinking his coffee. Is that like a guy under water?

33m 4s

Nate

Yeah. The diver. Yeah. Yeah. A guy named Kevin, Ted Ted ball in Santa Cruz does all our art for us. And that's, that's very akin to his style, but we've, we've got the guy we've got the diver, we've got the octopus, we've got the Otter otters, my favorite. And we have, we have a bunch of others that are kind of just in the wings, sort of waiting for their, their right opportunity. But yeah, as far as, as far as steeped goes, oh, the, the final thing about, about steep, that's really cool.

33m 46s

Nate

You know, you start thinking about this and like, okay, they're, they're grinding coffee. They're putting it in these, in these filters, Steve brewing methods and they're packaging it well, how does the ground coffee stay fresh? Because, you know, I don't know if you've ever ground coffee and then let it sit for a long time, but go stale. You know, so what we do to give the steep packs, the maximum amount of shelf life, and to, to really give the experience when you open the pack, it's, it's like, it smells like a fresh ground batch of coffee every time is that we, we nitro flush and seal the packs.

34m 27s

Nate

So essentially when, when the filters are manufactured with the coffee in them, they immediately, and everything's on a timeline to, to keep the freshness as, as high as possible, but they immediately get put into their packaging. And then instead of oxygen that's in there, they're puffed up with, with nitrogen, which, which then freezes the clock kind of on the aging process of the coffee. And it just makes for a super, super fresh experience. Shelf-life is about eight months on, on everything. So, you know, and even then, like, I, you know, we, we test expired coffee all the time because we're always looking for ways to elongate that, that, that freshness time window.

35m 20s

Nate

So, you know, if you're a month or even two months out of expiration, the coffee's still good that it doesn't go stale that quick. So the, the nitrogen really does that for us. And the best part about that is it's, it's not like we're trucking in nitrogen tanks to do this. We actually have a, a generator that, that, that sucks it right out of the air and converts it, separates it. And then we use that nitrogen in, in our packs. So it's, it's a fully sustainable, fully sustainable process. One that I knew very little about before I worked at steep, but one that I now appreciate a lot. And it, it, it keeps our packs, you know, fresh without having to revert to any kind of like freeze drying or other process that will, that will alter the taste of the coffee in the end.

36m 11s

Nate

So we, we really try to approach the coffee in the, you know, in a, in a, from a, do no harm kind of direction, because we, we want the co like when we're working with roasters, they're very particular about how their coffee comes out in the end. So what, what, how we approach is like, we do not want to do anything to alter that flavor that they've worked so hard to get. So our goal is to basically with the steeped brewing method to produce a cup, that's the exact same taste as if you were to just take the beans, grind them up, put them in your French press, you know, make a French press, like it'll be identical to that method as far as the taste goes.

36m 56s

Nate

So we're, we're really trying to stay true to, to the freshness and to the initial taste intended by the roasters.

37m 7s

JackieMarie

Well, listeners, I hope you are going to get out there and share this like amazing product. Would your like favorite coffee roaster, or they have great lakes, little kits you can buy for friends for gifts. We'll try it yourself. Like, how do you, like, you know, can people buy this in the grocery store or can they only get it on your website?

37m 28s

Nate

Yes, we are available in whole foods across the country, under the, the whole foods market brand. We are available in a lot of, you know, small, independent grocers across the country. And you can also just get it off our website, steeped coffee.com. That's where you can get all the kits and the starter kits. And we also have a very, very good subscription program where you can lock in the price of your coffee and get it delivered right to your door when, whenever, whenever you want it, cancel any time, pause the subscription anytime. And then finally, we're all

38m 7s

JackieMarie

Environmentally friendly packaging. It comes in like the box and you don't have to worry about like plastic or peanut to get thrown away.

38m 16s

Nate

Yeah, absolutely. And you know, we're, we're always trying to improve that process to it. It's a, it's a thing that that's developing, not only for us as a company, how we approach it, but how the regulations on compostability and you know, what can be called recycled liberal and all that stuff is handled. So we're very much on the cutting edge of that stuff. And we're always trying to improve that footprint, reduce it, reduce the amount of material that we're using, increase the amount of ne sustainable materials that we're using. And really try to maximize that on all fronts, as far as you know, no, no harmful plastic waste going out there.

38m 59s

JackieMarie

Sweet. What was there? I'll tell you, I get emails at least every day when people pitching me stuff, I get stuff mailed to me all the time. And like, I only do interviews and bring people on with Scott that I feel like I would use that you would use, that you would enjoy. And I'm honestly telling you this puppy is delicious. So I hope if you're a coffee drinker out there, you'll give it a try and, and support these guys and, and get the, get rid of those Keurig coffee. If you have people that you work with, they use those tiered things, you know, give them cinema, STI package are going, see package through your office and let the other people try and see how good it is and see that we have an option out there.

39m 43s

Nate

Absolutely.

39m 46s

JackieMarie

Was there something you were going to save it? Like I interrupted you when I said nothing about the packaging.

39m 50s

Nate

Oh no. You're you're you're you're fine. I think what was I gonna say? Oh, I was, I was going to say we were on Amazon, but no big deal.

39m 59s

JackieMarie

Oh, you are okay. Yeah. I just got an email today from somebody who told me they're going to come on, I think and talk about how to shop kind of like get a green fascia. Like, how do you check out was on that gets like a, some, it's like some kind of like, what are those things called that come up in like your top of your website thing? And it, like, I forgot what you called it, but you can, no, it's not a cookie. It's like a extension.

40m 28s

Nate

Oh, a browser extension.

40m 30s

JackieMarie

Yeah. And like, it tells you it's like the product is like fair treat.

40m 35s

Nate

Oh yeah. Cool.

40m 37s

JackieMarie

It's called finch.com I think. Or something. And it gives you some kind of like green reading. If your product, your, it it'll, it's like supposedly gonna enable you to shop on Amazon guilt

40m 48s

Nate

Free.

40m 52s

JackieMarie

Yeah. So I have a love, hate relationship with Amazon. I'm sure. Like anybody else, just like, I don't know how you can shop there and I'm just like, you know, whatever,

41m 1s

Nate

If you're rural, sometimes it's, you know, it's what you gotta do.

41m 6s

JackieMarie

Sure. Out there. Yeah. Ever since our local saw shop was like, we don't sell malls anymore. You need to drive 65 miles to Kalispell, the chainsaw shop to get a mall, to split firewood lights. I was like, are you kidding me? And I went home and went right to Amazon. And ever since then, we've kind of like, we buy weed eaters from them. And just about like, I'm ready to buy a lawnmower. I mean, it's just like everything, you know anymore. I mean, I haven't been to the Flathead since before Christmas. I still have Christmas presents that need to go back in here. It is almost the end of February. That's where I live though. But my mom like the lead across you from her and she lives on long island, right in New York gets packages delivered every single day.

41m 46s

JackieMarie

They're going to that woman's house. So anyway, she can get this on Amazon. I was going to tell people to follow you guys on Instagram. Cause you guys have a pretty cool looking Instagram feed. I think you guys got to meet pictures there and of people traveling and just enjoying your coffee and going different places. And you know, being somebody who lives in Montana who's camp. I mean, we are basically in the backside of glacier national park. And I used to like, my unintentional claim to fame is crossing the continental divide over 400 times going through under the park. Cause I used to teach on an Indian reservation on the east side and just, I have certainly been in plenty of places where I have wanted a camping style.

42m 39s

JackieMarie

Like that stove thing you were talking about On the road and things like that. So I definitely never go anywhere without wool socks and hats and gloves and a headlight in my car. Oh,

42m 54s

Nate

There's just some, and there's some, there's just something when you're in those situations, especially when it's cold, where you have a hot cup of coffee, then it just, it just makes it all better.

43m 3s

JackieMarie

Oh yeah. Oh totally. I mean, it's just like, for me it was it's it's just, and it's such, it's a whistle. It's a cup of coffee. I really mean that listener. So thank you so much for sharing with us today, Nate, and just keep up with everything you're doing and hopefully the next time you come, if you come camping, we can meet up and share a cup of coffee and just take care of yourself.

43m 26s

Nate

Absolutely. Thank you so much. It was a pleasure being here.

43m 29s

JackieMarie

Thanks. Well, you have a great day. Yep.

43m 32s

Nate

You too. Thank you

43m 34s

4

Listeners. Are you wondering how you can grow your own healthy and nutritious food with confidence? Have you been frustrated as a gardener? Does the thought of weeding make your back ache? Have you tried to grow a garden before and found you can't even keep a plant alive? Does the cost of organic produce in the store make you cringe, but the thought of bugs in your garden make your skin crawl? Well, we have the answer for you. Free garden course.com. It is so easy. You enter your email, you will watch a video right there. You can get my organic Oasis checklist are essential tools.

44m 14s

4

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44m 21s

5

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44m 31s

0

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