Virgin Hill Coffee expanding into new opportunities
Virgin Hill Coffee Roasters is making some big changes. The business is buying the building that was owned and occupied by Eastern Townships Docks on Route 243 in Foster; taking ownership on November 12 and moving in starting November 15.
According to Tara Moar, who owns the company with her husband Matthew Greer, the new location should give the company more exposure in an area with more traffic. It will also give them an opportunity to open an “atelier de café,” Moar said, where people can stop by and check out some of their products. They hope to have that open by next spring.
“I think it’s the perfect spot for us,” she said. “We’re not on top of anyone here.”
The company is already making changes to the building. The 5,000 square-foot back room has been cleared out and insulated to make room for the roaster, which will be converted from natural gas to propane. The roaster was originally a wood burner, Moar said, but they switched to natural gas because it was available in Waterloo, where the operation is currently located.
“It’s a big investment,” Moar said, adding that it should make the company more efficient in packaging.
There will be offices and a conference room as well, and there is also space at the new site to store the signature Airstream trailer the company takes to events.
The couple grew up in Knowlton and went to Massey-vanier High School together. They started the company in 2005.
“We knew where we wanted to be when we were raising a family,” Moar said, noting that they both came from entrepreneurial families.
Early on, Greer worked at a roasting house and he enjoyed it, but he worked long hours. From there, the couple opened their first roasting operation in Waterloo, but the building was destroyed by fire.
“We lost everything,” Moar said, adding that insurance covered only 30 per cent of the loss.
Not giving up, they signed a ten-year lease on the building they are now in, in Waterloo, just about ten years ago.
The couple then thought about taking their coffee to the public, and they found a 24-foot 1969 Airstream trailer in Toronto. It had been gutted and it took three months to turn it into a coffee shop on wheels.
Their idea was to go to events and offer free coffee in exchange for donations to charity. The charity of choice is usually connected to the event. People would often donate more than the value they were getting, Moar said. Now they charge for the coffee but 100 per cent of what they take in goes to charity.
“This year we had a big push for the Shriners,” she said, explaining that their son spent some time at the Shriners hospital a few years ago, and they wanted to give back. They raised $2,000 asking for donations door-to-door and another $1,700 through the business.
Last year the company raised $15,000 for various local charities.
“With the Airstream, it gave us a chance to give back to the community that supported us,” Moar said. The business owner added that the company didn’t want to compete with the stores and restaurants who bought their coffee.
That, she explained, is why the Foster location is good. Although their building is across the road from Scotyz Terrace and Bistro, she said that the two enterprises could complement one another.
Attending events with the Airstream gives the company an abundance of exposure, Moar said. “They start with a love of the product, and the customers come to you.”
Although clearly making waves with the mobile shop, the end of that ten year lease also began to loom, and the couple began looking for a new home two years ago. Drawing on a connection with Gilles Nadeau, the owner of Eastern Townships Docks, Virgin Hill was able to work out a deal that was beneficial to everyone.
Looking ahead, Moar said that Virgin Hill Coffee Roasters continues to plan for a bigger future. The company wants to expand further to the south and the west to Montreal. It already sells coffee to a store at Jay Peak in Vermont.
Asked about competition from Green Mountain Coffee, Moar replied that Green Mountain, a company that has grown into a huge corporation, is on a different level than Virgin Hill.
“Their small market is huge for us,” she said. “And people don’t see the Airstream down there.”
They are also planning to have a coffee festival, hopefully in 2020 in Knowlton where they would invite competing companies.
For now, though, Moar said they have to concentrate on the move to the new building.
“We knew this could be a gem,” she said. “We’re not in it to fail.”