Chris Weaver - The Online Coffee Gourmet

Chris Weaver loved good coffee. He is a solid businessman with years of experience and knowledge. Weaver wanted to develop a lucrative online business. After careful research, and knowing he loved coffee, he decided to combine the two. The Coffee Gourmet is the result of that union.

As an internet entrepreneur, Weaver's data proved to him that the coffee business was highly competitive. However, it was also clear that there was room for a little rivalry. Because Chris did not operate a brick and mortar coffee business he knew he would have to seek out product and expertise in a different way than those business people who utilized that business model.

In the following dialogue the reader will see how Weaver set about obtaining the information he needed to be successful. The reader will also come to understand The Coffee Gourmet's secrets to customer satisfaction.

ABS) What did you do before becoming the Coffee Gourmet?

Chris) I took some college courses in business, accounting and marketing. I also graduated from a college with a diploma in travel and tourism. Most of my previous employment has been in the area of food and beverage and customer service, which has been a very valuable asset when starting an online business.

ABS) What event or events led you to the coffee industry?

Chris) When starting my online business, I had to figure out what would be the best product to be involved with. My extensive research kept bringing me back to coffee. I am a caffeine addict and drink up to 5 to 6 cups of coffee a day so I figured that it was better to sell something that you loved so much and believed in. My research also showed that even though there was lots of competition out there, there was room enough for more in the marketplace.

ABS) How did you accumulate the knowledge necessary to become a coffee expert?

Chris) I conducted a lot of research online and talking to coffee roasters that prepared our fresh roasted gourmet coffee for us. I must admit that prior to starting My Coffee Gourmet, I knew little about the coffee industry, but set about learning as much as I could so that I could meet the needs and expectations of my demanding customers. I knew that they would expect the best gourmet coffee from us, and I had to educate myself to do that.

I started out by researching the history of coffee, and came to realize just how steeped in tradition coffee was. I than learned how coffee is actually made, going right from the growing of the coffee all the way to being delivered to the customer. This was the basis for the article that I wrote for Ezine Articles.
While researching the benefits to ones health that coffee had, I found many studies that had been done on the health benefits of coffee. That formed the basis for my second article that I wrote on the health benefits of coffee. So many people do not realize that drinking coffee regularly can actually improve your health.

ABS) What steps did you take to begin your coffee business?

Chris) To begin my business, I conducted research on the coffee market and found that fresh roasted gourmet coffee was the way to go. I had to find a great roaster of gourmet coffee, and after trying some different ones, settled on one out of Round Rock, Texas. That was where our distribution centre was set up.

The next step was to design our website. The entire website was designed by myself and done by myself. I do not trust others to do the work for me. I wanted to make sure that it was done right, and the only way to do that was to do it myself. Over the past few months, the website has constantly evolved to keep up with the ever changing consumer trends, and the needs of our customers.

After the website was launched in we had to assist consumers in finding us. Picture if you will, the internet is like a giant desert. Our website is out in the middle of the desert. No one knows you are there. You have to help people find you in the middle of the desert so that they can purchase from you. Through advertising and the assistance of the major search engines, we are now being found in that giant desert called the internet.
Sales have increased steadily since we started and we have an excellent base of returning customers as well. It is a slow and steady process and I am very pleased with our results thus far, and know that it can only get better from here.

ABS) I love Columbian Supremo coffee. Define good Columbian coffee, in your opinion?

Chris) A good cup of Colombian coffee should be well balanced, with good body, acidity and flavor. This is seldom found in your regular "supermarket coffee" that you would normally buy. That coffee can sit on the shelf for weeks or even months and you would have no way of knowing it until you buy it and brew it.

The only way to get a "true" cup of Colombian coffee is to have it roasted fresh, as it is when you order from My Coffee Gourmet. The beans are roasted fresh and vacuum sealed immediately to ensure freshness. Best of all, it is shipped right to your door in a matter of days. No longer do you have to be "privileged" to get great gourmet coffee beans, you can have it shipped right to your door!

ABS) The other day I visited a local coffee house. A sign sat on the counter stating that the darker the coffee grounds, the more caffeine - is that true?

Chris) Well that is definitely a new one for me, I had never heard of that! But I conducted some very basic research and did find that different coffee blends did have different amounts of caffeine. For example, Celebes Kalossi contains 1.22% caffeine, Costa Rican Terrazu contains 1.35% caffeine and Colombian Supremo contains 1.37% caffeine. So I would assume the statement of the coffee house you were in could very well be true.

Of course it would not be true if one were to drink decaffeinated coffee, which we do offer at My Coffee Gourmet for almost all of our blends.

ABS) Besides Columbian coffees, what other types of coffees do you enjoy, and what kinds would you recommend?

Chris) Personally speaking, I do enjoy my morning cup of coffee. I mostly drink the Breakfast Blend that we offer first thing in the morning. I will make a pot first thing and usually drink two or three cups of it as I go about my daily business. After dinner, I always brew a pot of our flavored coffee.

My personal favorite is our Chocolate Macadamia Nut Flavored Coffee. It has a great chocolate and nut flavor and the smell of it brewing has me staking out the coffee maker just waiting for it to finish up brewing. The other flavors that I would recommend are our Mudslide, Irish Cream or Amaretto flavored coffees. For those who want flavored coffee after dinner without the stimulating effects of caffeine, all our flavored coffees are available in decaffeinated as well.

ABS) Do you have a certain person that you would consider a mentor in the coffee business, or a certain type of paradigm that you are following?

Chris) I must admit that I do not. I prefer to do things on my own, using my own experience, research and the feedback of my customers in determining the course that our business should follow. I have looked at my competition to see the way that they conduct business, as I am sure they do with us, but I always depend on my customers to tell me what I am doing right and wrong, and where we can improve. Our customers are always number one and are the reason that we are business in the first place.

ABS) What organizations are you involved in related to the coffee industry?

Chris) Currently we are not involved in any organizations in the coffee industry, but this is not to say that we will not be in the future. I am a member of newsletters that keep me up to date on happenings in the industry and read news feeds daily to keep up to date on the industry as well.

ABS) What are the future plans of the Coffee Gourmet? Do you have anything else to add concerning gourmet coffees, the business, or other people involved?

Chris) My Coffee Gourmet has grown in leaps and bounds over the past few months. We offer our customers not only Gourmet Coffee Beans but also Pickwick Tea, Frozen Cappuccino Mixes, Gatorade Drink Mixes, Automatic Drip Coffee Makers, Coffee Pods and more.

We are constantly researching new products to add, and respond to the needs of our customers who frequently ask us to add products for them and usually have them added within seven days of their request.

Also it should be noted that My Coffee Gourmet prides itself on its customer service. Emails to us are answered within 48 hours, and usually on the same day. If there is a problem with a customer ordering, they can expect a personal phone call from myself to assist them.

Every order is followed up with tracking information so the customer can follow their shipment right to their front door. I can speak from experience, that there is nothing more frustrating that sending an email to a company that never gets answered. That is one company that will never see a dime from me, and I refuse to treat my customers the same way. We also offer our customers a toll free number (1-866-429-4224) that they may use to reach us between the hours of 9-6 EST Monday to Friday and it will not cost them anything to phone us.

I should also give credit to my partner in My Coffee Gourmet, Carl Weaver, who has proven to be a valuable asset in the business. Carl is mostly involved in the financial aspect of the business but is also involved in the promotional and customer service areas as well.

My Coffee Gourmet is owned by our company C.C.W. Enterprises, which also owns We Have Picnic Baskets which offers consumers wicker picnic baskets, outdoor furniture, tailgating supplies and more.

found it interesting that Chris took a very studied approach to his coffee business. As a start-up business reporter in the past, I had found that business people who took this method were often more sucessful on the whole.

Other successful models, and one of the even more successful ones, was the person who had a deep love and talent for the product or service at hand.

It appears that the Coffee Gourmet has both.