Inspiring Conversations with Sean Murray of Rootless Coffee

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sean Murray.

Hi Sean, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstories with our readers?
Rootless Coffee Co., was officially launched on September 21, 2020. Both I and my business partner, Jono Diener, wanted to make craft coffee more accessible to more people. After working in the coffee industry for a number of years, we realized that people love the taste of craft coffee but are put off by the pretentious nature of the third wave movement.

Also being musicians and artists, we wanted to incorporate our love for a slew of counter-culture things into the coffee branding. All of our artwork is done by comic or multimedia artists, we pay tribute to our favorite cult tv shows and movies, and we partner with bands, brands, and non-profits.

One of our most successful partnerships is with a professional wrestler named Danhausen.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
It has been as smooth as starting a business smack dab in the middle of a pandemic can be! We are fortunate that the community at large has received Rootless extremely well and supported us along the way. There have been many growing pains, specifically how expensive growth is, but we absolutely love this wild ride and couldn’t be more grateful to be where we are.

As things began to open up more we saw our wholesale business grow rapidly. In the beginning, we had to rely solely on e-commerce, retail, and a few wholesale accounts which was tough. Wholesale is a large part of our business model since we don’t have a shop. We anticipated the slow growth of that sector but It’s nice to now have partners in coffee shops, restaurants, and bars serving our coffee.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Rootless is a craft coffee company for the counter culture or people who just want an awesome cup of coffee. We brand all of our coffees to be accessible and easy to understand for those not well versed in the third wave. Want a Grade 1, Natural Ethiopia Yirgacheffe with a cup score of 88? Sure, we call that Berry Kiss! Our staple roast is A Damn Fine Cup of Coffee, a nod to our favorite 90’s tv series, and it tastes exactly as described.

We want people to know that they can get ethically sourced, high-quality craft coffee without all the non-sense. We roast interesting and unique seasonals and also roast blends that taste incredible brewed in your Mr. Coffee pot at home. We work with restaurants, cafes, coffee shops, and bars offering extremely competitive wholesale prices. We’ve actually had a few of our partners tell us that their cost per cup went down after switching to Rootless (they were using bad generic coffee prior).

We work with amazing artists that design our bags and love collaborating with organizations. Coffee is a conduit to do cool shit and we are taking full advantage of it.

How do you define success?
Pay your people well, have fun, and give more than you receive.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Website: https://rootlesscoffee.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rootlesscoffee
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RootlessCoffee/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/rootlesscoffee

Image Credits
Hayley Seibel