Interview: Chris Holloway, Co-Founder of Neighbourhood Coffee
Chris Holloway & the team at Neighbourhood Coffee
Chris is the co-founder of Neighbourhood Coffee, an independent coffee roastery, based in Liverpool. Ditto Coffee has sourced its coffee from Neighbourhood since the first shop was set up in Liverpool in 2018 - we seriously believe they offer up the best coffee out there, and our shops wouldn’t be the same without it! We spoke to Chris to find out what it’s like running a roastery.
What inspired you to set up Neighbourhood Coffee?
Ed & I were green coffee traders (green coffee is the raw, unroasted coffee beans), based in Liverpool, and we were helping roasters get set up and supplying them all over the UK… we figured that Liverpool deserved a speciality roastery, since it has a history that has involved coffee for decades. Circumstances conspired that in 2014 we launched Neighbourhood, and 6 years later we have an awesome little team of dedicated staff, and amazing customers spread over the UK. Including Ditto, of course!
How much coffee do you roast in a week at Neighbourhood?
Just under 1,000kg on a busy week, but like the whole hospitality sector, we’re feeling the pandemic’s effects, so the volume has dropped in the last 6 months.
What makes the Ditto blend particularly special?
It’s a perfect mix between being “safe” and being “adventurous”. Some espresso blends are so out-there that they dissuade customers from coming back, because the flavours are beyond their expectation and perception of what espresso blends ‘should’ taste like. There’s enough flavour and complexity going on that even a real coffee nerd would be hooked, but it’s approachable enough that anyone can get into it.
It’s also super versatile – of course it’s delicious on espresso, and in milk drinks and long blacks/Americanos but it makes a great filter coffee too!
Ditto Coffee House Blend, available at our London, Liverpool & Manchester coffee shops
In your opinion, what makes the perfect cup of coffee, and what’s your favourite way to drink it?
I don’t think there is a perfect cup – there’s to many contexts, settings or situations where coffee is involved, and it’s an incredibly subjective thing! Whether it’s sitting with mates having brunch in a busy lively weekend venue, or in peace & quiet early in the morning, or with a friend having a catchup, or even drinking it with the farmers who grew it – coffee is a tool for building relationships, so if it helps do this – it’s perfect. We always say that coffee is an incredibly affordable luxury; incredible wine has a high cost, as do several other food & drink products, but coffee is astonishingly cheap for the amount of distance it has travelled, and the amount of work involved. It’s also really simple to get into – a cheap cafetière or filter brewer, and you can start to explore the coffee world, and there are now so many resources available online for free, that it’s becoming far more accessible than it used to be.
I don’t have a favourite to be honest – I appreciate a fair few brewing methods, from V60 & Aeropress to espresso & milk drinks. As long as I can get a sense of where the coffee came from, and there’s a smile involved, I’m happy!
How many cups of coffee do you drink in a day?
3 or 4. Quality not quantity!
What’s your favourite type of bean/notes to include when you’re coming up with new blends?
When we’re blending, we try not to overcomplicate things, so generally no more than 3 constituent parts, otherwise they can get lost in the mix. We try not to have competing flavour groups – so if citrus-like acidity, then it makes little sense to add berry-like acidity or flavours too, because they may become indistinguishable. We like that you can taste a blend and hopefully be able to pick out what each coffee is bringing to the mix.
It’ll depend on the brief of the client (if it’s a shop) or on our understanding of the customer, so we’ll have an idea of what we want before we embark. Then it’s a case of finessing and testing! Of course, sometimes the rules don’t apply, and serendipitous stuff happens, and it just works!
How do you find the growers that provide your coffee beans?
Our aim is to build long lasting relationships with the growers we work with, which is easier said than done. We want to grow with people, to share any successes, and to be loyal, even if mistakes happen. Coffee is a seasonal, agricultural product, so there will always be variation! Our aim is to grow the purchase prices that we spend on coffee, so the farmers and communities benefit, but it’s a slow, gradual process, and bumps in the road happen.
We work with export partners who are in-country, and sometimes import partners too, as the coffee chain involves several stages. It’s estimated that over 40 pairs of hands are involved in getting coffee from the plant to the cup – we are towards the end of that chain, but if we’re going to work with people, we want them to share the values of integrity, transparency, and to do the best they can. That’s our aim, and we hope it shows. We’d love to do more, and as we (hopefully) grow, we want these partnerships and relationships to grow too.
We also get on planes and go to meet growers, as often as possible, but we don’t land in-country and then start asking around – we tend to do our research first, or to follow up one-off coffees we’ve roasted, and explore whether longer-term relationships may be viable and beneficial for everybody.
Are there any exciting new places to source coffee that are emerging onto the market?
Yes, there’s a few – China has been producing plenty of coffee for a good few years, but isn’t well-known at all. And on a totally different scale, I saw offers for coffee from Timor Leste, which I wasn’t aware even produced coffee! Along with new origins, we also get excited about producers experimenting with new processes, in order to showcase different flavours, and to increase the prices we can pay. We launched a processing experimental trial with a small farming community in Brazil last year, along with our export partner, and it was awesome to see them trust us that we’d buy the coffee, and that it was worth attempting. We both learnt loads, and the coffee was delicious!
You can enjoy the Ditto Coffee blend Chris talks about by visiting any of our coffee shops, or by ordering it to your home from our online store. Learn more about Chris’s work at Neighbourhood Coffee by visiting their website.