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Anyone spotting Piper Jones at the recent International Women’s Coffee Alliance convention in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, likely found her genuinely listening, deeply engaged in a one-on-one conversation, almost in awe of the person in front of her.
The trait has benefitted Jones through decades in the coffee industry, from a novice to an expert and mentor as head of the coffee-focused beverage consultancy TX Bev Dev.
“I know how hard the industry is, and when I meet people, I’m just gobsmacked by what they’ve accomplished,” Jones recently told DCN. “I’m like, ‘I know what you’ve done. I see your path. I understand the struggle and challenges and have been through every one of them myself.’ I know it without them even saying the words.”
Before working in coffee at the professional level — including leading Austin, Texas-based Kohana Coffee as executive vice president — Jones was the director of operations at an advertising agency. It was there that colleague Victoria Lynden opened a cafe, installed a coffee roaster on-site and started sourcing Hawaii-grown coffees while tapping into Jones’ operations skills.
“Getting behind the roaster was a profound experience for me. It was so exciting that I was almost giddy,” Jones said. “It was one of the coolest things I had ever seen; and with that, I did a deep dive into coffee. I didn’t come up for air for years.”
That business became Kohana Coffee, and soon after it began to supply the Central Market grocery chain while becoming the first local roaster at Austin’s flagship Whole Foods location. In between demo-ing coffees at those stores, Jones started making large batches of cold brew, which the brand soon bottled and sold to more grocery stores.
“There was nobody doing it then,” Jones said. “We started bottling it in the roasting warehouse where we were making it in big buckets… We got into the Whole Foods Southwest region. We couldn’t make it fast enough. We were working so hard with like two or three of us. It was just crazy.”
Soon, the company was contacted by a bottling company in California.
“I was like no, no, no,” Jones said of that initial contact. “I was cold brewing these beautiful Kenyans and Indonesian coffees. They were really high-end, and I was way snooty about it.”
Eventually, Jones did visit the production factory and its 1,000-gallon tank, and all her concerns about quality control were adequately addressed. The partnership allowed Kohana to scale production while entering more Whole Foods regions and ultimately providing a bottled cold brew product for nationwide retailer Trader Joe’s.
Despite such successes, Jones said, “We never were not in survival mode.”
While seeking more personal time and recognizing a need for outside help to scale, Kohana Coffee’s leadership sold the company to a Colorado-based company in 2021. The company was subsequently acquired by B2B coffee giant Westrock Coffee.
“We were in the trenches together,” said Jones of the Kohana group. “I would do anything in the world for those people.”
Today, Jones is sharing her experiences with scaling, selling to box stores, product development and more through her consultancy, helping to usher in a new generation of business leaders in coffee.
Here’s more from DCN’s recent conversation with Jones…
What about coffee excites you most?
When I see what other women are doing, I’m blown away by it. I am truly excited by the stuff that women are doing.
What about coffee troubles you most?
There are so many things I worry about. I worry about climate change, the next generation and what they’re facing, and what the current generation is already facing. I see challenges in every direction I look. When people talk about getting into the coffee industry, I’m just like, ‘Okay, you gotta really want to do this because you’re not going to make money. You’re going to work your ass off. You’re probably going to lose your savings, but it is going to be something that you love.
What would you be doing if not for coffee?
I would probably be doing something in food and beverage product development. I love research. I love development. I love being an operational person and solving problems. That’s the nerdy side of me, but I really like trying to figure out how to do something that we don’t yet have the knowledge or the know-how to do.
Is there someone in the coffee industry who inspires you? Let DCN’s editors know here.
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Jen Roberts Jen Roberts is a Paris, France-based writer and avid coffee drinker. She’s currently writing a book on women in coffee.
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