We do everything possible to avoid Starbucks. Their coffee is good, but it’s expensive, and as every financial advisor will tell you: if you stop buying Starbucks, you’ll be a millionaire within a year.
We do enjoy good coffee here at the house. We’ll buy the $7-8/bag from the grocery store, which is fine with me. We aren’t weird about brewing it – we use a Cuisinart coffee maker and each drink 2-3 cups a day, whether they are all at home or taken on the road in a Yeti. We’ve also gotten into the afternoon cold brew, which is a nice pick-me-up around 3 or 4 in the afternoon.
I came to know Good Walk Coffee Company through some buddies. I’ve seen some of the DTC coffee roasters but never really paid much attention. I like these guys, as they have a golf angle that resonates with me and our house. I’ve gotten to know Founder Chris Mellow over the last couple of months, and he gets it. He’s the kind of guy you’d want to play a round with. He sent me a slew of coffee to try out, and I’m really impressed. It’s delicious. We typically go with the Dew Sweeper or Breakfast Ball during the week, then treat ourselves to the Club House on the weekends. It’s a little darker and more savory.
We’ve also really enjoyed the Nitro Cold Brew cans in the afternoon. Mrs. RCS will pour one over ice with a little half and half. She loves it.
They offer nine flavors of bagged coffee and a few of those in K-cup options. The site does a really good job of describing the flavor profiles, so you should be good to go. And don’t forget the Merch Tent. They have some great swag!
What’s cool about their setup is the subscription model. They offer a 10% break per bag for a weekly/bi-weekly/monthly subscription. The coffee costs a little more than what we get at the grocery store, but it is really good.
You’ll see an interview with Chris below, but first, don’t forget to use code RCS20 for 20% off your order! Get some…let me know what you think.
What is the history of Good Walk Coffee? Good Walk Coffee launched at the end of 2019. We launched with a belief that other people, like us, would have a special passion for both great coffee and golf, but hearing the feedback on both the quality of the coffee and the intersection of passion points was really inspiring. Launching a company a few months before Covid hit wasn’t ideal, but both coffee and golf enjoyed huge booms during the last couple of years, so for us, we’ve just kept plugging away at building a company based on our two loves.
What got you into the business? I had been working in Brand Strategy and Advertising, on the agency side, for over 20 years and was always looking for an opportunity to build my own brand after doing it for clients for so long. Living in L.A. since the early 2000s, I had a close-up view of the “third wave” coffee scene as it was taking off over the last decade. When I saw the industry was producing a ton of really great coffees, but roasters were having a tough time standing apart from each other, I figured there had to be an opportunity to make great coffee that came from a brand that stood for something more.
What kind of person is a Good Walk customer? Anyone who loves a good coffee and appreciates time spent on a golf course. We like to say that coffee and golf both have a lot of soul. There are rituals around both, the preparation, the act of drinking coffee or playing golf, and then the shared stories that come from bringing people together over a cup or on the course. We want anyone to be able to love what we do. Although we’re specialty coffee roasters, we’re not pretentious about the coffee and my golf game’s nowhere near good enough to be elitist about that side of our brand either. Although we do have a couple of serious sticks on our team.
What’s your favorite flavor? I’m lucky to get to try coffees from all over the world. I love a good Ethiopian coffee. Lately, I’ve been enjoying a lot of stuff coming out of Central America. We have a great Costa Rica. A new Nicaraguan coffee that is grown on a women-owned farm will be coming out soon around the U.S. Women’s Open. And we’re always finding amazing Colombian beans to use in our Breakfast Ball Medium Roast.
What do you like to do outside of running the coffee company? We’re a start-up so I’m always working, even when it’s just planning things through in my head. But my family is who I’m spending my time with when I’m not in the office or on the road. My wife and two kids are like partners in the business and are always giving me new ideas while we’re doing whatever we’re doing. I’m a big proponent of living a well-rounded life, and we do a lot of sailing, traveling, a little fishing, and back when I had more time, I’d use my private pilot’s license to fly us around Southern California to find great airport restaurants.
What’s your favorite golf course you’ve ever played? Whatever course I’m playing next! If that’s not a satisfying answer then I’ll say I love a course with great history. I was lucky to grow up at Oakland Hills C.C., in Michigan, and that clubhouse was like a museum. They just had that awful fire but it sounds like a lot of the historical items were saved so hopefully they can rebuild and preserve most of it. We have a roastery and warehouse in Hillsborough, NC, as well, so I love playing golf in North Carolina. Old Town Club is great. Mid Pines and Pine Needles are two of my favorites, as well as the newly restored Southern Pines.
What’s on your Spotify playlist? I think the 90s was one of the best eras of music, so my Spotify is mostly bands from then. But it’s an eclectic mix of everything from the Dead, early R.E.M., Nirvana, the Pixies, the Black Crows, Tribe Called Quest, Beastie Boys, The Roots, Biggie, anything Wu-Tang. I’d probably be sent in for a psych eval if someone really analyzed my Spotify library.
I’m a huge head, but I don’t understand the obsession with co-opting the stealie. It’s rampant.
2nd that